Rival watch

Alternatively, remember when QPR's pornographically wealthy new owners showed up...?

 

Can't agree more. I don't think many people quite understand what they are dealing with - when Arabs say they are going to get something done it gets done by any means necessary. If you had said 10-15 years ago the UAE would shift from a largely oil-based economy to a tourism-based one you'd have been laughed at.

In my view Newcastle are only 2 or 3 good transfer windows away from being able to challenge for top 4.

 

Depending on what they do in January, there is currently a strong possibility Newcastle could go down this season.

I'd say City, Chelsea and Pool would desperately want that as they're the current sides who are favourites to win the title for this and probably next season, if Toon go down then that'll buy them all probably another two years of being the only challengers.

Though if Toon buy smartly in January (they won't sign elite players just yet, but some solid Prem players would likely go there, think Tarkowski is on their radar) and add a good manager then I'd imagine they'll stay up and go big in the summer which would then begin to cause panic amongst the current big three.

 

One thing we haven't seen yet is monied clubs signing players to keep other monied clubs from having them

We've seen monied clubs signing players to prevent non-monied clubs having them (i.e. Parker, Barklay or Drinkwater for Chelsea, Rodwell or Sinclair for The Sheikh Mansour Team - and, in the pre-billionaire days, Man Utd were also quite happy to do it) and we've seen monied clubs signing players from clubs around them who can't compete with them financially to nobble them (i.e. Tevez, Clichy, Nasri, Adebayor, Sterling, Walker, Mahrez...anyone notice these are all headed to the same team?) but we haven't had an arms race where they spend entire windows trying to screw one another over

This used to happen a lot between Juve, Milan and Inter back before the Serie A bubble burst fifteen years ago, which on a couple of occasions succeeded so well that it allowed Lazio and Roma to win the title (which was somehow both not the intention yet exactly what they intended to do, ironically enough) so I wonder if there's going to be a lot of gazumping going on to keep Mag-pa'eda in their box for a season or two to see if their owner rage quits or not

 

Club statement from Bournemouth on David Brooks, who has been diagnosed with Hodgkin Lymphoma:
https://www.afcb.co.uk/news/first-team/club-statement-david-brooks/

He's only 24. Very good player who has been troubled with injuries and now this.
Out of contract in the summer and I assumed he'd be moving on.
Hopefully he'll recover quickly and fully. The club will almost certainly do the right thing by him, too.

 

100% they won’t go down. They’ll get in players in January that would walk into most PL sides and then next summer they’ll probably properly become a force and get the huge name to let everyone know they’re serious.

 

It's highly unlikely but I wouldn't completely rule it out.

I think a lot depends on who takes over from Bruce once he's inevitably sacked and who they do target in January.

Pre-takeover I think there were probably about 6-7 sides who would be fearing the drop, the newly promoted ones and then Newcastle, Burnley, Palace and Southampton would also be in the mix. I still think that's more or less the case but if Newcastle do add smartly then they should be safe. I can see them primarily targetting the best players in the bottom half of the table (Tarkowski has actually been linked and then players like Zaha, Ward-Prowse, Phillips, Bissouma, Dunk, Aubameyang ) and then maybe one or two from clubs in European competition who'll fancy the lure of Tyne$ide.

 

For my estimate of when the Toon qualify for the CL. I simply
measured how many seasons it took for Citeh from day 1 of
their lottery win, then added an extra season to account for the
fact that the Toon face one more financially powerful incumbent
than Citeh did.

So 3 + 1 = 4, or the Toon will qualify for the CL for the 2025-26 season.
Before then, IMHO their owners have done even better.
After then (as I stated the other day) , I consider that to be failure.

One could do the same for the Toon qualifying for the EL,
and more speculatively for the EL2 (which is a decent initial target in itself) .

 

That's sad. My nephew is still battling this illness, over 6 years after being diagnosed. It's taken a significant toll on him and had he been an athlete, rather than a maths genius, he'd struggle to still be one today.

I hope Brooks makes a full and fast recovery. Good luck to the lad.

 

Hodgkins lymphoma is the more lethal form (my dad had non-Hodgkins) .
Hopefully Brooks at his current age and cumulative physical fitness will plough thru this.

 

Not football......but well done William Shatner....at 90. I half expected Spock to follow him off the returned capsule!!!!

 

Not a good day for players named Hernandez

- Theo tested positive for Covid after France's Nations League win
- Lucas becoming the second French LB this season with a prospective prison sentence hanging over him

Anyone know what Chicharito has been up to?

 

They should greet the capsule wearing planet of the Apes costumes and masks

 

Didn't they say the same thing about QPR and Fulham?

 

I wish him well; sad to hear.
Potential to be a very good player - and hopefully he still will be.

 

I don't know why he was so keen to go into space when he's spent so much time there before.

 

There's as much chance of them winning the league this season as there is them going down now.