IAmNick

The wording of your comment clearly implies it's a potential in your mind. Additionally if you repeat nonsense and frame it as a playable thing you do become responsible for repeating it. There's lots on nonsense we all see online we choose not to repeat, and with good reason. Especially seven year old tweets with 3 likes. This "just asking questions"/"just repeating what I've heard" thing is a well known tactic. Pointing that out isn't anything to do with this board being toxic or not.

Well you fell for a lot of the social media nonsense - I agree with you that kids are probably a bit more discerning, but maybe some of the less able ones fell for the same sort of stuff? I kid. Have a good Christmas mate.

Well people form opinions on footballers based on them as people as well, not just them on the pitch - I suspect there are a few players who have got up to things outside of the game that you wouldn't want us to sign because of that. Look at the debate around us signing Danny Simpson for example. Why would this be any different? It's just because you have a personal issue with it, which is fine.

Well if/when city sign one of them that's probably a good time to bring that up, but this thread is about Nahki Wells so I'm not sure how that's relevant!

Wouldn't it be stranger if people didn't change their opinions when things/situations change? I think you're mischaracterising peoples opinions as ridiculously extreme. When someone has an opinion and sticks with it in the face of all evidence or new info that's weird to me. I was absolutely wrong regarding Wells and I'm pleased to admit that. He's been great this season and I'm delighted he's resigned, but I'd happily have seen the back of him last year. Well he was publicly posting absolutely ridiculous lies about the jabs so that's most likely it, as you well know.

Going to put these two together as I think they're a good example of potentially misusing, or misinterpreting statistics. There is probably a slight correlation - but that isn't enough to say that conceeding less fouls makes you a better team. As always, the old "correlation does not equal causation" applies. I agree with Dave (no surprise there maybe ) about the other factors. For example I would expect in general a team near the bottom of the table to have less possession - and when do you almost always commit a foul? When you are trying to win the ball back, or challenge for a ball you're not in control of. Teams nearer the bottom will also likely have less skilled players, who are more likely to mistime a challenge and be punished for it. They're also more likely to let runners go, be out of position, or be making "last ditch" challenges. It's too simplistic to simply draw a line between two data points like that. If we make an effort and go up the fair play table that won't make us a better team or more likely to be a better team. It's the equivalent of a O'Driscoll style where you keep possession at all costs because good teams have a lot of possession... so obviously if you make sure you keep the ball as much as them you'll be as good as them! Wait, but in King's last 3 at CB we're W1 D1 L1, 4 points. Scored 4, conceded 3. Why not use the same logic there? It's way too simplistic to do something like that though, the sample size is far too small. It'd be like a striker coming on in the 85th minute, scoring, and concluding he'd finish the season on around 800 goals if he played every game. I recommend you do some reading about going with "gut feelings and hunches"! It's an absolutely awful way to do things. I highly recommend "Thinking, Fast and Slow" by Daniel Kahneman if you're interested in it (genuinely).

I don't think being "hard" is that related to fair play personally. It's about determination, bravery, putting your head/body where it hurts, and getting stuck in. You're not hard if you scythe a player down and get a yellow in my opinion, but more so if you go full bloodied but fairly into a 30/70 challenge. That's very different from committing fouls. You can pick up bookings for all kinds of reasons that are nothing to do with being "hard". I think that's very simplistic thinking to try and equate the two and dispels nothing. We've obviously conceded way too many - but we're also around the 3rd or 4th highest scoring team. They kind of cancel each other out in my opinion. It's not good, and it's not a good way to perform over an entire season but you have to be balanced when discussing these things imo. Pointing at individual stats like that as proof of anything is ridiculous. That's almost never how stats work.

I agree with you, I don't like the changes you mention - I'm just saying there's a contradiction if you say it's been fine, but they're also making changes and it's growing more than ever. Maybe it would have grown as much (or more!) without the changes they've made, we don't know.

Sure, but you could argue that even in that 30 years or so there was a fair amount of change which is what did that, no? Since 1990 the premier league was introduced, the format of the Champion's League changed, multiple teams per country allowed in the Champion's League, qualification changes to basically all big cups, Cup Winners Cup ditched, World Cup went to 32 teams, and more... There are constant changes to the formats, some for better some for worse. I don't think we should ignore change for changes sake... if football has got even bigger you could argue that's because of the changes made which is why they keep wanting to make more!

Looks like that shit small one in the picture is broken too

City third (Pring): https://streamja.com/XWeny

Whoops sorry, uploaded the wrong one! In my defence I just got back from a Christmas party in London and am not feeling too hot right now... Try this: https://streamff.com/v/zVM_L_F7vY

City goal (Williams): https://streamff.com/v/zVM_L_F7vY

Rotherham goal: https://dubz.co/v/2mn0mx

In seriousness though as you've mentioned, they pick out men for what they're doing (banging a drum, dressing up stupidly) and women for just... existing. Happens quite often imo.

Too close to home?

And I'm sure those female spectators love the idea that if they do go, there'll be sweaty camera men scanning the crowd for them at all times so a bunch of sad blokes at home can ogle them.

That's almost certainly because you weren't the one's being "targeted" / made fun of by them in almost all cases. Most of them were cases of punching down at easy targets - gay people, black people, whatever. It's usually pretty easy to dismiss something when you're not the butt of the joke.

- sent from my iPhone 9

It's a genius plan really. 1. Make a fortune of some billions building a huge investment business and in the markets. 2. Buy a loss making football club, pump even more money into it, financially mismanage it, and be a few hundred million in the hole while still losing at least ten million every year. 3. Buy some land, build some houses, and sell them for considerably less than you spent on the club to date. Now we just have to work out what step 3 has to do with 1 and 2 to uncover the master plan. Even if he sold it all and made £100m that's only a few % of his net worth, and when you consider the opportunity cost of the money it took over the time it took (over 20 years!) it's still not even close to worth it compared to other means at his disposal.

Saw something online about one guy who's going to try and go to every single game, which has apparently never been done before.

- Moving the home or away fans around in the ground will magically improve the atmosphere - "Football back in my day something something atmosphere and passion something something modern santised experience"... sorry, but you've just got older, that's the primary thing that's happened. - Williams and James won't/don't work as a midfield paring because they're too slow or something - that was accepted wisdom on here for quite a while

Looks like there's some legit criticism of United in there, but it's so mixed up with the 80% of self serving crap it's mostly lost. Shame as it seemed quite valid to me.

It's crazy because 18 months ago I would genuinely have been quite happy if Vyner and Wells never played for us again - and I'm happy to admit that. I thought Vyner had had more than enough chances, never looked that good, and wouldn't up his game enough. I always disputed Wells goalscoring, as most people were saying he was the "fox in the box" type who just need service. Wow was I wrong on both, it was between the two of them for me. So glad to be wrong. Picked Vyner in the end, I can't believe the improvement he's made this season and he deserves credit not just for the technical improvement, but also his attitude - it must have been so hard mentally to be relied on as he has after his time at the club so far. Wells has shown to be a far more intelligent footballer than I gave him credit for. TC was probably the least expected one for me, and obviously him and Scott are far more exciting to watch, but I just can't overlook what Vyner has overcome this season. Delicious humble pie.

Maybe not, but I think that's sightly putting the cart before the horse as he bought that land afterwards. There are plenty of other places he could build houses and make a profit that don't require a football club.