Is Steve Mclaren free?

LarryDavid wrote:

They've been poor recently, no doubt. But outright sacking seems wrong. Arrange a 'mutual consent' thing at least.

And two of those teams you mentioned got to their position of relative stability by sticking with their managers (B'mouth & Burnley). If they've got a plan in place and are confident of a quality replacement then it might work out, otherwise they could end up with a half-season disaster manager before Fat Sam or someone comes in to give them a quotation on a relegation avoidance job.

I think the balance though is they’ve had stability but are on the wrong side of the curve. Sticking feels like accepting doom as acceptable.

Having a look through the past 10 seasons. 36 points is enough to stay up in 7 of them, but nearly always puts the team in 16th/17th.
I think it is just too close, especially given that Fulham were absolute shite and Huddersfield just not a Premier League standard, both dropping very early.

Looking at the teams coming up,  think they will pose a bigger threat next season.

It seems cut throat but this is the best time to make a change. Get it done early, get in while having the pick of managers and get the best out of the transfer window and summer training.

Claude Puel!

IT'S PARTY TIME AND NOT ONE MINUTE WE CAN LOSE



SCOTTY ARFIELD

I was thinking about the final fixtures in the prem this year, and given such a close battle between Man City and Liverpool, it's a shame the final games weren't more competitive (for City in particular) - or ideally against each other.
This got me thinking, maybe the league should be more selective around the final games of the season to try to engineer potential big last-game shenanigans?
I'm thinking maybe top 2 from season before should face each other on last day, and/or the top 6 are randomly drawn against each other. Similarly, the bottom 3 teams that survive go into the mix with the 3 promoted teams, increasing the chances of a relegation decider on the last day.
I remember watching the liverpool-arsenal title decider from 89, that's how leagues should finish!

They’d need more than 12000 fans first. City used to get gates of 50k when they were in division 3.

City couldn't even manage 28k for their FA Cup semi this season could they?

Yeah fair enough. Still can’t see the town of Bournemouth being a draw for big names like.

Bournemouth can be nice but footballers dont like nice, they like gaudy shite.
The only people with worse taste than footballers are rich Arabs and Russian oligarchs.

It can be done, who'd have though Shakhtar Donetsk would be a popular destination with Brazilians? They created the restaurants, salons, shopping centre etc. Basically whatever a Brazilian footballer needs other than hot weather and a beach. It works for them.

Kernowgaz wrote:

So word is, Hazard to Real Madrid to be announced after the Europa League Final.

Not really a surprise. He deserves a stage like that for his peak years. Hopefully levy will be a bastard to Madrid over eriksen so they take pogba off us instead.

Some Italian papers mooted a swap deal of Dybala for Alexis Sanchez. Who ever could pull off that deal for utd would deserve all an MBE for that effort.

It’ll be a TWO YEAR BAN*


*suspended.

[font=nyt-imperial, georgia, "times new roman", times, serif]P.S.G. and UEFA have a tangled relationship. The team’s owners also run beIN Sports, the broadcaster that is UEFA’s biggest media rights buyer. Both the club and beIN Sports are run by Nasser al-Khelaifi, a Qatari national who was elected to a position on UEFA’s executive board earlier this year.[/font]

Let's hope they are CL banned, that will really sting. More so than a transfer ban or fine.