The Fish

They would have been much better off going down in 2013 imo. Clear out a load of shit (that are still there), cash in on Johnson, Fletcher, Mignolet etc. Get rid of Di Canio and bring in someone who isn't a massive fascist mad heed. Rowett? Adkins? Dyche? A year to reinvent themselves before the gap between Premier League and Championship sides gets too big. Aye that's fair enough. I'm probably being too generous to a man that has, by most measures, failed. Even with the cards stacked against him he hasn't exactly made a good fist of it. Also, stating in August that you're in a relegation fight is a sackable offence imo.

Deadpool was an 18, Logan a 15. The Studios seem to be finally realising they can still make a shit load whether the PG the shit out of character who's a straight up Serial Killer or actually let him be as he was originally written. Mostly from Nerdlingers like me.

Why I've always enjoyed Marvel more than DC. Deadpool had a few characters questioning his choices, but because the 4th wall was broken so often I couldn't really buy into this reality, so when his girlfriend asks why he left her, I didn't think "because he couldn't bear to see him like this", I thought "Well, to set up the big climactic battle silly". Outside of the 4th wall breaking and the humour, it was just another Superhero origin movie. Character intro->bit of a fracas->peril->all is lost->comes to terms with being a superhero->success despite adversity->kiss a girl. But, if Superhero movies can be disposable and hilarious like Deadpool or actually a story like Logan each time, I'm happy enough.

Never been a better indictment of the strength of their squad that missing Lee fucking Cattermole has been pivotal

Honestly, I think he could be a good fit for them. I think the fans have turned though and there's pretty much no chance of coming back from that. For the record I don't think he's very good, just think the underlying issues are countless and deep rooted and all criticism of him should be tempered with that caveat?

What did you think of Deadpool?

It is pretty hilarious that we all said that tongue in cheek, but it looks entirely true. I thought maybe those 6 points would come from Swansea, Burnley or whomever, but nope, they needed a match to get up for and needed a side to wilt under that pressure as we did.

Well, aye maybe. But not a manager that would have entertained joining Sunderland, not considering the plight they're in; No players, no money, not even enough players good who're enough to sell for enough money to fund the kind of recruitment that was needed. A disrupted preseason and a lengthy list on the treatment table. Moyes is bad, but he's about as good as Sunderland could hope to attract, surely? Don't think his position has been helped by the board, I mean how much did they spend in the January window, when it was obvious to every man and his dog they were in serious trouble but still in touching distance of safety? They were 18th then, 2pts behind Palace. Since then they've dropped to 20th, scored 7 and only won 6pts. Surely with a bit of money spent in January even Moyes could have got more from the reinvigorated squad?

Pipe down, you Beachbum Berry Total Tiki Twat.

Wasn't Marvel Studios, but it's a Marvel product and certainly operates more like their own in-house movies, than it does Sony's and Fox's. Didn't want to seem too Marvel fan-boy.

Aye, and while Logan was very Shane at times at least it was a bit of a departure. Curious as to how, armed with the confidence to strike out away from those formula, the big stables will approach establish properties like Thor and Spider-Man, and how they'll handle fresh properties like Black Panther and Ms Marvel.

To be fair, he might not have signal on the 9th hole.

Reckon if Moyes had had a full preseason he would have got them more points, but £25m isn't a huge amount for the presumptive favourites for relegation to spend to try and fix their squad. Still dunno why they didn't re-sign M'Vila who seemed important for them last year. Like @@Rayvin says, this season is just the end result of years of mismanagement from the top down.

Could have been mint, but DC (Batman/Superman/WonderWoman et al) seem 5 years behind Marvel at the minute. Hoping Wonder Woman nails it, not only because it'll be the first successful female lead superhero movie, but it'll hopefully show DC how to get it right for the modern audiences. People enjoyed Nolan's Batman trilogy and the Marvel movies because they spent time establishing the character(s) rather than just tossing them straight into the action. I thought Man of Steel was going that way, but too quickly they dumped the interesting origins and relied on destruction porn to distract the audience from the lack of any meaningful story. For me, Marvel's epiphany was to stop following the same formula for every movie. Yes AntMan was another Origin story, but at it's heart it's a heist movie. Guardians of the Galaxy is a Space Opera, Logan is a Western, Winter Soldier is more a Spy thriller than anything else. That's why Nolan's Batman movies worked. They didn't feel like any superhero movie you'd seen before. Unfortunately, DC threw that out the window and have gone back to; drag protagonists to big city, have mindless monsters smash it up a bit, protagonists stop McGuffin, big fight lots of damage, yay we won. I realise you didn't ask and don't care Guarantee the Justice League will see Batman et al go up against a legion of baddies that, once the big bad is killed/banished/exorcised all fuck off/die/revert to normal.

So distracted by the shamble in the White House that when I heard about this I though, "Oh yeah! I forgot they also did this shit". Looking forward to hearing Trump's carefully considered, measured, response to this tragedy.

Dunno like, Moyes' biggest problem was a disrupted pre-season in the wake of Allardyce's exit. Say Allardyce stayed, he knows that squad, who needs replacing/getting rid of, the players know his style of play. I don't think Moyes is a terrible manager, I just think he's not good enough, to do well enough, quickly enough, with the shitshow he inherited. He wouldn't have lead them to the top half, but I reckon he'd certainly have got more points on the board than Ol' Big Eyes.

They do, undoubtedly. I think Fat Sam is a very limited manager, with a massive ego. Where Pulis seems stoic and a little humble, Allardyce genuinely thinks that the only reason he's not had a shot at a "big" job is that he's part of the old British manager coterie. Where in fact the reasons are legion. He has one style of play and when it works it can undo much, much better sides, but it will also often come hopelessly unstuck against very average sides. It's negative, it's boring, it's inflexible and ultimately he values not losing over winning. Because he goes out intending to get a point, he'll rarely do better than c1.2PpG, which is good enough for about 46pts in a Premier League season(around 13-14th). The Crystal Palace side he's inherited will likely see flair replaced with function and they'll likely end up around 13th-14th for a few seasons before pressure from the fans force Allardyce out.

Don't disagree with any of this. We've a very good record against sides in the middle 3rd, best in the division in fact. 2.31PpG over 13 games, only losing once and we've only failed to score once in these games (Wolves). Brighton have dropped 14 points from a possible 36 in games against midtable sides. I'm hoping that those we meet (Ips, Pre, Car, Bar) have all clocked off for the summer. And looking at the table, they should have; Ipswich are 9pts clear of 22nd with 15 to play for, and they've 4 teams between them and danger. Preston are 8pts off the Play Off spots and by the time we meet them they may have already run out of time. Cardiff are as mid-table as it gets, 15pts off the drop, 14pts off the Play Offs. They'll have their boots off and the flip flops on, surely? Finally, last game of the season, at home, Barnsley. They'll have nowt to play for, hopefully we'll be either gunning for the top spot, or parading the trophy. I'd also say that Brighton have to face Norwich and Villa, who are better teams than their league position, imo.

A decent player would just bend it over or round it man

To be honest, I do think Allardyce would have had them further up the table. Not midtable as some predict, but he'd have got them within a win or two of safety at this point, I reckon. Same as he's done with Palace. I think it's fair to say his ability is hugely overstated on RTG, but his football will keep limited squads up.

That sounds all right to me. Which one do you use?