Rayvin

What's so appealing about Brentford away, exactly? Is it just nearer for you guys..? Which would be odd since (Fish) you live at a different end of the country now.

I recall someone saying earlier on in the season that Rafa has always been particularly successful against bigger clubs (i.e. those who are prepared to attack rather than sit behind the ball). I'd expect that to be ideal for next year, but there's certainly an unwillingness on his part to really force the issue when we need a goal. That said, one more game and Shelvey is back now, so let's just hope that we can squeak a win against Brentford and then move upwards and onwards.

He isn't going to sell up without his debt repaid. He won't just write it off. And with the debt factored in, we're not an attractive option. We need to go up, pay off the debt, and then he'll finally leave us. That said, I'm not all that bothered about him being here at the moment since he seems to have learned some lessons.

Superb and depressing. To think we passed that up for identity politics and ended up with the right wing fake version ripping off the same ideas without the follow through. The world won't be fucking told, sadly. I'd rather be an idealistic fuckwit than willfully blind

I'm far, FAR too careful for that. I meant more the situation he had with me, rather than one I have. I have no intention of raising any children which then can be weaponised against me

This is going to be a long running thread isn't it?

I dunno, I don't know much about them but given my own situation (and that of my father's) I've always had sympathy.

Tbf that'll just be one guy from their twitter account (F4J I mean). As for Simpson, he sounds like a total arsehole.

Sturgeon with an interesting gambit here - shelving a quick referendum in favour of soft brexit: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/jan/06/nicola-sturgeon-offers-shelve-independence-vote-for-soft-brexit-eu

Don't think we even need to spend £33m... I'd rather most of that was kept back for next year. We could probably get by spending £10m on cover for Shelvey and just leave it there.

Can you imagine having sufficient assets and liquidity to be able to put £33m into a football club on short notice... the guy is beyond wealthy.

...who'd have thought that inbred gay bars and phoenix's would have so much in common.

Not sure... he's local and 'gets the fans'. That seems to count for a lot with club PR departments if nothing else.

Maybe he's minded to sell again.

Who came back and said they wanted £30m £13m for a 34 year old and £30m for a guy who was bought for £500k over the summer. Fucking hell.

Dunno actually, thinking about this from West Ham's point of view, the money is getting significant now. They may conclude that they can pick him up in the summer, for nothing, and on lower wages. Moreover, if Defoe hands in a transfer request, all the negotiating power is back with West Ham. They can turn around and say 'actually we'll only give you £50k'. It's not like Defoe would be able to undo what he did - so I imagine he might be reluctant to hand one in.

I'm with you up until the point where £55m gives them a Championship winning side. I don't think it would... Certainly not with Sunderland track record. But otherwise yeah, I think that's a good analysis. Certainly doesn't look worth the risk to Defoe, if he stays.

Maybe that's Ashley's real legacy here.

Will Sunderland accept that though, I guess is what this comes down to. They'd struggle not to, I think.

I agree tbh, it's not my thing and I don't post there. I just happen to think that's a good thread

For the first point, maybe think of it more in terms of expectation. I honestly think many people agree with your assertion that the club is in a better position, with a better manager, than we've seen for some time. Which is probably why puzzlement is coming in that we're struggling to break teams down and win convincingly albeit without our best player. The last few weeks have been an unpleasant reality check and not everyone deals with such things by looking forward optimistically. Some people need to work through it by criticising the mistakes - and to be fair, Rafa has not adapted a system that has failed us on a couple of occasions now. He will have his reasons for this, but until these reasons become 'self evident', people are going to become unsettled (especially given that the Colback - Anita axis has been tried and has failed so many times in the past). If he was changing it up and we were losing I think we could all agree that experimenting with formations has a price. But we all know that the strategy he employed against Blackburn doesn't work with the players he used. For the second point, I can only suggest that it will take some time for the mentality of fans to change. Remember how shit it's been and how little fucks were given about us for the last decade. You've mentioned it was justified previously and isn't now, but it'll take time for that to work its way through.

Mikel is 29, mind...