15 Aug 2026 19:16:41
It’s a pre-season friendly, fitness is key. That’s it.
However,
1. Does the close of the window feel a whole lot closer to you than it did four hours or so ago?
2. Do clubs now think we are just a bit more desperate than we were four hours or so ago?
Losing a pre-season game happens, but it feels like we have just exposed ourselves to being more desperate for signings, the chairman of selling clubs upping the price.
The arrogance of Sjr, Wilcox and co. may get more tested, after that result, than when we were relaxed previously.
The bigger picture is the result doesn’t matter, unless you hated Amorim, yet the overall focus just sharpened. The club this window has been arrogant. The real games start next week but the incompetence started when the season finished and the penny pinching started.
16 Aug 2026 08:59:48
The miscalculation is that we could get the midfielder we wanted below £80m. Very quickly it became obvious that the midfield market was £100m+ for anyone decent, so we went for two squad players rather than a first choice player and hoped one of them works out.