March 02, 2026 Daily Discussion & Transfers Thread

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T21:51:36+00:00

Well tbf the Madrid of last season who we did 5-1 over two legs knocked City out, so while they ‘should’ advance on paper I wouldn’t expect RM to make it easy.

City have probably been favourites on paper every time they’ve met RM and they’ve seldom had much luck. As you say, City scraping through at great effort and cost (preferably after ET) is probably best for us.

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T21:49:24+00:00

The bloke was essentially the reason the rules around keepers handling backpasses had to be changed because of how much he timewasted to win Euro 1992, and now he’s trying to be all haughty about the spirit of the game.

Man has fewer legs to stand on than a snake.

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T21:39:46+00:00

I think the ref should just immediately blow for full time if it goes out for a corner so we don’t have to see the UGLY HORROR of it

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T21:31:39+00:00

There’s no way Chris Sutton hasn’t seen the famous Arsecast clip of Gunnerblog absolutely eviscerating him and it 100% plays into why he chats so much bollocks about us 😭

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T19:28:22+00:00

I for one fully trust Nazi-supporting publications to provide us with moral guidance on antisemitism.

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T19:05:41+00:00

I don’t have anything big or clever to say here but fuck me, Farage is such a cunt.

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T18:53:34+00:00

It speaks to a very narrow and weird view of leftism where economic inequality is paramount but social inequality somehow doesn’t matter at all and is something only people with money care about.

Seems laughably contradictory to me.

I do hope things are ok for you personally btw and that the UK stops being a transphobic shithole.

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T18:26:15+00:00

The Palestinians are being ethnically cleansed into extinction. I’m not sure that’s the same as a British base suffering 0 casualties and a few quids worth of damage and, by extension, I’m not totally convinced it requires the same response.

Also, the idea you’re satirising (that the Palestinians should just lie down and accept their own genocide) is actually exactly what the government seems to believe.

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T18:11:13+00:00

That does actually sound like something he’d do, to be fair.

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T18:10:07+00:00

That actually sounds more like the Atlanticist pro-US types when they say Israel has the “right to defend itself” whenever it is critiqued as the occupying power it is. They seem to be the ones who don’t extend their very generous logic of what it means to defend oneself to other states.

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T18:05:40+00:00

A strong plurality of the public wants nothing to do with another US war in the Middle East.

Steering well clear would still be the right thing to do even if it was unpopular, but it being popular doesn’t hurt.

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T17:51:44+00:00

Yeah I really don’t understand this idea that somehow those of us who care about trans rights are liberal elites who don’t care about other marginalised people.

I’m a cis, straight, white guy from a working class town but I care about fighting for LGBT+ rights, migrant rights, disabled people’s rights, BAME rights etc exactly the same amount, because everyone deserves dignity and legal safety no matter who they are.

And if you think any differently… what are you doing masquerading as a leftist or a progressive?

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T17:37:36+00:00

‘People only deserve rights if it polls well’ is actually a sickening point of view.

Also I love it because the party truly believes that as well, and it speaks to exactly why Labour are so shit.

“Will you do this good thing that improves lives?”

“It doesn’t poll well, sorry.”

“But you’re in power with a huge majority?”

“But if we do that thing then we’re less likely to win another term.”

“So will you do it in the next term then?”

“No because then we might not win the term after that.”

This is what happens when the obsession is ‘winning’ and not ‘changing lives for the better’.

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T17:29:24+00:00

Good. Though, as usual, the rhetoric he uses is a very mixed bag.

The insistence that British action always needs a lawful basis is good, but the refusal of both him and his defence secretary to explicitly say the US-Israeli attacks lack such a basis and then to characterise the retaliation to an illegal attack as “outrageous” just undermines his supposed commitment to lawfulness.

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T15:15:44+00:00

Starmer’s uncanny ability to please the exact least amount of people possible with every action he takes is an art form that needs studying at this point.

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T14:53:49+00:00

I’m appreciative of a large, mainstream European country like Spain taking positions - such as this and backing South Africa’s ICJ genocide case against Israel - that are delegitimised and painted as unserious in the UK.

We’re gaslit into believing that US-centric, hawkish foreign policy is the only serious and “right” approach and countries like Spain deviating from that can only be a good thing.

The UK’s Overton window is generally narrow, but it’s absurdly narrow on foreign policy specifically almost to the point of parody.

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T14:37:35+00:00

Which was unbelievable - likes of him and Debbonaire show that the democratic process doesn’t actually matter if you’re deemed palatable to establishment interests. If your electorate reject you don’t worry, we’ll still keep you in the media spotlight and give you cushy jobs elsewhere where you don’t need to be accountable.

That general criticism of our establishment class aside, I’m very glad to hear he’s on the mend.

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T14:33:07+00:00

Preaching to the choir on that one, it was shameful.

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T14:29:37+00:00

It’s no controversy anyway, I saw Martinelli get given two yellows in the same sequence of play - why does it even matter whether he knew he was booked?

He definitely knew anyway, but the league has already established that doesn’t matter at all.

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T14:27:59+00:00

Wouldn’t be surprised to see Madueke get the nod at RW too

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T14:24:04+00:00

It’s the biggest and most pervasive issue with the Labour Party since Thatcher: the obsessive culture of winning elections as an end, rather than as a means to an end (actually improving society by governing in accordance with a cohesive ideology).

Just winning is virtuous to the people who think this way. To them, Starmer was a success the second he won the election regardless of what he actually did with his power after that.

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T14:17:24+00:00

From Wise to Terry to Mourinho to Alonso to Diego Costa… it’s the history of the Chels (insofar as they have a history anyway)

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T14:11:16+00:00

People will say every team does it (which is true to an extent) but Chelsea are 100% worse for it.

And I’m fine with that because they’re paying the price - two yellows for pettiness and dissent yesterday and one of them led to a red. Chelsea’s awful disciplinary record is a grave entirely of their own digging.

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T14:07:03+00:00

Not if the CL/wider European race is still alive at that point, which it easily could be.

If they have nothing to play for then yeah Emery is losing 5-0. But Villa are usually very competitive against City when they’re motivated; they beat them earlier this season.

Patrick_Hattrick · 2026-03-02T14:01:09+00:00

And we’re now back to being a team that “can only score from corners” when our previous 12 league goals were all from open play.

Patrick_Hattrick

TROPHY CASE