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Gemmill

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Everything posted by Gemmill

  1. Started Kin last night on iplayer. First episode was alright. Started that Breathless thing about the NHS during COVID too. Obviously I never worked in a hospital but certainly transported you back to that time as we approached lockdown for the first time. You've already got the likes of Bev Turner on twitter rubbishing it and slagging off the doctor that wrote the book on which it's based. We have some genuinely appalling people in the public eye in this country. With decent sized followings.
  2. He was an absolute beast at Italia 90 if my then 14 year old's brain is recalling correctly.
  3. One of the things they measure btw is the last time the player sprinted at full speed. They know every player's top speed and they use the last sprint at top speed as a proxy for full fitness when a player is getting back from an injury. Also I think to spot when someone is not being completely honest about their fitness. I think it proves both physical conditioning but also that the player believes they're back to full fitness. Anyway, back to your stat mocking, you filthy rats!
  4. The way you lot scoff at data, it can hardly be considered a brag at all. Maybe later when I post it on the PowerBItastic forum.
  5. That last point is a genuine live possibility, that Man United refuse to pay what we deem is an appropriate sum, the bloke sits on gardening leave, and they have to look elsewhere. I don't think it was avoidable that the bloke end up on gardening leave at least for a period of time, but he COULD have done something like said to Staveley etc, "look I'm interested, of course I am, but I understand that I have a contractual situation that needs to be resolved. What about if I take a back seat for a month while formal discussions take place, and if an agreement can't be reached then I'm more than happy to continue with the project here." He's put himself right out on a limb as it stands. I mean he's getting paid £28k a week apparently so it's not any great hardship he's facing. Maybe I just don't understand the level of freedom that sort of situation affords you. From memory, I'm sure the talk at the time was that Brighton were very amenable to our approach because we handled it in a completely professional way, going to them before initiating any contact with Ashworth etc. Contrast that to what's happened here. At the very least Ashworth could have said - "look I'm under contract to NUFC, I want this done properly. Speak to the club first."
  6. I know Newcastle have massively overhauled their approach to what goes on internally with regards to data. Player training loads, data from all training sessions, testing player strength in each leg and trying to address imbalances etc. I know the bloke who built it all for them and he's shown me the dashboards and the attention to detail is insane. He reckoned both Ashworth and Howe were obsessive at least about this side of data. I suppose if Ashworth was mainly looking to identify youth talent, then the stats won't be there to lean on, but aye who knows what went on at Brighton, or how much of what Waugh is saying is accurate, but he has never come across as a Billy bullshitter or someone who will jump to conclusions on things. Waugh definitely makes it clear that Howe had final say on signings.
  7. According to Waugh's latest, the LUDDITE Ashworth favoured a scouting/opinion-based approach to identifying player talent, rather than a more objective, data-driven one. The owners/management are keen to look to data to try to avoid any costly mistakes, especially given the FFP situation starting to bite. Which will be music to the ears of Toontastic, I'm sure. Especially the old guard who absolutely love the analytical side of things.
  8. I got setting for the first time a couple of years ago. On the finger. You wouldn't request a repeat performance but it wasn't that bad. I'd take one over a headache or a bad hangover.
  9. He's issued a detailed response apparently but the only person I can see reporting it is Peston, and his write up is unreadable.
  10. Spot on. As it stands, this bloke's contract puts him on gardening leave for the thick end of 2 years. It's entirely up to Man United whether they want to pay to shorten that, but it's no skin off our nose if he stops in the house for the next two years, so they WILL have to pay a sum that we're happy with or wait until 2026. If they refuse to pay, our lot will be all over the possibility of him working for them while we're paying him.
