Teale's 'tache

Can't believe I nearly forgot to update this before the thread 'slams' shut!

I don't think many would turn down a fully fit, fully motivated Sturridge. However, from the outside looking in he hasn't looked either of those things for a few years now, and when you factor in the financial risk for such a high earner it's easy to see why clubs are looking elsewhere. I agree with @dont_do_it_doug., he doesn't fit our transfer strategy. We are very short up top though, and if there's any truth in the Kodjia rumours we could be getting pretty desperate. Desperate enough to take the Sturridge risk? Time will tell I suppose.

I don't think his body language helps in that respect, he has quite a lazy style and much like many explosive strikers (Messi being a prime example) he doesn't do a lot off the ball to win it back because he's trying to conserve energy. All of this makes it very easy to stick labels of 'lazy' and 'bad attitude' on him without either necessarily being true. I don't know the guy, he could be both of those things, but I've seen no actual evidence to convince me he is other than a few weird quotes from Klopp. Either way, I don't think it would be a wise signing for ourselves, he'll want big money and we shouldn't pay it for someone unlikely to play very much, and as we've discussed might not want it much anymore.

I think it's fair to say he was pretty enthusiastic in his youth, and a cracking player in his day, but with so many injuries and his attitude constantly being questioned you can see how he might of been worn down by it all, he's won a fair bit in his career and earned plenty of money, is any of it really worth it to him anymore?

Poor Newcastle fans, their love of their football club is seriously being taken advantage of

I disagree with a few parts of this. Hourihane made himself available for the ball whenever he could, his touches and passes stats back this up, the thing is when you are under the pump tracking players from here there and everywhere you aren't always going to be in a position to receive the ball. There was also a definite ploy to get the ball out to our full backs in the second half where it's less dangerous against the Spurs press, so in many ways the ball was bypassing him rather than the other way around. I don't get why Hourihane is the one to blame for us not keeping possession? He was dispossessed once and had an 88% pass completion for the game. I get that people are frustrated that we couldn't get out, but I don't see the benefit of piling in on one player when the evidence suggests he's no more culpable than the rest of the team. Jack didn't play so deep because of anything to do with Hourihane, the entire team were forced back by a dominant Spurs midfield. Jack likes to be on the ball, and when we don't have much possession he goes looking for it, that doesn't automatically mean the defensive midfielder is having a bad game, he'll likely do it when Luiz plays as well. Luiz came on after the first goal, at which point Spurs dropped off a little to draw us out, so he had a little more room and less pressure to work with, and against tired players when he's fresh. It's not fair to compare him against Hourihane as the circumstances had changed and in many ways they are different players, I don't doubt Luiz will bring us more going forward, in fact that's probably why Smith brought him on. I have high hopes for Luiz, but I think 10 minutes is not a big enough sample set on which to judge him. I certainly don't feel those 10 minutes should be used to put the boot in on Hourihane who had a pretty decent game, if Luiz is the better player he will have the shirt sooner than later and Hourihane will still be very handy to keep around. I'm not Hourihanes biggest fan myself, but he should be judged fairly, he's been playing out of position essentially and done a great job by all accounts. On Luiz, he looked okay, I want to see more though, 10 minutes didn't really show enough of his defensive work and positional play to draw any conclusions, I'm certainly excited to see more though!

He scored the lowest Whoscored rating from both sides... (equal with Kodjia for the pedants). I know stats aren't everything, but it's a barometer to the performance based on what actually happened rather than opinion. When I saw Walker-Peters was starting for Spurs I thought he would of been there for the taking, in my opinion Anwar just didn't do enough, I know the support was lacking at times but he's going to have to do better and I'm sure he will. I'm not criticising him, far from it, in fact he's one of my favourite players, his defensive work was pretty good in the main and I understand why people want to defend him, he just didn't have a good game going forwards, it happens, I wouldn't be even slightly surprised if he starts against Bournemouth.

