You can’t fault the spuds’ determination to out under-perform us.

Us: were just going to put in a half-hearted effort and settle for a draw against Chelsea.

Spuds: oh yeah? Well we’re going to bottle it against Ipswich and give them their first PL win in 20 years, so suck it!

I suspect they are planning to move Per up from the Academy, and then recruit Tomas to fill that Academy position.

I don’t recall right now, but there were several decent ones in the summer transfers list that I maintained here during the last transfer window.

I see this as a symptom of our mediocre attacker recruitment during the summer. We brought in Merino (while I know he’s capable of scoring, it’s not his biggest strength), and Sterling on a loan (who I had low expectations of but he has still underperformed overall IMO). Meanwhile we got rid of ESR and some others (Nelson, Vieira - though TBF they were dead wood).

We have excellent resources in defense, but we are thin in attack. And the strategy seemed to be to hope we got no major injuries, which was incredibly naive. So when Odegaard got injured we were screwed. We need 3 or 4 quality attacking players to challenge for the title. But honestly, with 3 losses already, and the fact that the January transfer window is notoriously difficult, and now with no Edu… our title challenge is likely done for the season.

Good to see Area is giving the likes of Nwaneri and MLS more play time. That’s a good idea. Hopefully they can both come of age this season and add a whole new dimension. But we can’t hope for a good if teenagers to full in like that. Spend big in January, if we can. Or just resign ourselves to trying to get a CL spot and regroup for next season.

Nope. He’s gone gone.

I haven’t been able to watch any matches live in weeks, due to youth coaching and then running errands. The fact that only about half of our matches are live on Peacock doesn’t help either. But the youth season is nearly over, so I’ll hopefully be able to watch more lives matches in a couple of weeks. Hopefully our form has picked up by then.

WTF?!

I definitely will. The lack of consistency and terrible man-management he brought led to some hilarious losses. Goodbye sweet prince.

Let’s hope his replacement also fails.

What’s this I’m reading about the spuds having to warn their fans about homophobic chants directed towards… Arteta??? Good that they are trying to crack down on such chants. They have no place in football. But I’m confused why they are directing them to Arteta. I guess to the clowns following that joke of a club assume every Arsenal manager is gay? How weird and pathetically childish.

So, Tommy Tuchel is the new England manager, eh? I haven’t been paying attention to the chatter sounding possible candidates, so I was not expecting that. It seems like a weird appointment.

Maybe they fell back to the etiquette of bygone centuries where the biggest, ugliest Viking warrior was the defacto leader?

Why do I feel like fate is telling us we need to fast-track Nwaneri’s transition into becoming a first team regular. Seems like with Odegaard now likely out until December, we will need a younger player to step up. And he’s the perfect candidate.

This reminds me of when Arteta had no other choice but to give ESR a run in the first team because of injuries. And Emile used that opportunity to not only stake a claim, but also to revitalize our flagging season. We’re playing well now, but still, this could really jump start Ethan’s development. Start him there in some of the easier fixtures and see how he does.

We also have Miles Lewis-Skelly available and keen to get a chance. Though I see him as more of a winger. Every time recently Nwaneri’s come on it’s been in that 10 slot.

Fuck, I hope this injury Saka picked up playing against Greece isn’t serious.

I feel down a bit of a rabbit hole last night watching confrontations between referees and parents/coaches in youth football (soccer) in America. Some of the incidents were pretty wild.

It explains some of the hyper-guardedness I’ve encountered with referees as a youth coach, and why there’s a referee shortage over here (probably in lots of countries really). I haven’t witnessed any confrontations or drama myself, except for the couple of times one particular referee inexplicably kept going after my assistant for perceived (but false) infractions. But damn, I feel bad for referees in general. Except the PL ones. 95% of them are genuinely shite and hide behind an shield of impunity.

Anyone know how bad Kai’s injury is?

I just watched the second half highlights. I don’t want to take away from Brighton’s clinical attacking, because they legitimately played well. But holy shit, the spuds’ defending was atrocious! That was Sunday league calibre play on all of Brighton’s goals.

On the first goal the Brighton player was surrounded by defenders who did nothing but get in each other’s way. On the second Udoggie fluffed a simple cross and then avoided trying to block the shot. And on the third Welbeck was basically unmarked with acres of space in the six yard box (Romero appeared next to him after he graded the ball but he was MIA before then and had no drive to try to stop him when he realized what was going on).

I feel bad for Postecoglu. He deserves better than the cavalcade of clowns he has.

Bottlejob Notspurs strike again! 🤣 2-0 up at half time and they still find a way to throw the match away, bless 'em.

Lol, I bet he really enjoyed scoring that one.

I said this in the match thread, but I’ll say it here too… That Dibbling lad really is a talent. He looked so dangerous for Southampton when he got the ball. I’d be amazed if one of the bigger clubs doesn’t nab him in the next year or two.

Some of Cala’s touches were just amazing. And his positioning is so good. He really is a cultured, intelligent player. He has Zinchenko’s talent with getting forward into inside channels to squeeze the opposition, but without the defensive frailties.