coalman

If only he was half as good at defending as making pantomime joining videos.

I was particularly impressed by the Spanish FA releasing a statement saying the player said it was consensual. Only to be contradicted by the player. Then his defiant victim speech was a work of art. Either of which demonstrate a degree of unprofessionalism and tone deafness that should preclude him from any leadership position. All it would have taken would have been "I got over excited in the moment and behaved poorly. I'm sorry for taking things too far.". He may still have wound up having to resign but at least his mum wouldn't be live streaming herself refusing to eat.

He's only signed Manning so far and he's slotted in ok. Not sure how real the link to Piroe ever was except in our heads. Wood fits the profile of the kind of centre back we should be looking at. I don't care where we sign the players from as long as they improve the team.

We still have a team capable of killing the championship. We've got 10 out of 12 points despite learning a new system and first team uncertainty. Our loan signings seem smart. We've got talented kids ready for their chance. We're creating chances. Given the dross we saw the last couple of seasons then having a big reset is not a bad thing.

Schneiderlin agreed to stay for one more season and he was a pro about it. He's a rare example of this. Van Dijk was not a pro about it. His performance dropped after we turned Liverpool down initially because they didn't meet our valuation then they came back three months later. Martin said some players decided to stay (eg Charly) which is great. If the player doesn't believe in what we're doing we can't force them. If they're not committed then they won't perform. If we keep them it has to be their choice as well. Even Le Tissier came close to leaving but it was his choice to stay - not ours to keep him.

In any profession someone who wants to change jobs can change jobs. People are not chattel. As a manager you can choose to part on good terms or not. The way you handle it has a knock on effect beyond the person leaving. I also doubt the club would do something in the player's interest that wasn't in its own interest and vice versa. Everyone takes care of their own interests and those are hopefully aligned while a player is at a club. I get it's frustrating that so many players are leaving but our squad was (is) too big and it's better to have players committed to the cause than whose hearts are elsewhere. This is as true for Man City as it is for us. The only difference is they can throw money at the problem but even then if a player wants to move on they will - for example Gundogan this summer.

There has to be a sane way of him resigning or getting fired without the whole country going up in flames.

Rubiales mum has gone on hunger strike over the treatment of her boy as well.

I'd be interested in seeing how Mara fared with a run in the side. And giving AdamA a run in the role behind the striker. For all his faults that finish on Saturday was clinical for all that I think everyone was confused as to where his first touch was going

I'd be ok with that - it would mean ABK and Sulemana staying which could be huge.

Good to see this. Will be interesting to see where he fits into the midfield. Is he competing with Charles/Downes or Alcaraz/StuArmstrong?

Given that there's no topic for this yet I'm going to put my perfect match day thread record on the line. We've had a decent start, unbeaten in the league but will the end of the transfer window see a vastly reduced side or will we continue to compete? Can we get a clean sheet? Will we finally sign a striker? Beginning of a tricky sequence of Sunderland, Leicester, Ipswich and Leeds which should go a long way to answering whether we're getting promoted straight back up. Bazunu KWP Bednarek Holgate Manning Charles Downes Edozie Alcaraz Fraser AArmstrong Given our current run of results I can only predict a 2-1 win. Can see Alcaraz getting on the scoresheet and AArmstrong to continue his goal beastery.

I could see myself saying that, yes.

I would hope we'd learned our lesson about recruiting from Genk. Paintsil has end of window panic buy written all over him. Particularly if we see it as a way of recovering some of the money we splashed on Onuachu.

He could. I would love "could be brilliant" to turn into "is brilliant". Both he and Sam Edozie deserved more minutes last season and a run in the side to establish themselves.

I'd include Diallo in that list plus Bree, Lyanco and Sulemana as well. I stated that the VVD purchase was something that had been linked for a while. Koeman did come in with his own list of players he wanted. Or at the very least we had plans in place or a combination of the two. That window was somewhat miraculous after we were gutted bringing in Pelle, Mane, Soares, Bertrand, Tadic, Forster, Alderweireld , Long and Gardos - nearly all of whom had a big impact in our golden period. I don't remember us missing out on a string of targets for the same position. This time I'm hopeful that we'd walk away rather than panic buy someone but I also had high hopes in the January transfer window.

I guess it depends on your definition of panic buy. How would you describe it?

VVD had been lined up for ages. Mane joined on 1st September though not sure how much of a panic buy it was because Koeman clearly had a list of targets in mind when he joined.

Fairer to say all our expensive last minute panic buys have been fails. The only one who might break that sequence is Sulemana and the jury is still out there.

Are you sure that was Stephens? He went off after 25 minutes. We didn't score until the 30th. They didn't threaten until they scored shortly after.

Now FFS can we defend

Lovely goal

Lucky lucky lucky

Edozie!

Downes on for Stephens