I mean I've always thought that in the past but it's been so blatant for quite a while now it's coming over as malicious.

Yup.

Wouldn't be surprised. This has to be a(nother) line in the sand moment surely. Enough is enough.

We didn't want him originally, what's changed?

Forshaw. What a fucking joke. Chaddy?

I don't particularly rate him, everyone else seems to. That's cool. A lot of people didn't even rate Raya. Our former manager included.

Travis, Beck was top class, Brittain was very good last year, Dolan's decent at this level, Ohashi and Gueye are good value considering what we paid for them. Carter still has potential and I rate Scott Wharton subject to fitness. That do you? Edit: And Batth

Someone at the Club or connected with the Club is doing a cracking job of linking us to players we've no intention whatsoever of signing. Makes us look like we're doing something I suppose. Edit: Whoops Mark beat me to it.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/gareth-southgate-england-next-manager-35405149 According to the Mirror Southgate has offered his services to Poland. He might do well with a Country which has no real expectation of success.

You're entitled to that point of view, we'll see who's right this season. We don't exactly appear to be beating the suitors for Tronstad off with a stick this summer though do we? What is it they're not seeing either?

At this stage, no idea what you're on about, you're not even talking about the same thing that everyone else is on the thread.

Don't understand the obsession with shipping Pears out. Pears and Toth are both fairly crap but Toth is clearly the worse of the two imo. Neither are the answer. Have there been any concrete links to Pears leaving or are people simply speculating? Apologies if there have been said links and I've missed them.

Hee Hee Chaplin's inside the Oak Tree which is now a Tesco Express. There's a blast from the past. Not all things change for the better sadly.

He's a politician first and foremost who was brought in by the FA to pour oil on troubled waters after the Big Sam debacle. Did better than expected initially, healed factions within the squad and imo did pretty well in 2018 and 2020 apart from the crucial games where his lack of proactivity and in game management cost us. Should have been replaced after the Italy final for me. Heard a rerun of an interview between Simon Jordan and Allardyce recently where big Sam attributed Southgate's failings to lack of managerial experience. He said the longer you've been doing it the better you are at in game decision making.

That was John Butcher for the old timers. Not many modern keepers confident with crosses these days.

When you're in a hole stop digging. The only thing we can control is whether or not we reach a particular stage of any competition by beating whoever is in front of us. We have no control whatsoever over who we play. if we end up with an easier game at any particular stage than we would normally have expected because another fancied team hasn't performed and the draw hasnt panned out as expected, then most people would describe that as an element of (good) luck. If we meet a particularly strong team earlier than expected through no fault of our own then most people would describe that as being slightly unlucky with the draw. RF 99 has described it very well above. I think most people would describe draws over the years against Sweden, Croatia, Denmark, Switzerland, and Ukraine as extremely favourable. Italy were far from the strongest side at the time in 2020 and in the last Euros we were in a side of the draw which meant we avoided Spain or France until the Final. We also avoided Germany because they unexpectedly lost to Switzerland. You still have to win the games whoever you play, but to claim there isn't an element of luck involved at times is ridiculous.

I doubt we'll be selling many female shirts this year!

I know it seems to have been popular in general - I just didn't like it at all.

I agree........ But......IF we played well and got knocked out in the semi final or were losing finalists, I wouldn't necessarily consider that a failure for his first tournament bearing in mind he would have either equalled or surpassed anything Southgate achieved at the World Cup.

"Full kit wanker" Love it! That deserves a new entry all of it's own in the Oxford English dictionary this year. Adj: Elderly male wearing full soccer kit with neither the looks nor the physique to pull it off.

Just out of interest does anyone know how many times we actually wore that horrific pink kit last season? It cant have been many. I hated that particular kit but in general it shows how much the fans are being taken for mugs when they are expected to shell out another £60 for something thats used what, 4-5 times?

*cough* Kargbo.

Yes I do think he can get us to (at least)the last 8 I'm not too concerned at the moment, the last couple of games will probably have been a bit of an eye opener for him and by the time the tournament comes round I'm sure he'll know his best X1. I just don't agree with comments like "If he doesn't win it he's failed" when Southgate never even got us past the semi finals of the World Cup. If he were to have 4 cracks at winning something and came up empty handed like Southgate then I'd probably concede he'd failed.

I'm not actually sure it is cheaper to fund a League 1 side. Didn't someone post a table the other week showing the massive hit in TV revenue you take if you get relegated? Difference was just over £1m instead of £6m or £7m from memory. What they would probably ideally like is to stay bobbing about in perpetuity in the lower reaches of Championship using academy kids and cheap loans. Unfortunately that won't happen as other Clubs have ambition and try to improve instead of treading water or regressing at a rate of knots like we are.

I'm reminded of the character in the waistcoat in The Fast Show who always had impossibly fortunate stuff happening unexpectedly to him and ended up by saying : "Which was nice!"