Rayvin

Bravely said and true. In reality we know next to nothing about their circumstances and frankly all the drama really does seem to be about ASM/Gordon. I mean that's a really narrow line of fire for a supposed wum. Still do feel LTA could -also- rise above it though - would be nice if we could get back to just banter style comments even if we do disagree. Once this one is sorted Gemmill, why don't you have a crack at the middle east?

As ever, spot on.

Elon Musk with the Hitler salutes This is going to be a wild 4 years.

This thread is meant to be about what we lack, not proclaiming we were gonna do it this season

Poor really, as good as Bournemouth were. Think 2-1 defeat would have been a more fair reflection but Howe obviously went for it in the end which I guess you'd always want him to do. But we did seem tired honestly. So many loose and wasted balls, so sloppy. Tonali was good but that's about it really. Hopefully that brings us back down to earth a bit and we can just get on with playing again without fussing about records and being the form team etc.

Important one to win but they're a good side so I'm unsure what to expect really. Not watched them much this season tbh. Hopefully we can get another relatively comfortable win but I think it'll be tougher than Man Utd/Spurs.

Sorry to hear this man. Your mam has you at least, but remember to take time for yourself in processing the grief too. Sincere condolences mate.

The great Toontastic Left Centreback debate. On it rages. This is how you know @The Fish has won the battle for your souls btw. We're about 5 minutes from someone suggesting that Botman's ideal playing role is a Left footed Libero and discussing the impact this has on the balance of the rest of the squad

How have Southampton managed to fuck that up so hard ffs. Woeful stuff.

Gloves really coming off now

I enjoy each win in the 30 mins immediately after it and then return to stressing about the next game the joys of an anxious disposition.

Yeah fair I guess. I did love that season.

So I can see that argument if you had to call it at the start of both seasons - but from where we are right now, and the ridiculous run of form he's had to pull together to even get us back into the conversation, I think the margins are just finer this season. Maybe I'm remembering the last time a little too generously but I sort of feel we were in the conversation all season for that one, so the odd game going astray here and there didn't derail us - moreover everyone was still turning up thinking they'd play us off the park. This season feels much more like every win has been hard earned. To me at least. It's probably just bias towards what is immediately in front of me I suppose. I just feel like Howe and the team have had to be even better this year than they were that year.

Imagine Gemmill on the day Everton finally go down

I'm concerned about CL tbh, we're on an amazing run of form and wins but we're still only just 4th. If we can stretch the winning run to another 4 or 5 games then I think we may earn daylight but that's a really tall order (though the games look winnable). I think there'll be some questions asked if we don't get CL this season though, and that is the scenario under which I suppose we can see us losing a few of our top tier players. That in turn would necessitate a rebuild which just delays everything further. I think getting top 4 this season will be Howe's greatest achievement to date tbh in terms of what it will do for the club/how difficult it will be.

Was wondering this actually, who would be the cover for Murphy?

Forgot all that. Lunatic.

How does that PSR spending thing work again, if we sold him for £11m what would that 'become' in terms of immediately accessible funds? A £55m player on a 5 year deal? If we could replace him now and bring in that £55m player, I'd say go for it. Otherwise I think Gemmill is right.

It's probably just Mourinho reminding our board he exists in case they want to trade in an 8 game win streak for chaos, drama and PSR breaches

Aye fair wouldn't wish that on anyone at this point.

I said exactly the same like It's not even that they're that good, it's that teams just keep sleepwalking into the same situation as each other when playing them.

Forest are gonna win the league ffs. Not sure I can live with that like.

Fragrant...

I feel like the actual clubs know this, it's just the fans who haven't quite caught up. Have any of the actual clubs properly tested us yet on this front? Not sure they have. Clearly they don't fancy their chances.

Aye, agreed on this. I also wonder if there's a wider thing at work here in terms of how the rest of the league perceives us too. If you look at our first full season under Howe, we did well because we exploited an arrogance in other teams who felt that we were still fairly shit based on the players we had - or that they fancied their chances against us. Forest are benefitting from that this season. Once we are title contenders and people take us seriously as a dangerous team, they're going to sit deeper, take fewer risks, try to react to us more. That allows us to dictate terms for how the game will be, same as the City/Arsenal/Liverpool teams. And I do wonder if that might actually be an overall positive in a lot of ways. We have to build into it for sure, get the right players to unlock low block defenses, but as much as our mentality around the club needs to evolve to seeing us as winners - I also wonder if everyone else's has to do the same. In other words, would Liverpool be so successful this season if everyone else believed they could get something off them and really went for it?