Talking about his actual value (at the time) to anyone who can spot a player, rather than his market value. I feel we got short changed on the latter by a good 5 million or more though. But we're weak assed negotiators.

So that would have been in the summer of 2022, when JDT had just arrived. I can only imagine what he was thinking.

Leeds aren't one of the biggest clubs in the country, they just have a lot of fans, and Brentford play a whole division above them.

And we got a good 10-12 million less than he's actually worth. Think we all know what the difference is.

Once the club is in the hands of new ownership, which generally doesn't take that long with football administration, I'd expect most of the old jobs would be recreated, and some new ones. If we have owners who can get us back to the Prem, there would then be far more jobs than there were before.

Being sceptical that it's true is the only reason I didn't ejaculate reading that.

If only Venkys were going to suffer the same fate this summer...

I actually think that's a horrible start to the season. I detest playing promoted sides at the start of the season. They're on a bounce, highly motivated to prove themselves, and often underestimated. They seem to start seasons with upsets more often than not. Then Norwich away for the second game is tricky, and I expect the Dingles to bum us at that point of the season when we'll probably have only brought 1 or 2 players in (potentially none...). I can easily see us coming out of the first 4 games with perhaps a point or two, potentially.

Gallagher is 2 inches taller, so his ceiling is probably higher.

I don't think Wharton is getting any game time at this tournament unless there's a major midfield injury crisis. So far, TAA, Gallagher and Mainoo have all been preferred ahead of him to play alongside Rice. Now we're in the knockout stages, there'll be no 'risk-taking' by trying someone with 30 minutes of international experience in a friendly. If Southgate had any intention of playing him, he would have got on the pitch against Slovenia when the stakes were lowest.

Yes. But purely because I'm a fan.

Ours was an incredibly shit group, stunk up the whole tournament - 6 games, 5 of them draws! 😴 The only other result a 1-0. No game involving more than 2 goals total, no side scoring 2 goals in a game, no side scoring more than 2 goals in total in the whole group stage. Utter yawnfest.

A genuinely cracking shirt as well. The picture of the new shirt...not particularly cracking. It's a bit like if you ordered the 94/95 shirt off Wish.

Three freshly promoted teams plus ourselves in that race. What's the betting we finished last out of the 4?

Apparently he was eligible for England schoolboys because his school was in England and that's how the rules worked for schoolboy football. I looked it up before making that post and apparently he was never eligible for the England senior team.

Little shout out to Albania. They're absolute minnows and got drawn in the group of death, with three sides who have been contenders for top titles in recent years. Somehow they came out with a draw and only lost their other games by a goal. Great achievement for them.

You can never write them off. A bit like the Germans, even when their team doesn't seem that strong, they understand the game, the strategy and their jobs on the pitch and they stay focussed. England are missing these elements. We really should consider a foreign coach again, even though Chaddy will have an aneurysm.

I wasn't talking about the 'morality' of it, just the reality of it. I don't think multimillion pound clubs operate an ethnic discrimination policy, and nor should they. As long as it's within the rules, clubs should find the best young talent they can, regardless of where it's from. I'm sure you weren't complaining when Duff broke through.

Everybody on this board and their dogs already knew this without you needing to say it Chaddy. We could release our entire senior squad on frees and you still wouldn't think we're going down. I can say with absolute certainty and without needing to ask you, that the last three times we went down, you thought we wouldn't go down.

The training regimes shouldn't really matter much in theory. Talented Scottish youngsters should be getting picked up by English sides who have the resources to develop them. The reason must go well beyond that. Perhaps the English clubs are looking further afield whereas they used to look more to Scotland, but that doesn't seem to have affected the England side. English clubs probably have better developed scouting in England than in Scotland but I doubt it's by orders of magnitude. What you say about 8 Celtic starlets going to better academies should be a positive for developing Scotland internationals, but you don't seem to think it is?

As far as I can see, Grealish never played for the Irish senior side. In fact it seems he repeatedly rejected the offer to do so well before he got his England callup. Rice played in three friendlies. I'd say it's pretty clear these very much English lads only played youth and senior football for Ireland because they didn't know if they were going to get to play for England. I doubt anywhere near as much work on their development was done at Irish youth level as it was at their English clubs. Honestly, no offence but I don't think you're in any position to lament it (I know you said you're not complaining), although I get why you'd wish it was different. These lads were only even available through a bit of a back door clause, the same clause that has allowed a lot of definitely English lads to play for you and improve your side. At the end of the day, if someone is English and has Irish grandparents, the only way you're going to get them playing for you is if they don't have enough faith they'll be able to play for England. And that works well for those players and for the ROI team. I can't think of any examples where it has gone the other way, and someone who is clearly Irish but has an English parent or grandparent has gone to play for England. The system works very well for you with no real downsides. It's not the reason your international side is poor, you already identified those reasons (plus small population). You did have a nice patch in the 00s wasn't it? With Keane, Duff, Given. All players developed in England, two of them at Rovers actually. Maybe those days will come again at some point, the Irish can clearly produce good players, but Ireland really needs to work on popularising their domestic league and strengthening development infrastructure. Kane and Rooney are just two more examples of very much English players. Of course they chose England. Even if Ireland were as good as us I'm sure they'd have chosen England. Just the fact they could have played for Ireland doesn't mean you have any entitlement to them. Conversely I could point out how Bale could have played for England, and I was going to say Giggs too, but apparently he was never eligible (think he would be under current rules though). One or two of them in what is traditionally our weakest position and England might have actually won something!

Didn't he only sign his deal here like a week ago?

You're putting words in my mouth - I absolutely do think the squad needs major surgery. But if you're shocked by something that happens every year here, and has happened at most clubs in the league this year, you're very, very easily shocked. Like you, I think we will go down. Because I fully believe we won't rebuild the squad as much as is needed, so I'm not shocked here whatsoever.

No you're thinking of Tyler Morton games.

This is a good post but your examples of Rice and Grealish are strange ones to pick given your other points. Yes they have Irish heritage and played in the ROI youth teams first, but they were neither born nor developed in Ireland. They'd only qualify through grandparents, so it has nothing to do with Ireland's domestic league etc. They didn't 'come through' in Ireland.