ant

Bruce Rioch. Kit Symons. Matt Ritchie. Theo Widdrington. Tom Cleverley.

Assuming we were told at all (and presumably hidden deep in a novella of T&Cs?) that's a sneaky change to the established norm. I've always used the previous season's credit for cup games in the following. One thing the club is extremely competent at is erasing goodwill. 🙄

Bluntly I do think he's gone missing on occasion, and there's likely to be some 'he's leaving soon, but overall been ace, so we'll be kind' revisionism. But Kyle's a fantastic, positive player that reminds us we can get it bloody right, now and again. Whether he failed to get a move away last summer or chose to dig in, his level of professionalism was above reproach. That he made the Championship team of the season is all you need to know. There's few of the current lot that I'll miss; KWP is one of them.

2 points from 4 games, with 3 goals scored? Steady on, now. 😳

Whilst that's a comforting thought, the fear's got to be how many we'll actually manage to offload... Can you imagine teams handing over actual money for some of the dross contracted to us? 😬 The talent pool's diluted further and further every season under SR...

Having arrived in an uncharacteristically timely fashion, it's the first time in a long while I've witnessed the shooting drills. Fucking hell. 😂

Earlier I put Rusk's press conference on as background noise, but ended up attentively listening to most of it. He speaks well. Certainly seems to 'get it', in terms of the common, obvious discussion points surrounding us. If nothing else it'll be interesting to see whether that translates to the way we play or not.

On one hand, I'd be lost without it. On the other, this is the 3rd or 4th consecutive renewal where I've seriously questioned it. And do I really want to hand SR more of my hard-earned to squander? Hmm.

Much of the board attends home matches, no? All and any ire should be turned towards them. To a man they have utterly fucked it, or presided over those that have. Awful, amateurish decision after awful amateurish decision, with a bottom line of 13 wins, 15 draws and 60 defeats at Premier League level; a win rate of 14.8%. They're shysters, and should be ashamed to show face.

Got to be Lallana, hasn't it? At least Brereton-Diaz and Sugawara have some form of sell-on value, no matter how meagre. Cornet was quickly off the wage bill, and Grønbæk will be similar. Nobody expected significant minutes from Lallana, but he's only accumulated 444 - less than 5 full matches. With incredibly limited impact within that. No amount of 'great to have about the dressing room' (🙄) makes up for that.

Send a few hundred of our lads to this and get them to do everything possible to rile up the Spurs lot. They boo their team from the first whistle; Postecoglou finally snaps, and instructs the players to stage a sit-down protest. We eventually squeeze the ball into their empty net on 90+2, securing the points. Season over, and we can forget it ever happened. Easy.

Careful now, that's the sort of extrapolation that led to signing Brereton-Diaz.

That was a golden chance to stumble over the lowest possible bar. But of course we spurned it. This is one of the most gutless 'top' level sides in history.

RE: season ticket holders not bothering, it's my step daughter's birthday today - and it's only because she's a little 'un (and will be in bed by the time I leave for the match) that I'm not staying home/prioritising that. Rightly or wrongly, this season has made me re-examine my relationship with football a bit.

I was shouted down last summer for suggesting we should disregard sentimentality, thank him for his service and look to sign better. Seemed patently obvious that whilst he'd played a role in the Champ, his days at the top level were numbered. But what do I know?