HKP90

Don't make my bonfire all wet and smelly.

Not on official site yet.

OMG that is the best signing we could possibly have made.

Not sure I understand. It would not be their place to object on those grounds, it would be Everton's, no?

How about a rusty starfish?

Agree 100% with all of this.

To be fair that will work. I'm pretty sure I won't give two shits if we achieve either of those things. If we get both I won't give 4 shits (22 shits)

Next year Morgan is gonna be Grealish level, i'm telling you. Him and Ollie are like, in a tree, or something (i've forgotten how the rhyme goes tbh).

Lucky he didn't credit Klopp for being in the same country that Rogers grew up in.

We are supporters. We don't change any situation by doing anything. Why post anything at all by that criterion?

In fairness the new new badge has grown on me a little bit. It's not as good as the old new badge, but better than the old old badge.

I'm not sure I take much in the way of comfort from that.

Looking unprofessional is H-i-larious.

It's Villa, I think we know which will turn up. See Man U for details. We'll just have to be better. At least we'll have had a bit of a breather.

Spurs don't play til Sunday, so if we could get a result here, and it's by no means certain,we would be 9 points ahead. They would be under immense pressure to go to Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool and get results. Please choke spurs, please choke.

I think that's why they just come out with a ruling on those rather than referring the ref, but I would like to see what calibration they use, as in several of the shots showing the lines, they run over Wan Bissaka's foot.

That was the 'clearly incorrect' element. VAR made a decision to overrule the onfield decision, which was a goal, when they did not have the clear evidence that the goal was offside. That was just wrong.

At least it would allow you to set up your HDR levels on your TV. 'Increase brightness until badge is barely visible'.

Referees won't call out their own mistakes when they are presented with an opportunity to reinforce their credibility. They will think it makes them look weak (even though it would actually show qualities of self criticism, which is a strength). It will also I'm sure be monitored, so if they make a number of mistakes, it will add to a database of their errors which will reduce the chance that they get more work. The system as is allows refs to delegate responsibility to VAR, which is exactly what they are doing. The only way I see VAR actually offering any help, is as a tool, to be used by referees at their own judgment at the side of the pitch, without the referral. That way refs can use it to bolster their own decision making, without implication of error.

Sigh.

Well yeah, but when bad refereeing is not just influencing, but deciding the outcomes of games, particularly a cup semi final, the human error continuum is tilted to the point of being inflected. And it's every bloody week. Not expecting 100% accuracy, but I don't think it's beyond the realms of whimsy to expect 'mostly accurate', or 'occasionally inaccurate'. That's two big games games ruined in one day. By their own figures, which are likely to be wild underestimates, the Premier League have recorded 20 VAR incidents alone- that's 20 incidents which have been considered in slow motion, by multiple cameras for minutes on end- that have been incorrect. And that does not include incorrect calls by refs that were ineligible for VAR review.

Why? It is their job to get decisions correct. No-one is expecting 100% accuracy, but to have (in the case of the Notts forest game) at least two potentially game altering decisions made incorrectly- potentially earning them a draw and a point toward survival, and (in the Coventry game) to have the principal outcome of the game REVERSED due to an incorrect decision that was reviewed by at least 3 officials- sending the wrong team to a cup final, is imo......unacceptable.

Problem is that manager's jobs are on the line, and appear to be dictated by the incompetence of referees and VAR. If my livelihood even tangentially revolved around someone outside of my control who, because they were not good enough to do their job, could result in my dismissal, you gotta know that I am calling them out in no uncertain terms. I don't think referee abuse should be tolerated, but they absolutely should be called out if they cannot do their job. As much as managers have a responsibility to not abuse match officials, referees have a responsibility to not be shit. Which they demonstrably are. You see it on MOTD all the time. About half of the summary of every game now is- so and so got this decision wrong. The standard of refereeing in this country (and elsewhere as we saw against Lille) is itself wholly unacceptable.

Yes.

I think the main issue is that everyone expected that when VAR came in, the results would be empirical, and definitive. When arguments were being made against it's introduction, I heard lots of 'it will take too long', and 'it will take the spontaneity out of the game', 'break the flow' etc. I didn't hear many folks say 'it might still be wrong after review' or 'it's almost if not as subjective as the on-field decision'. The backlash from Notts Forest smacks of frustration with the process to me. The negatives were generally accepted- slow down, inability to properly celebrate etc as long as in the end the decision is right. What we're now realising after some time in practice is that you can get the slow down, break in play and STILL get the answer wrong. What's more, it's made everything even less transparent, because VAR officials are locked away somewhere doling out judgement, but we don't even see them (I know we know who the officials are, but they are invisible to the fans on the pitch). It's less accountable. In spite of the ham fisted way they have gone about this, I actually do still have sympathy with Notts Forest. They are playing a game of fine margins, and are realising that VAR is still missing big decisions. I really really feel for Coventry. What a shambles that was. The media have come out this morning (Phil McNulty on the BBC) saying that questioning the competence of officials is fine, but questioning their integrity is completely unacceptable. In Notts Forest/Coventry's defence, it's very hard to take that at face value when you see VAR decisions, which are meant to be definitive, being wrong, and on the side of the 'bigger club'. Honestly, I think VAR has been a disaster, and while I know we're now down the rabbit hole, probably never to return, I would scrap it all in a heartbeat. We always used to moan about refs being rubbish. It's only more recently that (rightly or wrongly) we're talking about corruption. The opacity of VAR is imo a big part of that.