The Fish

Back from the gym, house is unbearably hot, might go to the pub. I'll take the work phone, y'know, just in case...

Sacking the rest of the work day off, going to the gym for a swim and then sit in their air-conditioned cafe.

It's only 29 here, supposed to get up to 35, which isn't ideal for a little'un. It'll be the same or a little hotter tomorrow, but fuck it he's Nursery's problem then.

We'll probably overpay but, if the striker is 'worth' £40m to the market as a whole, and we end up paying £60m, that's fine. It's not like we're paying £6m for Riviere when he's worth 60p, the £40m winger will likely be much better than whatever we've got, right?

Why does the club captain need to be on the pitch? If his leadership qualities outweigh his footballing qualities, and there are other leaders on the pitch, what's the harm? I couldn't give a toss about who the club captain is, because I'm zen as fuck.

Forget about that Rosco, how many fucking tabs have you got open man?!

Captaincy doesn't just happen on the pitch to be fair. Can't see Lascelles starting many games ahead of Botman, Burn, or Schar.

Absolutely we should criticise their mistakes and missteps, but with 6 weeks left in the window, it'd be too harsh to judge this window negatively. Especially as we've signed a good left back, an upgrade on our first choice 'keeper and one of the most exciting young CBs in Europe. There will be a little naivety, e.g. Ekitike He wasn't massively keen on the move in January, plus Reims didn't want to sell. I don't think I would have spent as much time trying to agree terms with him, I'd probably have called off the pursuit earlier. I think Ashworth and now Eales will provide better guidance because of their experience. There's 6 weeks to go, plenty of time to bring in someone we've been linked with, but also available capital to take advantage of the carnage that tends to happen at the end of the window. I fully expect us to sign 2 players who ply their trade at the business end of the pitch. It might be a winger and an attacking midfielder, or it might be a striker and another. Either way I can't imagine we're done, not by a long stretch.

I honest to God LOL-ed 1 second after clicking play. Why is he recording it from there man?! Special mention for this gem "We all need to intergrind together"

They're not too bright from Blyth. When his mate told Big Dan to give the ref the finger, he did just that. A little Yubitsume humour there.

Hey Renton?

Not any more!

"Just looking at the Boots £4.90 meal deal, probably going to go for those apple slices. So, yeah, let me know what you'd get from Boots?" Taking notes for the next podcast, this is gold.

In a choice of who to invite somewhere, my sister is never top of anyone's list. Until NASA needs to plug up a wandering black hole.

I've never had hot chocolate.

Mrs Fish would think you're all awful. Apart from Martin, she likes Martin.

She drives me mental Scott. She broke a sofa leg and punched a hole through a floorboard by sitting down then said "It mustn't be built to take much weight"... I kept all this stuff quiet when I first started dating my Mrs, I didn't want to colour her first impressions if she ever met the sister. But now? My wife fucking hates her too A direct quote from Mrs Fish "If she calls me sis again, I'll fucking leave you"

Aye, my company got me a snazzy desk, and office chair, all the rests and guards and shit. When the heatwave was predicted an email went out almost immediately saying we could expense a desk fan (up to a reasonable amount).

Oh I did. Her defence was "But I don't have COVID, so they're fine". I mean, whatever this illness is, it has you coughing, and exhausted and sweating and feeling faint. You shouldn't be passing it on to two septuagenarians with health issues, should you? You're fourty fucking two. You don't need mammy to make you hot chocolate and dab your forehead. Fuck sake.

Get an email from my Dad saying my sister has COVID and they've had her stay with them so they could look after her. Soon as I could I phoned him to give him the kind of bollocking he gave me for setting off the fire alarm with a burnt cheese toasty at 3am. Why the fuck are they inviting COVID into their house when they're both high-risk?! Sister answers the call. Turns out she's not even had a fucking positive COVID test result, she just thinks she's got it... Still gave my Dad an earful though. It's really fucking stupid to invite someone you've been told has COVID into your house when you're an old fart who's had several seizures and hospital visits in the last 6 months. They're just not taking it seriously, I just don't understand it, especially when they know people who've died because of it.

Honestly, the melancholy flows through you like Matrix-code through Neo.

I'd also suggest the pools of talent we're fishing in for strikers is significantly different to that for wingers. I mean, we can conceivably sign a £25-£50m winger who would significantly improve our team, represent better value-for-money etc. Whereas a £25m-£50m strikers are; more in demand, a bigger risk etc. Same reason we can sign highly rated/high value defenders? Not necessarily connected, I'm just curious, would you lot rather sign a £50m striker and loan a winger, or sign a high value winger and loan a striker?

Yeah his number aren't great last season, but he's a good player imo and I think that many of the misses were a bit of bad luck. But he's not the finished article and if they won't budge on £50m, we should move on.