Rayvin

The lowest we can finish at the moment is 8th - that's based on simple maths, not taking into consideration that some teams beneath us will play each other and therefore can't all have perfect runs. At the very least, if we get 3 more points, we've qualified for Europe one way or another. I would have taken that at the start of this season, in fact I think I predicted 7th. But realistically... We are going to get at least 4 points from Leicester and Leeds. That puts us on 69. 13 points ahead of where Liverpool are now, with 5 games remaining for them. So they would have to win all 5 of their remaining games even if we lost to Arsenal, Brighton and Chelsea. And tbh, I would imagine we'll get 6 points from Leicester, Leeds anyway - and 1 point minimum from Chelsea and/or Brighton even if we can't beat Arsenal. So that's the whole final act of this - we get champions league if we beat Leeds, Leicester, and get 1 fucking point from 2 home games and an away game against midtable Chelsea. We're fine.

How did he lose the England gig again? All I remember about that was the pint of wine

Are the Lib Dems back on the left of Labour yet? Must be getting close to that.

Starmer throwing a few more pledges out of the window this morning. Taxes on the top 5% will be unchanged since they're the ones struggling at the moment after all. Also the promise he made on tuition fees has been abandoned because the economic situation has now changed. Spain has made digital nomad visas more accessible by the way, for anyone wanting to abandon ship.

So IMO they're on the 5 stages of grief with this. Somewhere between denial and anger. And they're going to be there forever, which is why they're so hilarious. They could get over this tomorrow by just saying "aye you know what, wish it was us - gonna be great for them, really jealous but nothing I can do about it marra. Just gonna support me own team and crack one out over a seagull" Just own it you fucking losers, it's the denial that makes it so painful for you

Weirdly I find myself very confident about this particular game in amongst the others - Arsenal were destroyed by the atmosphere at SJP last season as much as the football. And as a club, they have form for this. They've always been lacking 'the minerals' for a proper fight and that's still apparent given their capitulation this season with respect of the title. Not only do I think we should win this, I think we'll fucking shred them. I did want them to win the league rather than City tbh, just for variety - but they're getting poleaxed at the weekend.

For what it's worth, I'm very confident. We'd have to go on an absolute howler of a run to fuck this up now. There is not a single game left that I don't think we're at least capable of winning, and a draw with Brighton is as good as a win in terms of our position anyway.

Is it not 8 from the remaining 15 to be certain? Assuming Brighton are 7 points behind us on even games anyway. 2 wins and 2 draws would do it.

Credit to Howe here mind. That's a few games now he's rescued by making good decisions at the right moments. As far as I'm concerned he's world class. A step closer now, a banana skin averted. We've got this.

Gordon will come good once Eddie has managed to get into him a bit but we can't risk the whole team's efforts to indulge that now - good decision from Howe.

Reading this thread, you'd think Gordon was the only one playing for us.

Ah true, forgot we have to play them too. That should do it then, we won't lose to Brighton at SJP.

They have to play Man Utd as well tbf - if they win that, it's a bigger problem for the Mancs than us.

I think if they hadn't lost to Forest the other day Brighton could still be a concern. But let's be real, they only look in any way threatening if we go on the worst run of form we'll have had to have been on all season. Neither them nor Liverpool is clawing back this deficit without some serious upsets on our end.

This is what gets me too. It's almost as if he thinks football clubs evolve organically out of the virtues of the city they're based in, and that we've broken form by getting taken over by a commercially minded entity. Prior to this the premier league was made up of clubs building up from the grassroots only, and players were volunteers! Fucking muppet. No we wouldn't be winning as many games without Saudi ownership, it's true. But without an American billionaire bailing them out, Sunderland wouldn't even fucking exist. So nelford_safc, we'll give up the Saudis if you lot collectively bin yourselves eh? EDIT - actually I take that back, their obsession is that fucking deep I suspect they'd probably take that offer and run with it. Better not to exist in a world where Newcastle don't win things, than to exist in one where we do.

I think what he's attempting to do is to reassure his own players that even though they are loathed by their fanbase, it's possible to turn that around - and then suggested that we were rounding on our own players (the ones who were pre-takeover) but that the situation has totally flipped now because the team earned it. It's a fair enough point I guess but I'm not really sure what the Everton fans are serving up so it's hard to compare.

You have my total respect for this post and what you've expressed here. I'm sorry for what you went through - and indeed what you're still going through, but you're taking all the right steps here I think. Forgiveness is an understandable and laudable goal for precisely the reason you've set out - I think you're approaching this correctly and I wish you the very best in tackling it. You'll make it through this mate.

Our thread for this game was 22 pages. Their thread is 28. It's the usual stuff by and large, screams of 'we're lucky', Desperate cries of FTM, someone who doesn't like Murphy's face, etc. And a lot of this: It's a lot of stuff like this. The desperation to self delude on evidence here man. The idea that he thinks we don't know he is absolutely fucking dying inside. It is D fucking lectable.

Apparently because it came off someone's elbow, he won't get an assist for that. Ludicrous. Amazing stuff from the lads. We are in the champions league man, it's fucking done. We are fucking back.

Please, please let them come up Just to watch the fear when they realise that reality will at some point that season crash through their fucking doors. Most likely twice. That said, I don't see it. They're maybe not too far off but even so.

Confident of a win after watching that? Lunatics.

This was a great day like. I really enjoyed this one. I remember a few years back, think when Rafa had just taken over, a Spurs fan came on here and started ripping into us ahead of the game. We won 5-1 or something despite having just been relegated the day before. Strangely he didn't come back post-match. I imagine he's on suicide watch at the moment

I do think we should at least Brazil them after that start tbh.

CT was spot on with this one mind.

It's bringing benefit fraud to the top of the list of targets, and very intentionally doing so. There are plenty of other targets they could have gone after, I am quite sure. As I said though, it's beyond me to care at this point. It is what it is.