AstonMartin82

Sorry if this has been discussed already but there seems to be some confusion over how many places qualify for Europe. My understanding from the below link is that because Man Utd beat Brighton and it's a Man City Man Utd FA Cup final, and with Man Utd winning League Cup , then the top 7 now qualify for Europe? https://www.premierleague.com/european-qualification-explained

I thought someone would bring this up... So he was close to getting the job a couple of months ago and is now no where near getting it. Suggests he was used as a red herring to make the whole interview process look fair and competitive. It was always Allardyce's from the start and he was never a serious consideration.

There has to be a reason why Steve Bruce has never been touted for one of the top jobs. He's a manager for clubs that specialise is yoyoing between the top 2 divisions. I hope that Dr X ambitions are loftier than this and he goes for the more dynamic, young and riskier Wagner. Perhaps there are parallels between his last appointment: Bruce = Pearson Wagner = RDM Come on Tone, do the right thing.

Wagner for me. Never heard of him until recently but the more I read and see the more I like. This season is almost certainly a write off now so let's take a gamble on someone who has the pedigree and potential to be something special.

Based on his tweet? Do you think he's going to say anything other that full support for his manager publicly even if he is planning the chop? It wouldn't surprise me one little bit if RDM did go this weekend if we didn't win.

My point being that single arbitrary stats on their own are meaningless without context. You can find a statistic for pretty much any position you want though being able to back it up with reason you can't. Not saying you need a PhD to understand it, more that someone with a PhD in statistics will find this particular measure unpredictive of either a player or teams ability. Without a qualified statisticians input into the matter I will base my judgement of someone on what I see - and in this instance, over a decades worth of utter dross.

Which season for the 1.08 quote? Overall or a single season? Almost all statistics can be misleading without full context. Football, being an incredibly complicated model to analyse statistically, is more prone to misleading stats than most others. As such, without someone providing a PhD level analysis and presentation of a players game I rely on my own eyes and he is, and always has (even when pushing for 4th place) been a liability. In fact I put the sole fact we didn't qualify for the CL firmly at his door. The amount of chances, and points, wasted in the season that we came so close to CL qualification is shameful. That was Randy's final throw of the dice season and had we a proper striker up front instead of GA then we possibly wouldn't be in the position we are in today.

I wouldn't get too excited... If they were wanting success that quickly and we're willing to spend they wouldn't have bought a club in the Championship. The Man City owners wouldn't have bought City if they were in the Championship. We have been bought as an investment, not for fun IMO. Don't expect anything other than mid table PL at best.

The prophecy of Bannan playing League One football within a few years is slowly coming true... I'm pretty sure once his one year deal at Sheff Wednesday expires he'll then be joining a club like Fleetwood or Burton. Scottish Iniesta

Interesting video on Redknapp interviewing Sherwood yesterday at Bodymoor Heath... about 15 mins long... http://goo.gl/MulbbZ

I seem to recall many people prophesizing that this would happen a couple of years ago... however, this was when Bolton were in the Premier League. Turns out it took them to get relegated before being interested in him. World class my arse.

We'd be 6th, but still remarkable how close the league is. When you have the likes of West Ham in 3rd place it makes you think we really aren't that far away from doing decent things in this league... If only Lerner wasn't such a pussy.

Yes, it certainly was! Took about 20 minutes of going over and over in my head exactly what to say, but as always fear is incredibly irrational.

So I today finalised my new contract and was in a position to call the company that I am not joining... I had prepared a cue beforehand to ensure that I cited key words and points that I wanted to get across to try to keep any damage down to a minimum. Conversation went very well and the company that I have let down even congratulated me and wished me well in the future. Bosh!