seems like Derby scored all the first half goals

Would it make more sense for Alli to play further back with Dier? He seams to do better when he is play further from goal.

I don't think they are similar at all...anybody else see this? Barkley likes the ball at his feet all the time and is kind of lazy. Alli is a powerhouse off the ball (though he has some sweet dribbling skills) and his workrate is tremendous. I don't think he has the passing range of Barkley but I don't mind cuz most guys just waste possession on useless hollywoods ala their hero fat wayne.

wow. nice job. i have been aids this season. didn't we have someone else in the top 100 a few years back? uistbhoy maybe?

that guy should come back.
He can play there, but I think he is a lot better higher up. If England is chasing a game I think it is a really good option to move him back there and bring on another attacker though.

http://www.theguardian.com/football/...l-resign-offer

Love you, Woody...keep up the good work!

Agree with mw, totally different types of player. Would expect Allis starting positions to be a lot deeper than Barkley.

Sigh, we're a complete joke.

follow up on that blackpool pitch invasion from the end of last season, their level of made is reaching nuclear heights it seems. and we play them tonight, what joy

Bugger.....

Tottenham Hotspur ‏@SpursOfficial now35 seconds ago
Further assessment & scans have confirmed that @Jan_Vertonghen sustained damage to his medial collateral ligament in his knee at Palace.

Tottenham Hotspur ‏@SpursOfficial now21 seconds ago
Our medical staff will continue to monitor his progress during his rehabilitation to determine when he will be ready to return to training.

So that sounds similar to coquelin.

How did United become one of the worst run epl clubs after Ferguson quit? I would love a documentary or oral history on this one day.

Coquelin expected to play this weekend. Welbeck is back and could play for the u21s next week for match fitness.

BBC now saying LvG didn't offer to resign and that there's no meeting scheduled on his future today. Taking training today and business as usual. Sigh.

The press, and specifically that useless **** Jamie Jakson have no idea what's going on behind closed doors at United. Every one of them said he was gone over xmas if he didn't win his next 2 games vs Stoke/Chelsea and look how that worked out. Why would Woodward leak that conversation knowing how the United fans would react to it? Obviously zero chance LVG or his camp leak it.

I seriously doubt LVG would offer a resignation and be talked into staying, he's the most stubborn **** in history if he made his mind up to go he'd just walk.

RIP Ray Pointer.

He was my dad's favourite player.

We really missed leCOQ

the rot set in pre-saf retirement imo. they replaced scholes/giggs/rio/vidic/ronaldo with cleverley/young/smalling/jones/valencia, and let poggers walk

that last season saf title covered up a lot of decay

First Wenger and now Peter Hill-Wood criticising Costa for Mertesacker's abysmal mistake shows the lack of class within that club but moreso the sheer inability to confront reality and face up to their own weaknesses.

That's why they will not win the title in a season where they had their best chance in years.

Feeling a bit bad about not posting here. It must look like I've just made a smash and grab on the FPL tournament (lol all those xGtards who can't beat my "finger in air" approach). In reality, I've just had a lot on, starting new job and moving home.

First of all, have to point out a couple of dolts ITT (as if there are only a couple ). CBA to go back and find the posts to quote:

1. There are two clubs with Sheffield in their name so referring to one as "Sheffield" doesn't cut it. Even if it did, the lesser club both in terms of current league position and historical status would not take primacy.

2. Sheffield Wednesday is a great club name.

--

TP,

I note that our next league fixture is at home to you lot. When I last hung around in this thread, my feeling was that Burnley seemed to be winning without playing particularly well. Lots of scrappy wins by the odd goal. It seems that now you're playing well and goals coming from all over the team, not just Andre Gray (who I thought would be useful but has been a much better signing than I envisaged). IMO, you've looked the strongest team in the league over the past month or so.

