Rayvin

Was Ba better than Cisse? Maybe more of a complete player, not sure about just a goalscorer. Mind you I've always loved Cisse because of that goal against Chelsea.

Do we not have to be a bit more mindful of 'homegrown' players now that we're not in the EU?

I kind of hope it holds a mirror up to the rest of them as well tbh - this didn't happen in a vacuum, it happened because the road towards undesirable owners had already been well worn. Maybe they're all a bit further down that road than they'd like to admit, if Saudi Arabia is coming in just after them.

Actually a really good point - the only clubs who are really going to care about our success longer term are the top tier clubs. Those with delusions of grandeur like Palace, West Ham and Everton will care for a few seasons until we go past them, then they'll just recalibrate and get on with things as usual. I mean the likelihood is that we'll replace an existing top tier club anyway so it doesn't make that much difference for them. And as Howay says, the top tier wouldn't sell to each other anyway.

I actually think it will indeed go something like that - and if he does manage to make relegation less of a certainty, the other clubs might give up on their stance anyway. It's only worth pursuing if going down looks likely.

The truth is we all wanted it to happen and we're all prepared to more or less turn a blind eye because we're in the very fortunate position of not actually having been able to influence this at all. So we get the benefits with plausible deniability. I don't think any of us were under any illusions about what Saudi stood for before this takeover was on the radar though. But we can simply shrug and say "this is the world we live in". Because it is.

I think there's a limit to what they'll actually be able to realistically do before they become anti-competitive - the lawsuits that would come in if they tried to prevent a team from being promoted under the existing terms of the league arrangements would be incredible.

If we go down, do they not lose any chance of limiting our ability to spend? Can we not use the opportunity to sign several 10 year multi-million pound sponsorships that would constitute pre-existing business relationships that the PL won't be able to veto, and that would just come up with us on promotion? I don't think we're going down even if we do limited business in January anyway, I'm convinced Howe can get more out of this team than Bruce did.

What's gone wrong then, as far as you can tell? You really need to go up automatically tbh, you've had a few runs at the playoffs now and they don't appear to be a strong suit.

Those on RTG certainly don't look like they will.

Howe actually being physically able to run is a key distinction in and of itself.

I really don't apologise that much ffs

You'll get no bother from me, but brace yourself for a sea of gifs from everyone else

It's excessive from the outside looking in but I don't really think it's counter-productive; you don't tend to see trans issues getting anyone except the media and radical feminists worked up tbh. Maybe it's useful to the people living that reality though. Even if it is though, I don't know what bearing that has on infrastructure and traffic systems. It's just going to cause confusion more than anything else.

There are now multiple different kinds of rainbow flag in circulation to signify various gender and sexual orientations. I'm in no way familiar enough with them to know which one this represents, but presumably it's a fairly broad one for the trans community in general.

But why...?

Yeah me either, why have we turned against Jones? I mean he's not team manager calibre but the bloke tried his best and secured us a couple of points.

We have repeated incursions from generally terrible WUMs on here, typically from your neck of the woods. I accept that you're more in the 'Fish' mould, i.e. seemingly genuinely engaging in discussion - but you're gonna have to fight through a lot of Sunderland related stick to get to the point where it's going to be reciprocated across the board. Honestly if I were you I wouldn't bother There isn't really that much sincere discussion on Sunderland on here anyway, you've kind of dipped off our radar in recent years beyond potential takeovers by fellas that look like extras from the Hobbit. You might be better off on NO. If you do stay, you'll need a thick skin.

You're preaching to the choir there, I'm not at all of the opinion that we either can or should start throwing money around. I agree about loans. But either way, we do need to obtain some quality from somewhere.

We're going to beat Brentford, they looked very poor against Norwich and I really don't think our team is anywhere near as bad as they've been made to look. With some proper organisation and confidence, we should win. Season starts here.

Thank fuck that's over with.

Yes, gloating about this recent polling aside, it's taken an awful lot of shit to get us to this point and the year ahead looks incredibly grim. I can't believe so many people voted for this obvious shitstorm.

More importantly, a coalition of the 'let's not fuck over our main trading partner'. The Greens would work with Labour and improve them, the LDs I'm always a bit suspicious of but at least as far as the EU goes you could trust them. The SNP would give Labour anything they wanted as long as they were offered another independence vote. It just takes Labour to have a bit of vision to make this a reality.

56% if you combine Labour, LDs and Greens. More presumably if you add the SNP in there. Yes, needs a coalition though. Totally agree and will not budge on that.

Goes without saying but it would be a good moment for a charismatic and inspired Labour leader to really start twisting the knife... Nowhere clearly - his best hope is that other events come along and people forget.