épieur

Just to elaborate. When someone tries for the patronising "this anti Hughes stuff is boring, he hasn't failed at anything" schill and then follows that up with "what, you would rather have signed someone s***? We could be second or third if that happened. But we're winning and if you think that's not what football is about then you are talking s***" then it's not a bad marriage, but that dimwitted cousin inviting himself to the family dinner, complaining about the food even though he only ever ate the piss stained hot dog he took out of his own pocket and a few others suggesting in various tones that he at least go to the other room to sleep it off.

Add to the list of bad faith fallacies piled up here.

I don't consider myself an expert. I am, as you, just some guy posting on a forum. Continuing to claim your position is vindicated by us performing well does make you a f***ing idiot though.

I really shouldn't, but fine let's do one more round. Us being top of the league and "flying" is a simple strawman. It has no bearing on whether or not we would have improved or not by replacing Endo with another midfielder. But that question in itself also has no bearing on Hughes' performance in the summer. He meant to improve midfield and failed, both in the action he took to sign one and the subsequent inaction in identifying alternatives. Applying hindsight to that of the "it all worked out anyway, didn't it" variety is somewhere between intellectually lazy and disingenuous. I lean towards the latter since you're not content to say "it all worked out anyway" but are genuinely claiming there's a good chance we'd be 8+ points worse off if we'd signed anyone but Zubimendi. It is, I think, quite bold to follow such a claim with an argument that my ideas, which to recapitulate, were that he failed to sign a midfielder, have little to do with real life and "mad to the extreme" and then speculate that football manger [sic] must have made me think of myself as a football expert whilst complaining about personal abuse. You are either arguing in bad faith or being massively dense here.

Genuinely tedious. I think we're done.

Also failed to identify that we could have signed a left back with a view to push Robertson out of the starting line up and a forward with a few to becoming a starter. Of course that would required forward thinking, and the preferred FSG model is to solve problems a year after they are burning red flags, so let's give him a pass since he was occupied all summer drawing up a shortlist of Zubimendi and... No, that's it. So no blame for a signing collapsing and the old "no other players exist out there who could possibly improve midfield, and shouldn't he get a pass in hindsight as well, seeing Gravenberch'progress." Finally, did you literally just try to claim we might be 8+ points worse off if we'd signed a midfielder in the summer? LOL, give your head a f***ing wobble and go lie down.

Not just me then. Was genuinely baffled reading it.

They've sacked Ashworth. Waited five months to get him and sacked him after five months in charge.

Yeah this is his moment.

He literally failed to sign the one player meant to improve the squad this season. Then had no backup plan.

For me, too many games glossing over his flaws because it wasn't that consequential and now one too many games where his flaws were consequential. I really really like his type of player. And I don't necessarily want him sold per se. But he can't be in filling the role in the squad he currently is. The minutes that Nunez is currently given is a charity case, hoping down the line it will lead to something good. It's minutes down the drain, whilst his team mates are having to carry the can for him. We need someone who will use those minutes he's getting to actually benefit the team. Incidentally that someone also needs to be good enough to be clearly better than Gakpo as well. I don't particularly care who gets sold as a result of that player pushing others down the hierarchy. But we do need to push Nunez down to the the pecking order. Taking minutes away from him for a better player is an outstanding concern. His level is part time player project, a la Chiesa, or sold. I think if not for his great connection with Salah on the pitch, I would have come around to this sooner.

That's basically where we are here.

There's also the "what Jota are we getting" after his injuries. Far from a given he'll come back and be good right away. Don't think he's fantastic but he's really good. He was also really good when he was our fourth best forward and now he's our second best forward. We need two better than him. Diaz is changing the conversation somewhat, but he needs to keep doing that. Need another. Gakpo and Nunez are squad fodder.

If Darwin had technical ability and could strike a ball, he'd be Forlan. I love how involved he is and the way he gets involved. I hate the output of his involvements.