David Kelly

I thought they only had that keeper on loan last season so were back to the T Rex this year? I totally get Polarboy's point about Everton. Their spending and alledged targets have been so far very modest (even if they haven't been poor signings). After recent seasons, even taking Covid into account, I can't see their fans being happy. If they get off to a poor start Rafa could certainly be feeling the heat.

I forgot about him as a striker long before that.

Lejeune and Muto were out on loan all last season, Atsu was only available for half the season (but didn't play) as he didn't get a squad place for the first half and on the odd ocasion that Carroll was fit, bagpuss still wouldn't play him even when Wilson was out. So if we do get Willock we're not really down on last season. Technically we still have Woodman and Watts available to so you could argue we are up. It's still not near enough when you see the amount Hendrick and Gayle have had to play in preseason mind.

We could do with an upgrade in every position in the playing, managerial & coaching and administration staff but we absolutely need reinforcements in midfield and up front.

I still can't work out why we want another centreback. We have Lascelles, Schar, Fernandez, Clark and Dummett or Hayden who could easily fill in before we had to resort to Krafth or Watts. How many do we need? Whereas when Wilson inevitably picks up an injury we're now down to Joelinton and Gayle who keep proving they're not up to this level. The need for midfielder is obvious but so is the need for extra up front yet our glorious leaders still can't grasp this. Absolutely staggering.

Vauhagn has been pretty scathing about Sibley and Lawrence not being test standard and it's hard to argue with him. The thing is, I'm not sure which of the players, other than Root, Stokes, Broad and Anderson, and probably Woakes, are. The young players just aren't improving and the likes of Bairstow, Buttler and Ali keep looking like they are just white ball specialists. The ECB's focus on white ball competitions definitely isn't helping. The Ashes is a frightening prospect currently.

Now that I'd happily watch.

As bad as we have been, and it looks like we will be worse this season, it has to be better than Love Island.

Jesus that’s awful. Hopefully they got to him quick enough.

Yeah they seem to be going though everyones social media content now retrospectively but if they are going to police what people say on social media they really need to be a lot more proactive about it.

I think what they've anounced in terms of his suspension is probably a bit over the top. A better wording may have just been that he's been took out of the spotlight until it's thoroughly investigated. They only needed to do it for the next match and then Stokes, Woakes & Curran should all be available for the India series so they can easily excuse him not playing on the basis that while he did very well in the match he played, those players are currently ahead of him in the queue anyway. That gives them plenty of time to investigate and impose a reasonable sanction/punishment. I do feel though that they've went down the route they have so as to be seen to taking it incredibly seriously. They've had criticism for stopping taking the knee then they made a big thing about the moment of inclusion or whatever before the game. Added to that the case of the two umpires and that of Azeem Rafiq, I think they will have just thought we have to be seen to be doing something serious.

I also think he should be used to go around teaching children and other young players what he's learned.

Yeah but that needs to be investigated and confirmed. Him just saying it because he's been caught out isn't really going to carry much weight.

There's a massive difference between making a shit joke or just saying something offensive that you didn't mean to and being an EDL member looking for a fight with minorities. People can certainly be educated out of the former but it's a lot more difficult to expect pricks like Tommy Robison to change.

I know, it's not something to revel in though.

It's interesting that the only two people I've actually heard say that he should be banned or that Boris and Dowden should pipe down are Carberry and Ramprakash. Carberry saying that he shouldn't play cricket again seems absolutely ridiculous but he's obviously felt the effects of racism like most of us never have or will. Ramprakash said if Moeen or Rashid had been part of the team last week this would have been a massive issue in the dressing room. I think we have to consider there is quite a problem within sport in this country and if they want to attract minorities into the game they have to do something more than wear a t-shirt or take the knee. That said, while I can understand the ECB suspending Robinson while they conduct an investigation (something they surely should be doing before they call a player up in the first place) a long term ban for someone posting some offensive tweets when they were 18 and probably pissed would be way over the top. After all Stokes bust some kids jaw in a nightclub and is a national hero. People in all walks of life make mistaes and commit crimes and are allowed to be rehabilitated. Robinson hasn't even commited a crime.

Suprised that these cricketers aren't clever enough to delete their old dodgy tweets. It's the type of behaviour I'd expect from Premiership footballers.

Whilst far from being in a rage about this, I really don't think it's something to be laughing at. It just screams shit club.

You're pushing it with midtable aren't you? I used to play Champ Man as Huddersfield because I knew they'd been a successful team years ago (won the league 3 years in a row I think the song goes) but were absolutely nothing as a club at the time. I didn't mean it as an insult to Hudderfield but any supporters who could remember their success (given it was in the 1920's it was unlikely there was many even back in the 90's) might see it as a pisstake that they have fallen to that point. I think this is where Howaymanheyman was coming from. It's Ashley that's insulting us by dragging us down to this level not Griezman for picking us.

I enjoyed that but it was pretty relentlessly grim.

Much better session this one like. Looked like the match was drifiting away.

I was bored at work last week so had a scan through RTG and they had a thread about this very thing. While there was certainly some on there talking down this shit, there was a ridiculous amount seriously blaming this for their failure to get out of that league again. Their level of self delusion is staggering. I'm sure we might have mentioned at the start of our last season in the championship that there might be a few teams who will see playing us as a massive thing but it's not something that was used as an excuse for every time we dropped points. And had we failed to go up we wouldn't have kept bleating on about it four years later!

The defence and goal keeping situation is definitely the most like reason for our failure this summer. Apart from rightback we look appalling.

Let's face it, no one would have heard of Max Power were it not for his magazine.

I think that all depends on if it's the last one. If it is then the whole thing has been a waste of time.