CaptainBeanfart

Assuming that the BBC is right; XG has us winning 3-1. It wasn't a smash and grab. Give Ismael some credit.

Not everyone connected to the club is a lackey or a stooge. Ismael doing about as well as can be expected with these players. A huge gamble was taken to replace experienced Championship players with cheap foreign imports and it has failed. The head coach can only work with what he's got. All this anger is directed at the wrong man.

This is so far off the truth. They were in the Premier League and had qualified for Europe the year that foreign owners bought them. We'd have to do something similar to be appealing to foreign money.

On what grounds are we planning to appeal? The precedent for action in these cases is clear. Reminds me of when we embrassed ourselves appealing the O'Brien and McGuire transfers. It sounds like they'll change the rules now at least, which is long overdue because they're garbage. But that's too late for us.

The issue is that there is absolutely no precedent for it, and nothing that separates this game from others that have had full replays ordered.

Not really! Just a hunch on what I have seen.

Miller in a two scares me. I'd be tempted to play a back three to try and mitigate it. Toth Miller Wharton Pickering Alebiosu Tavares Tronstad Ribeiro Morishita Ohashi Cantwell Something like that

Saka, Foden, Bowen, Palmer, Madueke, Rashford, Eze, Gordon, Grealish, Barnes, Rogers, Hudson-Odoi, Gibbs-White, Sancho, Elliott... Sure, something could happen to all of those, I guess!

De Neve reminds me of the period when we signed a load of random Portuguese lads, played a few games, and were never heard of again. I do not understand the signing at all. Henricksson and Tavares have more pedigree, Henricksson in particular seemed to be a fan favourite with great scoring stats for a midfielder. Hopeful that both will come good when they've adjusted to the league.

Because other teams get stronger, too. We probably overacheived last season as well.

If Baradji isn't fit for a while then we should look at a domestic loan, I don't see how we can justify another permanent signing there. There should be some young PL talent available as we near the window close, there usually is. We'd have to sell a centre back before buying as well, we've got four senior already.

Has Ismael been backed? This is all funded by sales.

This is the quote from Gestede: "We used to be over 2,000 minutes for Under-23 Academy players. Last 12 months, 142 minutes." So I guess any player under 23 (possibly including?) that came through the academy.

Maybe we're talking about different things, but this is what Gestede said: "We used to be over 2,000 minutes for Under-23 Academy players. Last 12 months, 142 minutes." They want to get minutes into the academy graduates to give them resale value.

Established players like Carter and Wharton won't count towards that figure, just like Travis didn't count towards last year's. It's a target figure for giving a pathway from the academy to the first team. Why would you count players in their mid 20s?

With Tronstad, Tavares, Baradji, Forshaw, and Montgomery for two positions, I don't see us spending money on the midfield. The only obvious deficiency now is up front. I don't think we have the funds to buy a guaranteed improvement. A last minute loan perhaps when clubs get desperate to offload?

That's not a his natural side. I haven't seen a single clip of him playing on that side. He's a left winger. We've had 20 years of wingers of being inverted and people still talk like it's a fad! I suspect we'll fill this space with a young PL loan. Hopefully it's more Elliott than Cozier-Duberry.

With the exception of De Neve at 5'11" (still quite tall for a winger), all of our signings are at least 6'2", including Henriksson if he joins. I'm sure that's not a coincidence. Expecting a very physical style of play next season!

It's a squad game, teams need more than one striker. He'll likely be rotated with Pedro, with Nkunku and Jackson leaving.

Substitutes are a huge part of the game now and often planned in advance. Managers frequently refer to "starters" and "finishers". Saying we should sell Gueye because he's not a regular starter is ridiculous. He can change a game when we need a plan B, and he's also incredible at defending set pieces if we're hanging on to a lead.

In the team that avoided relegation on the final day of the season. It's not a difficult argument to make really.

How can you say results were going backwards when his last tournament result was to finish runner-up? You can make all the subjective performance criticisms you like. But, objectively, results were as good as 2018-2020.

Surely the performances of the subs shows why he was reluctant? He deserves support next season, he's not the problem here.

1-1 away to a team that finished on 90 points is not a disgrace. The damage was done in January, none of the signings helped the cause and meant we were unable to get results when injuries and poor form happened. Kargbo and Dennis were dreadful today, Woodrow barely involved. Only positive is that Ismael is obviously a competent manager. The concern is what players he has to work with in August. Huge (and frightening) summer coming up.

I'm not sure about that. Listening to Gestede, the club wants to bring players in that they can sell on for profit and stop Venkys having to put money in to plug the gaps. I think we'll use loans as a last resort because it's dead money and takes away minutes from academy grads (again probably so they get some transfer value). I think Kargbo/Gueye/Ohashi/Ribeiro type signings will be bulk of the business because they offer the most potential in resale if they get one or two right.