DJS

Probably not where Di Matteo is concerned but there's more credence and conviction when it comes to believing in someone based on a 38 game campaign, rather than a cup win.

Yep, with the assistance of Howard 'the c***' Webb against Spurs at Old Trafford, where they were 0-2 down and heading for defeat until Webb gave them a penalty for Gomes daring to come out and smother the ball at the feet of a Manc player. And then there was the last minute Macheda fluke vs Villa. It's seasons like that and run-ins like that which convince me that the best team actually doesn't ALWAYS win the league.

I've no qualms with Rodgers being kept on. Last season was brilliant and I'm a firm believer in the theory that if you've done something, you can do it again. That said, if an obviously better/more experienced manager, with more pedigree & a history of winning is available, the better choice would be to get him in. As it goes, two are available. But if Rodgers stays, and I think he will, I'm ok with that. I don't see the point in keeping him and not backing him properly though and I fear that's what will happen. That said, I'm dubious that any coach could be successful on a consistent basis for us, with the constraints put in place by the owners.

That may be true. Equally so, it might suggest that they are prioritising positions and intend to spend the bulk of the budget on those, therefore needing to lessen the spend on other positions eg backup keeper.

For Juventus to have reached 22 semi finals and only won it twice is rubbish.

It was Dwight Gayle that turned into Pele against us, rather than Bolasie.

Haha excellent semantics there Phil. The point is, kids generally don't tend to be allowed to attend without an adult. And they'd care because, as I'm sure you can understand, that's the policy they have. Whether they enforce it, I don't know, but as I've said, I find it hard to believe that they're just selling kids tickets without an adult accompanying them. That's all. On a side issue, I do believe the away club pays for the tickets it requests in its allocation and keeps the revenue from what it sells, does it not?

I'd have thought it'd be a software issue, whereby the online sales system wouldn't allow a kid ticket to be bought individually.

I'm not 'so arsed' about it, I just don't believe the club are telling 10 year old kids "Here's a ticket, go to Hull on your own".

So the club sold them a junior ticket on its own, despite that clearly being something the club doesn't do?

Haha, yep that'll be it. So how's the ingenious under 10s, 'keep our credits' plan going then?

Depends how many moons ago that was. The law is a bit stricter now about letting under 10s go on their own, surely. 'Health and safety' is on top of everything else. "Children under 10 must be accompanied by an adult" or phrases of that ilk are commonplace and I imagine when you were 7, you didn't travel from Liverpool to Hull alone to attend.

Do other clubs have owners who think they can succeed in a way that's never been done before?

Forgot to mention - this is based on the assumption that Arsenal win the cup.

Change of rule means 7th gets a Uefa Cup spot - so there's no avoiding it. Other than by somehow scraping top 4.

Maybe then a Chief Exec is more what I was on about Basically someone who is in charge of the footballing side of things, that the owners can just trust to get on with it, listen to on footballing issues and who isn't called Ian Ayre. Manager decides who he wants to sign, football boss man executive goes and gets the deals done.

At the risk of making Cobs even more jealous, I agree totally. A David Dein type would be grand. Or even Kenny, but somehow I don't see that happening. Only thing I'd say is, I don't agree with the idea of a DOF deciding what players to buy and sell. The manager is the guy who gets sacked if it goes wrong so he should be sacked or praised based on results he gets with the players he chose, not somebody else.

Much as I'd love to think there's still something there in Balotelli, I just couldn't trust him to not leave us playing with 10 men. Rather start Borini for his enthusiasm and movement (with the knowledge that they're 'only' West Brom and he surely must be good enough for that level) or Lambert, for the peace of mind of knowing that if a chance comes his way, he's actually a very good finisher (albeit aomeone who, if he has to run fast to get to the chance, probably won't be able to). Either way, I just can't see Balotelli being sufficiently motivated to try all that hard. I suppose the caveat is, if we start him and he's a lazy twunt, we can sub him. If he comes off the bench and decides to be a passenger, taking him off again is a big call.

no worries. There's always another game to hopefully fix a bit of the suffering

No thread yet? Seems like nobody's arsed Let's smash these feckers and put some pressure on the pair of Manc tw*ts above us. Ibe's PL cup-tied-ness has been appealed and we won, so he can come back in. Prefer to see 4 at the back and a midfield diamond here. Need 2 up front since our only proper good striker isn't fit. They aren't very good, this is a decent opportunity to get our heads up and jump back on the horse. Then we can smash Hull on Tuesday and the additional 6 points will make us feel better

They shouldn't. But Benzema.

Nothing to do with 'superfan' or anything like it. I'm merely saying, if you have genuinely lost all hope of anything being good, what's the point? It'll just bring you misery, without even the (perhaps misguided) hope that all supporters require. I have my doubts, serious ones in fact, over FSG. But the lifeblood of supporting a football club is hope. Even if it's beyond all logical reason, like at HT in Istanbul, surely every supporter always has to have some hope. It's part of the joy of opening day of the season, every supporter has a clean slate and new hopes/dreams which reality hasn't had time to ruin yet. If you have no hope, there's surely nothing remotely pleasurable or enjoyable about supporting the club and therefore, what's all the time, money and effort for? As I said, I have major doubts over FSG. Not over their intent, I believe they're trying to do the best they can. But I don't think they actually know enough about football, and I don't think their method of "we can outsmart everyone else and win" will work. That wasn't what my point was relating to, as I have addressed in my last post.

If you think it's going to be permanent doom and gloom, there's not much point supporting the club and investing the time/effort/money.

That's a bit weird. Anyway, conviction overturned isn't worse, is it?

So you'll not bother being a supporter anymore?