The Bard

Respectfully disagree about JWP. High energy and has a little more invention than Rice & Phillips. Would help if the coach believed in him more like he clearly does with Mount who just needs to go on holiday.

The 2 left backs are injured. He tried an alternative in March who was deemed not up to it. Who else is there?

Your great uncle was Ernest Bevin? Fair play

I think we'll favour a back 3 with the ability to change to a 4 if needed. Think our likely squad will reflect this. Gonna make the following assumptions:- Bentley & O'Leary will stay with no new keeper coming in. Possibly 2 new contracts. Baker not involved. Moore won't be here. Vyner will be. One of Idehen and Towler out on loan, the other remains. Kalas sold. Either Cundy or this Horsfall also here. That would give us following defensive options. Tanner, Wilson, Dasilva, Pring, Atkinson, Klose, Naismith, Cundy / Horsfall, Vyner, Towler / Idehen. In midfield King will stay but be bit part. HNM & Bakinson will leave. We will sign a replacement for HNM. Sykes has been signed as understudy to Weimann who will be rested a bit more next year. James, King, Scott, Sykes, Benarous, Williams, Owers + 1 other. Up front, little change unless someone offers Wells a good deal or silly money for Weimann or Semenyo. Conway to be more involved. Outside chance of a long term replacement for Martin being signed and gradually introduced. We now need to get rid of players having made some good signings.

Blimey all the Yateonians have gone all gooey

Love how his name changes between Brewster and Baxter

Ever considered the possibility that Mount is playing shite because he's out of form??

Egos is the main tbing. Especially the captain who plays for himself. can be solved with a couple of high profile droppings. Need to be testing likes of JWP, Tammy & Timori. 4 games in a short space of time should mean this can happen. JWP only seems to play vs likes of Andorra.

What else is there yo do in Sunderland though? Except putting your dog in a pram..

It's a line isn't it? It will never be perfect

That's excellent. Wages saved. Fee a write off but that's been the reality since about 5 seconds after he signed his contract with us...

I find that bizarre. Surely it would be better to sign someone with a superb attitude who will improve technically because of their football coaching. They read SAF's autobiography and they think they're geniuses in man-management.

They should merge league 2 and national league and make it north & south. There is **** all difference in standard. It would increase attendance and away following for sure. Grimsby v Scunny rather than Grimsby v Crawley

Or it shows he's no longer able to manage younger players maybe as they're 50 years younger. Cooper clearly understands how to manage players that age.

That would be subject to negotiation between him and his agent, us and the buying club. We'd still probably have to pay him something for him to essentially rip up his contract with us. Once that's done, he'll probably then accept much lower wage at a new club but over 2 or 3 years. If he thinks he can sit on his arse for another year and still get a decent contract next season he's kidding himself. He's probably already got a reputation similar to Jack Rodwell

Yep. It's also amazing how some people bang on that Southgate is a poor manager. Zero sense of perspective. We're England and have been shit all my life with the exception of 2 one off tournaments. We've surpassed the achievements of the previous 52 years in 3 but apparently he's not good enough. Idiots.

I hope it doesn't get built and they carry on playing in a cow field in front of a load of posh pricks paying £80 per game to sit in the pissing down rain on some scaffolding..

Mason Mount has been ******* terrible. Bet Bowen gets hooked first though

Do wonder about some people and their understanding of what decides a transfer fee. He has 1 year plus a 1 year option that we have exercised or will exercise. We are therefore in no hurry to sell. The idea that we will accept £8 million in that scenario is laughable. We paid that for our centre half! If he goes for under £20 million I will be really disappointed in the club. If he has a decent season he will fetch £15 million. A good season a lot more. You can't coach a lot of what he has but you can coach him to use what he has more effectively which a side like West Ham will probably do.....

RB maybe but absolutely not RWB. That's the sort of thing Pulis does so he can have 9 6 footers in his team. He's not got the attributes for a wing back especially with us wanting to play a swift counter attacking style. You have to have either superb positioning or pace and energy to play there. Not sure he has either tbh.

Early on in the game Frankie Boyle tweeted that the Scottish players were struggling to adapt to the sunshine..

Lauren Smith's job was advertised as £30 to £40k. You had to have all the UEFA qualifications too.

That is almost exactly what I was saying... ...but took several paragraphs whereas you took a sentence...

Absolutely.