BG

David Davies, who has good FA sources, has just described Hodgson as a very strong candidate. Would love it.

True, though Lucas suffered in comparison to the then competition (both in terms of getting games and how good/bad he looked too).

This content is not viewable to guests.

He had a pretty nice time of in the knock-out stages. Somewhat luckily beat United, then Lyon, Deportivo and Monaco.

This content is not viewable to guests.

Agreed both men have repeatedly made it clear that the manager has the final call on players, as he should. He therefore takes credit for successes and blame for failures. Coates is about the singing I recall whereby listening to Commoli talking about the player it sounded like he'd really strongly recommended that Kenny watch him over the summer with a view to buying him. Personally I think the return so far on more than £100m has been underwhelming and the signs don't look promising on about £55m of it.

I agree though given we've got a 20m million player contributing like someone worth less than half that and a 35m player contributing like someone worth a seventh of that, he's not the biggest problem... I like him: good attitude, good engine, does the basics well. That's a good platform from which to improve.

It's down to the manager - the good signings and the bad. He's the one with final say on who comes in. (Henderson I still have hopes for).

A loan move would seem to be the only option (as regards Tevez), as Milan seemed to realise. Can't help but feel City are either going to have to take a massive hit or just leave him there. Can't see anyone paying a big fee and City must be desperate to shift him given he's costing them a million quid a month.

He's clearly very short of confidence at the moment (despite Kenny's claims to the contrary). The two key issues for me about him are that he just doesn't look like he wants it enough at the moment and in many games he's not doing the basics anything like well enough. He's currently making Aquilani look seriously good value for money. Hopefully Kenny saw something that's currently not too obvious and has a plan but I can't really see it at the moment.

This content is not viewable to guests.

This content is not viewable to guests.

It shows what a joke the FA are that they've said something which would have not a chance in the world of ever standing up to legal challenge. That said it may end up contributing to the player leaving the country at an earlier date.

Beyond the pale. Alan doesn't deserve that after all his work with the LMA.

Think we might do well to get that at the moment.

Both KD and DC have repeatedly said the former has the final word on transfers - as such he shoulders the praise and criticism where due. At present I'd say that Suarez and Enrique are clear successes and Carroll a clear failure. Personally I think Downing, while not being great, has suffered a bit by people not sticking the ball in the net from chances he's created. Adam is debateable IMHO, certainly as to whether he has the requisite quality to start. Henderson I think is too early to tell, Coates certainly is. In both cases I think the signs are encouraging. The big, obvious problem is that of the £100m spent on the four expensive players only Suarez is a clear success. That's a bit worrying.

We need a reliable finisher so badly it's untrue. I think Hernandez in our side would have got us about 8 or 9 more points this season.

There's a Balotelli fact or fiction type quiz on The Guardian. Full house for me.

This content is not viewable to guests.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/video/2011/dec/19/best-own-goal-ever-video

I know what you're getting at with this line but he's clearly not that limited or he's worth it anyway given that the man managing arguably the best club side in history wanted him and he's played 80 odd times for Argentina at the age of 27.

Agree he doesn't mention Evra's previous as he does Suarez's but that's about it and, in any case, Evra's previous misdemeanours are also less dramatic than Suarez's.

Did Winter not ghost Kenny's autobiography? Don't think he's in the hate-Liverpool camp at all personally.

For an isolated ACL rupture or with medial meniscus and/or medial collateral ligament?

I believe her degree is medicine...