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"Get on to the Trinity Daily Mirror group, we need another favour called in." "Now come on here, we can't get Ryder another award, nobody will fall for that again!" "No, no. Our contact there tells me they have a super computer, or should I say 'Sewpa dewpa compewta'? Anyway, I've got him to rig it so it says Sunderland will finish bottom next year. Make sure it gets published." "Very well..... Where did it actually have them finishing?" "Second bottom." (Both) "Ha ha. Hahaha. Ahahahaha."

I'm a few hours into this, thanks Robin.

This is the gif you need.....

I think not wanting to overspend is part of a long term plan. We don’t want to set the precedent of being prepared to pay way over the odds. It’s frustrating from a fan point of view but sensible. Everything suggests they’re here for the long haul

Meanwhile in the "real world" we have a potential world champion #garage

I can see exactly why you'd think that but technically it's two.

This is the thing. The more we tie our colours to the "Tories will fuck this up and leave an open goal for Labour" mast, the more we need them to absolutely fuck this up - as they inevitably will if we give them the chance to, because we actually live in a fundamentally soft-socialist country, even if that voter base has been told they're actually conservative for such a long time and they love voting that way because it makes them feel a part of something. That's what, as an exception in the political continuum, Third Way Blairism got so right (and it's notable just how well the Lib Dems did at that time, too - the potential for a broad "centre and left" consensus has always been there, you just need the grounds to be fertile enough for that to happen in the first place). Now? Now those voters are used to being wooed by the hard-right narrative, because we really don't want to believe that other people deserve the same opportunities as us once they've been reinforced. But ultimately I do think and hope we can see some reversion as long as the Tory alternative is so clearly insane that it can't be outweighed even by the personal prosperity narrative. That's exactly the point we're at now, whether people (and therefore the polls) realise it - but the grim fact is that we do need things to get (even) worse before people will tip over to the other side in sufficient numbers to allow a regime change. And that's why I'm Team Truss.

I think 24th is generous tbh

We should put in a bid for their shite striker, just to see if it unsettles him.

Who gives a fuck where the upgrade on our squad comes from? If we'd signed Botman from Bournemouth would that means he's not as good? If we got him on a free does that mean he's definitely not an upgrade on Lascelles? The difference between Ashley and these owners is clear; ambition. Under Mike we never would have signed someone like Burn in January, let alone Guimaraes. If we'd somehow managed to sign improvement on our squad, which so far every first team signing has been, for nothing, from unfashionable clubs, I know I wouldn't give a toss.

Can anyone work out who Nick Robinson would prefer as PM?

Back to dreamland for the mackems. Firstly no one wanted to allow him to have 10%, him asking for it is different to anyone allowing it. We’ve signed one player from Burnley and none from Leeds newspaper links = definitely true and going to happen (also Man City and Barcelona have just signed Leeds players), never mind that we have signed Bruno Guimeraes from Lyon, Kieran Trippier from Athleti, and Sven Botman from Lille for a combined fee of nearly £100m it’s definitely hard to see a difference from Mike Ashley.

Or worse "Dad, can you get us a meet with Adam Pearson?"

Totally forgot, 1st full day in Cyprus, see this post and take a chance anyway and got two tickets together for £16 cheaper than the forest game! No queue either!

The Tories are the economic armageddon they always tried to claim Labour were. The simple fucking truth in economics at the national level is that it isn't the fucking same as planning your household budget. You need to spend to stimulate economic growth - the "skill" is in investing in the right areas to drive growth that exceeds what you put in (and not necessarily financially). It's not even just that though, if you spend on the economy and living standards then people's happiness and welfare improves, making them more productive. I still can't get past the idea that Sunak fucked off the development of a generation of kids who lost out during lockdowns because he didn't want to spend £15bn now despite it being clearly demonstrated to save us ten times as much later. Even if the cost is the only important thing for you in that statement, and it shouldn't be because we're talking about human lives in that calculation as well - but even it is, you should consider that decision to be negligent, short termist, and just fucking stupid. They are a party of poorly informed, middle class house wives and pheasant botherers who think they know what's what on the basis of class and wealth.

23 billion added to national debt in June alone! What a fucking job the tories have done in 12 years. Inflicted austerity on us causing a 15% loss in the standard of living (conservative estimate). Destroyed public services. Taxed us more than any other government in history. And, drum roll please, during this time they have more than DOUBLED the national debt. Slow hand clap please. If Labour still can't capitalise on this I despair.

£40 million...

‘Reader, I married her.’

The link has the correct price lmao

I've just put all of the Coastguard Emergency TV shows on series link.

The extra digit makes all the difference

The straw clutching is off the map.

No. And if anyone is, they're wrong, stupid and fucking ridiculous.

One of the most damaging things they’ve done is manage to make people think that all politicians, on every side of the fence, are tax-dodging, expense-claiming arseholes who are only out for themselves. It’s exactly why people just aren’t voting because the Tory press have managed to convince everyone that Labour are as bad as them. I don’t know how you undo that, I really don’t. And if people don’t think the alternative will be any different, why turn up and get them out? There’ll always be someone else to blame for the Tories fuck ups

This is true.

Imagine telling a fucking NURSE about how Johnson has been stabbed in the back.

The Daily Mail needs to be shut down. Amongst the many things any future Labour government needs to do, a key one is enforcing press standards. In fact, standards across the board wouldn't hurt. Politician openly lying? Sacked. Newspaper fabricating stories that are found to be baseless and misleading? Fined. The Mail would be fined out of circulation within a week.

Sure, but you exhaust lower cost options, before committing to overpaying, right? We could have got Botman for, what was it, £50m in January? Or we got him for £34m this summer. Makes sense, right?

There was a joke? I just assumed Gemmill has posted in the wrong thread again.

I wish we didn't after that "joke"

yup. feels like this is the sort of window where we might have to settle for few stepping stone players in the burn/targett mould rather than the £50-60m marquee signings. I still think we could see another player brought in though who will excite in the way bruno did

What does an angry pepper do? Gets JALAPEÑO FACE!

Nice to see Tarkovski got on the scoresheet already

Readable podcasts? Whatever will they think of next?

He did an excellent job in getting us out the Championship as a stop-gap but it basically sums Ashley up that a stop-gap was around for about 6 seasons

How the fuck could you forget Diego 😱 he’s a cornerstone of the board, you’ll be forgetting that other great poster … erm…. Whatisname you know, the one who’s never wrong and who said Everton were going down, you know the one I mean, he’s Renton’s bitch, aye him.

🧐

We believe you.

“ That’s uz buoycoutting the Mirror woman, chuck ‘em out” “ Arr, narr man Wor Exile, it’s the smoothest one of the lot- Jordan and Little Jordan’s arseholes are in tatters as it is ‘cos we can only eat cheesy chips now. We’re nearly veygans!”

Ah I put that in the wrong thread. Liz Truss is not my hobby.

Both decent defensively as attacking players go, Dennis the better finisher. Wouldn't be terrifically excited about either, but I wasn't that excited about Burn or Tartgett either so what the fuck do I know? They are definitely both an upgrade on the departing Gayle and arguably on Almiron and Wood too, which I guess is the most important part of the puzzle.

Has this lad not heard of the aggregation of marginal gains?

er, i think you'll find i called the final two before anyone on this thread, Nostradamus