Our form on paper (5 wins in last 7 league games) has been about as good as yours but I really don't think we've played great. There's a slight doubt over Forestieri's fitness. His absence would be a huge blow under normal circumstances but especially with how I anticipate we'll set up for this game. We often like to play Forestieri on the left of midfield with Hooper + 1 (usually Nuhiu) up front when at home but I doubt we'll be so open against one of the best sides in the league. It's more likely that we'll aim to keep it tight. Bannan will play LM and we'll play a more defensive minded CM in the spot he vacates and Forestieri will play a deep number 10 role behind Hooper, instead of pushing Nuhiu up top. We're a fair bit more solid defensively with this system but it puts the creative burden squarely on Forestieri's shoulders as Bannan can't influence the game as much from LM and we'll concede possession more often without a Nuhiu type to hold the ball high up the pitch. It might make sense to play Forestieri behind Nuhiu (what we did at Turf Moor) but can't see us not finding a spot for Hooper with the form he is in.

Any insight on the Burnley team, besides the obvious that they're playing really ****ing well?

I disagree with this theory a lot. We came 2nd by 1 goal the previous season as well.

Fergie has been proven right on Smalling and Evans is basically beasting at WBA who seem to have a clean sheet every other week. Fergie was on the verge of constructing yet another team by pushing out Rooney but his sister in law's death during that final season curtailed his ability to build it.

Moyes' bizarrely stunted the team's progression by retaining Vidic, Rio and Rooney.

imo the ultimate proof of fall from grace during fergietime lies in their CL odds. consistently faves or among the faves from when ronaldo broke through until about 2010. but in saf's last season you were like 6th fave at 14/1. team just wasn't world class any more

basically i think you got left behind because while barca were busy paying for neymar's dad's orgies and real were figuring out how to get the spanish taxpayer to spend £85m on a welshman, your lot were spending all their energy trying to get a giggs/carrick/cleverley/ancientscholes midfield working while moaning that agents fees aren't like they once were

heres the thing, barca and real are member-institutions whose GHW members and owners care about tinpots and the G in GHW and beating each other whereas epl clubs are mostly owned by people who care about black ink and number of digits in the bank account and stuff

which is why barca and real pay the most wages itw and why sometimes catastrophic errors can be made in trying to one-up each other ala the reign of joan gaspart where the barca equivalent of cleverley and andy carroll were pocketing like 5x their market wage

LONG BALLS?

CL odds generally a good indicator (this season aside for obvious reason).

Assume la liga will be rethinking their strategy because I don't think anyone will care about real madrid / barcelona once neymar makes his move to stoke in around 2019.

Fergie is an anomaly who could probably get > 80 points without getting out of bed regardless of whether he has nicky butt / phil neville or scholes / keane available. This is a man who fielded 7 defenders (oshea wasn't in goal) against arsenal and came out with a comfortable 2-0 victory.

i blame murica. team owners over there have a weird dominant role, they are the owners of the team like its just another company, and if they feel the company isnt as profitable as it could be then they'll just relocate their place of business as if they're tesco. and if you as a fan dont like it then you're quite free to go consume some other product.

there's no sense that a team owner should be a sort of custodian who keeps things ticking over on behalf of the fans.

i think its best exemplified by the fact that you always see these doddering 95 year old white bewigged blokes with their 78 year old hideous plastic surgery gone wrong wives* on the field getting handed trophies and making dumb altzheimers-inflected speeches when their team wins. kroenke and the glazers brought that culture over here and as a result mun & arse have gone through chronic underinvestment.

either that or wenger & saf are just tightarses that cant believe a mars bar isn't 16p any longer

arabs and russian gangsters otoh do it right.

*i have the broncos in mind but this description covers >50% of nfl owners

Yupp, not to mention he was always drunk, the red-nosed Scottish prick... Regression would have been imminent no matter who took charge of United after him, but I don't think anyone expected quite the clownshow that has been going on since he retired. Pretty great

Thank god Fergie retired. Even if he had Utd's current garbage squad, he'd still probably be 10 points clear by now. LVG is awesome.

Welbeck was supposed to be three weeks away six months ago, but I will be so happy to see him back in our squad finally. Just really enjoy watching him play.