Spudulike

Hi lads, Long time no see as it were (long story and now's not the time or place). Just a quick message to say I can imagine what this morning's news means to you all. Anyone with half a brain knows that the events in Russia are not a reflection on the club nor the fans, or the owner. Personally, I'm very sorry you are in this situation - you're a great bunch - and hope it'll soon be resolved. You'll defo get through the situation, even though things seem bad now, so hang in there.

A good start for United, no doubt about it. I won't worry about Lukaku until he becomes consistent, however. If he scores in his next outings, I may revise my view. However, Matic is more of a worry. He's brought a coherence to Utd that they've missed in recent seasons. He wasn't cheap but by God he looks great value for money. An ok start for us. It's hard to gauge how good we are as Newcastle are not the strongest opposition. I feel a bit sorry for Rafa tbh; North East clubs still struggle to attract players.

A good point. I will not take anything for granted however. Playing a side like CFC after (what sadly looks like being a defeat) isn't a welcome proposition.

I don't know. Both us and you haven't made many signings and, for me, a lesson of recent seasons is that new signings are vital to motivate. Don't get me wrong, today is a poor start for CFC (so far) but we haven't played yet and I'm not overflowing with confidence.

I agree with that 100%. Moral issues aside, I can't see how the current model can be sustained. I don't know what happened to FFP. I don't know if it's even a thing these days, in practice.

Where does it stop though? How long til we see a player sold for a quarter of a billion? There must (I hope) be a natural value level?

Some of this window's other prices confirm that. It's long past the level where a single player can be 'worth' more than the entire cost - players, backroom staff, grounds - of entire lower leagues. I still can't see how BT makes money from the EPL while chucking money at clubs.

There was that hype. The whole pre-season coverage was wrong and the media couldn't acknowledge it. Being honest, most punditry is sort of educated guesswork. The media want angles but the clubs are more important than managerial rivalry.

It's an annoying double standard. Pep was so hyped, perhaps the media felt they had to cut him some slack, as an alternative to admitting they were wrong.

That's true. I hope Pep does try to change Walker as City's defence was poor at times last season. Pep was very slow to adapt to the PL and, generally, was given a free pass by the media. An English manager, given such a large club, would have been held more to account.

So Walker's left us for City. No issue with that particularly: his head was turned and the price was good, and a tidy profit. My issue (and I am late to realise this) is that, at the very top clubs, there's little skill in making transfers. Walker is a good player, well established and known to be reliable. City have just, it seems, said 'He's good. Buy him and the manager can fit him into our system and make it work'. It's, superficially, as basic a process as choosing players for playground football. 'He's good - pick him'. I appreciate that a lot more skill goes into identifying talented players in lower leagues, or from abroad, but the top clubs are just buying 'good' players because they seem safe buys. Put another way, did Jose want Lukaku specifically or did he want any forward from a list of recognised, capable, PL forwards? Was Lukaku a case of 'We need a 20+ a season striker; find one'. Was Walker bought because he fitted a very short description of 'good right back'? E. g. 'We need a good right back, get me one'.?

Good Lord no. Players like Tammy Abraham and Demarai Grey. They need experience but they should be where we look for coming tournaments.

Damn. Undeniably :-) That's a good point in a way. Hodgson had a team of naturally fast players and we looked slow and uncertain. What a mess.

True. However, and I am cynical about this, I think England managers have a genius for wasting talent, and choosing wrong formations and tactics. The last Euros were a new low. Particularly following on from the abysmal preceding World Cup. Nearly all of Hodgson's decisions are still incomprehensible and I don't think Southgate will be any different. There's a strong vein of conceit in England managers that makes them - I think - make weird decisions (Kane on throw-ins and corners) in the hope that they'll work and be proved clever. For that reason, I wouldn't put it past a manager to take Rooney to the next WC. I just hope, next time, we're less of an embarrassment than recently.

That's a fair point but surely he can't go to another World Cup? He's done little (in fairness, neither did anyone else) at the last two we attended. He's definitely slower and, with - we hope - younger and fresher players coming through, he must be in the past internationally? Looked at another way, he didn't work wonders, in World Cups, when at his peak (lots of reasons for this of course and few are his fault).