Wall Writer

That goes for the whole team. It's like watching schoolboys play. When they get the ball, it's head down and run forward. When we don't have the ball it's just chasing the ball.

We need to dictate the tempo a bit more here. All a bit frantic at the moment, and I feel that's playing into their hands a bit.

They're gonna be trumpeting players like this till Deadline Day. Best to ignore it.

That's a low bar. I'd like to see double figures.

Intelligent player that Brainthwaite.

We obviously lack quality in the final third, but I think the effort was there, which after last week was the minimum required. The result was disappointing, but if we continue to play like that, we will get better and our luck will change. But it can't be that we have one match where we create but fail to take our chances, then one week where we fail to turn up. There needs to be a consistency in the level of performance. The young lads did ok. Branthwaite did enough to bench Keane for the foreseeable. Dobbin was ok. Chermiti had a good cameo. We'll need luck to be on our side with injuries this season cos the squad depth is not there.

We're definitely going to lose if Pickford is playing left keeper.

Sorry @duncanmckenzieismagic, it's not a jab at you. I just really dislike the Echo website. I understand they have to make ends meet with all the ads and clickbait, and just the general churning out of content - but I just think it's an awful site. As for the article, an article of 573 words, 404 of those words (70%) were directly taken from another newspaper. Smells like plagiarism to me. ...btw, yes I did calculate that just to try to prove a point!

Is that what counts as journalism these days? Basically copy-and-pasting what someone's written in another newspaper and presenting that as news. The original and full article can be found here* without the annoying ads and clickbait. Anyway... Can't argue much with what he's saying. We're an atrociously run club. I fear that if we end up in a relegation fight again things could get very ugly indeed. * try deleting cookies if you can't see the full article.

We can argue the toss on definitions of what a striker is or isn't, but I think what we're talking about here is a centre forward. Someone who can lead the line, hold the ball up, bring in other players, be a target man and ultimately score goals. Who on that list can you say is going to get us say 15 goals? Who can properly fill in for DCL if/WHEN he's injured? Who's capable of being a target man for the team? Maupay - a proven striker! Proven that he can't lead the line on his own. 1 goal last season. Dobbin - showed really good flashes of potential in pre-season, deserves a chance in the team. Scored 3 goals for Derby County in League 1 last season. Cannon - scored 8 in the Championship in 20 games. Not a bad return, but too early to say what he can do in the Prem. Again, deserves a chance - if he stays. However, would be misguided to say he can keep a struggling team in the Premiership at this stage of his career. Chermiti - totally unproven, 19 years old. Probably won't see much of him this season. Danjuma - Perhaps the only one on that list who could get close to 15 goals, but not a real centre forward McNeil and Harrison - hopefully, can get us 15-20 goals between them, but rather from out wide. --- This guy Beto quite probably is not the next messiah, but from all the players that we've been linked to for this role, he's the stand out for me. Big, strong, pretty nippy, can go past a player, and he's still quite young (25). That's the profile we're missing. Would also offer decent competition for DCL if and when he's fit. If we end up losing out for the sake of a couple of million, then end up pissing that money up the wall with a change in manager midway through the season, seems a bit pointless to me. Because let's be honest, if we haven't got an out and out striker in by the end of the transfer window, then we're in for another season of the same old rubbish we've had to put up with for the last few years. I really cannot abide it when people make the same mistakes expecting a different result.

If we don't get a decent striker in, especially for the reason that we can't afford it, then it's gonna cost us more in the long run. And not even in the long run! Without a decent striker coming in we'll be sacking the manager again come Deadline Day in January. That'll be another season and another how many millions wasted on manager payoffs. Oh, and add on top of that relegation. Get the lad in. Come on Moshiri, you promised us a striker months ago!

If you end up in Poland let me know, we can go to the pub and not have a drink together

Drinking in the week again Matt?

Probably saw the shambles at the weekend and thought nah!

Apparently, Bill already call about him. He said "Can I have one of your Balde's?" Some french guy answered, "There no Balde here!" So he hung up.

State of this club we'll probably end up with his brother Gari and a cold cup of tea.

With DCL out again for a while we need someone better at leading the line than this lad.

That might see him out for 6-8 weeks I reckon.

I agree. It's plain as day who's to blame for that shambles at the weekend. We've got a fair few out injured and hopefully a couple, including a striker and at least one CB coming in. But it's the players who need to put the excuses to bed and start getting their act together. Too many managers have come and gone for sack the manager shouts.

I'm not sure where I should post this, but as its a general rant maybe here is best. If yesterday wasn't a wake up call then I don't know what can be. To see that team fail to turn up once again makes me feel sick with rage. How many times have we seen performances like this over the last two seasons, and for the players and managers to come out after with the same old platitudes 'Oh, the mentality wasn't right', 'We weren't good enough', 'Not enough quality.' They are supposed to be professional footballers. How can they be using the same excuses for what'll be the third season now. I'm not accepting them. If they can't get themselves up and go out there and perform like professional footballers every game, they don't deserve to put the shirt on. If the effort's there and we lose, fair enough. But at the end of the day, they are not getting paid millions to stroll around the fucking park on a Saturday afternoon. Go and walk some fucking dogs. We're renowned for our away support, because our fans turn up for every game! The least the players can do is resiprocate that dedication. To come out after the game with the same lame excuses is unacceptable. I don't whether it's the culture at the club? They put out these behind the scenes videos of them training and these goofy interviews, where it all seems pally-pally, and we're all good mates, and we're all having a nice time. Fuck that shit! I'm not arsed what Tarkowski's favourite curry is or who's got the smelliest socks. Or whether Michael Keane chips the keeper in training when he then fucking passes the ball straight the other team in our own box doing the match. There's no seriousness in this squad. In any other line of work, if you consistently fail to show up for work as they have done you are held accountable. I don't see why the players should be treated any differently. And it's obviously the players that need to be brought to account here, because we'd have plenty of managers come in and the result is always the same. The manager get's thrown under the bus, and the same excuses keep getting rolled out. --- I've been relatively optimistic with the transfers that have come in so far, and Danjuma was probably one the better performers during the match. But when these transfers come in it's always the same old spiel about how excited they are to play for such an historic club. A club with a rich history, blah, blah, blah. But I wonder whether the players, with their match day bonuses safely stashed under their mattresses, sleep well at night knowing that the team of this era, will go down in that history as one of our worst ever. --- As a club we can't keep living in the past. It's almost thirty years since our last trophy, and even longer since our last great team. We might have shiny new stadium on the way, but if this club is to continue to be a great club it's in the here and now and it's written on the badge. What these players need to realise is that it's not that they're paying for an historic club, but that they are playing for a club whose team goes out there on the weekend and puts everything into performing on the day. Because that is the 'best' of which nothing else is good enough.

Twist

Great assist from Keane!

Looking at the benches, it's embarrassing - they've got Diego Carlos, Coutinho, Tielemans, we've got half of last year's Under-21's and Maupay.

Onana the onanymous today!

Second best in every area. Late to second balls, slow getting up the pitch.