It will be interesting to see how Bournemouth play this, they don't have a great away record in the Premier League and from what I've read they didn't really impress against the Blades in their first game. However, they have the experience in this league and won't be as desperate to get points on the board as ourselves. It wouldn't be a terrible strategy if they sat back and tried to frustrate us for an hour or so and then try and hit us when the crowd is starting to get restless, they know we have 3 late goals conceded fresh in our minds. However, Howe doesn't strike me as the sort to play that way, more likely they will try to play a counter attacking game using the pace they have up front, soaking up a little pressure and striking when we have over committed and are out of shape. I'd expect them to still try and keep the ball in spells though, they want to invite pressure but not too much. With this in mind I think we should set up looking to dominate the ball and get forward, but we really need to be careful we don't get caught, so the key is not to over commit, this may mean no changes at full back as some have suggested. I also think if we are going to have plenty of the ball then that is the situation where a player like Jota is likely to show his best play, firefighting isn't really his thing, I wouldn't be overly surprised if either of El Ghazi and Jota started, with one replacing the other depending on the situation we face. I haven't seen enough of Luiz to say if he will get a start, thought Conor had a decent game at Spurs, but then he had McGinn and Jack sat in right next to him for most of the game, the defensive midfielder is more likely to be on his own and will need to be pretty mobile in this game I'd of thought, so I wouldn't be overly surprised if there was a change there. I'm quietly confident about this one, we have the players to hurt them, I don't think their defence is good enough to nullify all of our threats and the crowd will be right up for it, Bournemouth are no mugs though, I'm going to plump for a nail biting 1-0.

Thought this on a few occasions, a few of our guys had their pocket picked and either there was a shout that wasn't loud enough or worse no shout at all, we are going to need to help each other out more, both making ourselves available and communicating better.

There's something almost hypnotising about the way he hits the turf and uses the momentum to roll himself back up again...

I think it was a pretty difficult performance to appraise, there was some good and some bad which is maybe why there's such a division in the posts on here. I feel some of the criticism has been a little harsh, there's going to be a learning curve in the Premier League for a number of our players, and also Dean Smith. We really need to keep the ball better against the big teams though, I think Jack should be left up field with Wesley to give us an out ball when we are under that much pressure, we need someone clever on the ball who can win us a free kick and relieve the pressure, or good enough on the ball to keep it and spark a counter, he's far more suited to that roll than playing as a defensive midfielder which he seemed to be doing for the majority of the second half. Spurs were very happy to see him forced back that deep where he couldn't hurt them. It was pretty clear our full backs didn't want to cross the halfway line, this left our wingers a little isolated with nobody overlapping them, I was still expecting El Ghazi to get something out of Walker-Peters down our left hand side but he had a really poor game I thought, and fair play to Walker-Peters he looked very solid. Spurs did a very good job second half of isolating our players with their press and winning possession back quickly and high up the pitch so we just couldn't get out, and we had no real answer to it. Spurs weren't amazing by all accounts, but improved as the game went on and the Eriksen substitution really was the difference, our midfield had been ground down by then and we were sitting so deep it was perfectly set up for him to run the show, how amazing would it be to have a player that good on our bench?! I thought Engels looked really good, his partnership with Mings looks very solid and definitely something we can build around going forward, the defence showed they can drop in for large periods if required which we will need at times this season, it's something we haven't had too much recent experience of in the Championship so they way we stood firm bodes well. In the end we just didn't hold on to the ball well enough and made too many mistakes, eventually you will get punished for them against a team that contains Harry Kane and the like. I'm not disheartened, but we have some work to do, I think Dean Smith will be able to take a lot from that game going forward and formulate a few new game plans. UTV!

I don't think we've brought a shed load of players comfortable on the ball to then start playing it long all the time, we'll mix it up, play out when the opportunity arises and go long when required

No matter the result just enjoy the game and the occasion, it's what we've been waiting for! Think this could be closer than a few think, Spurs lost something like 12 times last season, so they aren't unbeatable, mix that in with the injuries and suspensions and I think there's an opportunity. However, we have our own concerns, we've a lot of new names and how well they've all integrated is important to how well we are likely to perform. From the outside looking in it looks like we've done that well, but you never know until you've played a few competitive games. I'm going to predict an exciting 2-2 UTV!

Benteke? Milner? There's also been a lot of rubbish granted.

History is littered with transfers where only one team was seemingly in for a player and the transfer was later deemed a success, the amount of teams interested in no way guarantees quality and nor does a lack of interest prove a lack of quality. Dean Smith knows exactly how good he is or isn't, and was clearly interested, but they've asked too much and we've refused to pay it. It doesn't mean he's not a good player.

I agree with this 100%, there may well not be any more this window, but until it Slams Shut™ we'll still be open to negotiation

Will be interesting to see if this is a bit of gamesmanship, and if so how Brentford play it, do they keep a potentially unhappy player who's value may reduce or drop the price to get the deal done?

The Cutrone deal has definitely gone through, Wolves are in Armenia today playing in a Europa League qualifier, not sure if he's eligible to play in that game or with them at the moment though, so you could still be right.

Elmo can also play as a winger, Grealish could move out wide as well, though that would be a last resort you'd think, we certainly have more cover on the wings than up top.

Wolves are rumoured to be in for Kessie from Milan, so could possibly be something to do with that, but like you say, could be anyone.