  11. WHEN Manchester United needed a new defender, they quite happily paid Leicester City £80m to sign Harry Maguire. A midfielder? Why not spend £82m to prise Antony from Ajax? A new centre-forward? Here’s £75m to sign Romelu Lukaku from Everton. And that was back in 2017. None of the above helped address the long-term malaise that has set in at Old Trafford over the last decade or so, so rather than blow the budget on yet another big-name player, Sir Jim Ratcliffe has sensibly decided that his first move as part-owner of Manchester United should be the acquisition of a world-class sporting director capable of overhauling the club’s entire transfer policy. If he’s deemed to be that important, though, it’s surely only logical that Ratcliffe will have to pay top dollar to get him. If an error-prone centre-half is priced at £80m, what is the value of someone who can ensure that similar sums are not wasted in the future? Twice that? Four times as much? That’s not the sporting world we live in, but it makes the point. All of which brings us to Dan Ashworth, and the current stand-off between Newcastle United and Manchester United over the former’s sporting director. Manchester United want Ashworth to be the driving force behind the INEOS-led restructuring of the club’s recruitment operation. Ashworth wants to be allowed to swap St James’ Park for Old Trafford. So far, so simple. But, understandably, Newcastle’s executive team do not really want to lose the figure they entrusted to lead their own rebuilding project. And if he is to go, they want to ensure they are properly compensated for the inconvenience of having to recruit a second new sporting director in the space of two years, not to mention the possible damage caused by the departure of someone with detailed knowledge of the club’s transfer policy to a leading rival. Newcastle are understood to be demanding compensation of more than £20m, but the initial indication is that Manchester United’s new owners regard that as much too high. Really? Is upwards of £20m too much to pay for someone who is being appointed in the hope of completely transforming the way an entire club operates? Pay £100m for a striker, and you might get a few goals over the course of the next couple of years. Appoint a world-class sporting director – and for all that his record at Newcastle is chequered, with major question marks hanging over the summer signings of Sandro Tonali and Lewis Hall, that is how Ashworth is regarded within Premier League circles – and you have the potential to supercharge your club’s fortunes for decades. Newcastle are right to dig their heels in over Ashworth, not least because a large compensation fee potentially has major repercussions when it comes to the club’s ongoing attempts to stay on the right side of the Premier League’s profit and sustainability rules. If Newcastle receive more than £20m for their sporting director – the vast majority of which will be entered as profit on the P&S balance sheet – it potentially negates the need to sell a big-name player in order to fund purchases this summer. Allow Ashworth to leave for £5m, and you might be waving goodbye to Bruno Guimaraes at the end of the season. Bank £25m instead, and you might be able to sign a new striker while still keeping the Brazilian midfielder on the books. And who are one of the clubs consistently championing the current FFP rules, largely because it enables them to retain their own privileged position as one of the Premier League’s biggest spenders? Manchester United, of course, desperate to keep upstarts like Newcastle in their box while they continue to outspend pretty much every team in the league even though they have not really challenged for the title since the days of Sir Alex Ferguson. Having made a set of rules that encourage clubs to hold out for the maximum possible fee for anyone that leaves them while under contract, it is disingenuous of Manchester United to start wailing and moaning just because they are having to live by them. One more figure to throw into the mix. £14.5m. That is the sum, comprised of a loan fee and a Premier League survival bonus, that Manchester United were demanding when Newcastle wanted to sign Jesse Lingard on loan for the final four months of the 2022-23 season. £14.5m for four months of football from a fringe winger who left Manchester United as a free agent five months after Newcastle were quoted that figure, and who is now plying his trade in the South Korean league with FC Seoul. That was an outrageous attempt to overinflate the value of an employee who was wanted by a Premier League rival. Newcastle’s demands for more than £20m for Ashworth are anything but.
  12. They've finally made an official approach apparently. Staveley:
  13. There's almost certainly going to be a memo comes to light over the next few days. Hopefully Staunton is sitting on some bombshell and just waiting for her to embarrass herself and get all of her lies on record.
  14. Claiming she's "proven" that Staunton is lying (just by saying that he is) and claiming there's no evidence that compensation claims have been delayed. The evidence is that no one has had their compensation.
  15. Badenoch is detestable. I hope they make her leader cos no one is gonna warm to this walking attitude.
  16. Yep. We'll be paying for two people in the same post, but not the end of the world.
  17. It sounds like he might have left rather than being sacked. No official announcement yet but some reports that he wasn't happy with things and jacked it.
  18. 4 points off the playoffs and they're gonna let the assistant take charge to the end of the season. Madness.
  19. They've just finished building a new ward big enough to measure my knob.
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