Mooster

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Dunno, pop around and see if the lights are on?

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Assuming he actually wants to come back? If someone else is in for him then it's probably in Leverkusen's interest to sell him elsewhere for a higher price?

They won't want to lose their focus.

We won 4-0. The team played well, and everyone had a great night and that should hopefully breed a bit of confidence and momentum. If he'd made 3-4 subs on 65 mins the intensity would have dropped off and if this season is anything to go by we'd probably have conceded a goal (or 2). Gloss taken off evening, and people saying why did he take *insert players name here* off. It was the perfect opportunity for key players to find some much needed form. You're just looking for any opportunity to have a pop at Slot. Again.

They were playing well, they actually looked like they were enjoying themselves and it's been a long time since that's been the case. From a building momentum angle I can see why he might have wanted to leave them to it. It's definitely not irrational, whether it proves to be a good decision is another matter.

Maybe as it was the rare occurrence where the team actually clicked and remembered how to play well together he thought he'd leave things as they were, playing themselves into some form?

I don't think this has got anything to do with his kids schooling. You say this has been the norm, but this season has not been in any way normal. As Hus said above, none of us will ever truly appreciate how stressful the job is, but on top of that what Slot's had to try to deal with in the aftermath of Diogo's death must have made it nigh on impossible. I know he/the club said they would never use it as an excuse, but I don't see how you can look at this season without considering the massive effect it must have had, not only on the players but also on him personally. So yes, maybe the opportunity of a few days away from Liverpool would have been considered a good idea, his bosses probably encouraged it, and I'm sure he'll have taken his laptop with him. Guess my point is he found a way to win the league last year, this year he's been faced with a nightmare situation, he hasn't found a way through it, I don't think he will, and his time's almost certainly up, but he deserves better than being accused of being lazy or being called Humpty Dumpty.

Or maybe, given what he and the rest of the club had been dealing with in the 3 months prior to the international break, the idea of a few days away from the club might have proved to be beneficial. Suggesting he just 'pissed off on holiday' seems a pretty cheap shot.

There are three players on the list whose names have been redacted, wonder if one of them is Mo.

I'm not attacking him either. Can't see any way back for him save winning the CL but even then I think he'd be off... But this season was f***ed from the start. Whatever the plan was had to be totally rewritten, it's an accepted fact that getting pre-season right is crucial and ours must have been near impossible. Add to that the Isak shambles, the other injuries esp. in defence, the drop off in form of a number of key players and especially the complete decline in the form of the guy who made all the difference last season. Not all of our issues can be down to the coach. He's not Jürgen, but then, no one else is. But he's done far better replacing a long serving legend of a manager than has been the case anywhere else in the league in the last couple of decades. Don't understand the need to downplay what he achieved last season. He doesn't seem capable of turning things around so reckon his time's up. Just hope they get the next appointment right.

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3-0 A Titchmarsh (51) M. Don (53) P. Thrower (74)

Fork off!

Width from Frimpong and Kerkez?

Remember that game mainly for the West Ham fans entertaining themselves singing "one man couldn't carry, couldn't carry Lampard. One man and his forklift truck couldn't carry Lampard. Two men couldn't carry..."

To be fair though a major part of the recent turn around got injured in the warm up.

If a game had played out like this under our previous manager people would have been banging on about mentality monsters.

Think the first time I heard of Michael Owen was in FourFourTwo in some feature about top prospects, but think it was only about six months before his debut.

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Howard Webb!

The BBC has the quote as "...those are conversations that take place not far away from here, but not in this room." So isn't that just him saying he's not discussing transfers in the press conference?

Were we though? We'd just been dumped out of the FA Cup courtesy of Djimi Traore, and someone on here were suggesting Rafa should be rotated back to Spain for starting Mauricio Pellegrino against Southampton away.

Agree. Think the bit before this clip was him saying we are hungry to do well, the Atalanta bit felt more like him saying we need to take the opportunity because there are no guarantees we'll have it every year. It was an off the cuff spontaneous reply in a post-match presser he was probably keen to get through asap, I don't see how people can get so wound up by it like he's had a pop at your Dad or something