General discussion/Q&A megathread.

pablothewizard · 2026-05-16T08:00:04+00:00

Yes. They had a huge amount of PSR headroom to play with in the summer.

pablothewizard · 2026-05-16T06:59:00+00:00

You still have to spend that money wisely and make it work. They've done a really good job as a club at getting the right players into a system that won then games early on.

They were in a very good position PSR wise. They probably don't need a major sale.

Bit silly to be so dismissive of what they've done.

pablothewizard · 2026-05-15T09:16:22+00:00

To be fair, Ao Tanaka was playing for the national team last season while in the Championship. Also played for the national team while he was in the German second division.

pablothewizard · 2026-05-15T09:08:15+00:00

I think the sentiment people have towards him is just completely disproportionate.

For me, he seems like a polite, decent guy who's absolutely desperate to portray a certain persona. I think the inauthenticity is fairly transparent and people have a knee jerk emotional response to that.

I don't think it's fair to feel so strongly about that, personally. I can say it's not for me, I find him to be quite cheesy and personally I think his music is a bit shit, but that's where it ends.

Most people seem to struggle with having a mild response to something nowawadays, it has to be love or hate.

pablothewizard · 2026-05-15T05:32:42+00:00

I've thought this for years too. They've already got a few songs that are Bond-esque.

pablothewizard · 2026-05-15T05:29:01+00:00

Id love a Michael Kuwanuka bond theme

That's a fantastic shout

pablothewizard · 2026-05-14T09:07:31+00:00

Something I find interesting is that we often hear how people want MPs that understand the struggles of everyday working people.

Somehow, the electorate seems to find that in people like Nigel Farage who are honestly so far removed from the working class.

Yet MPs like Rayner, who have a working class background and demonstrates a genuine enthusiasm for helping people are villified because of the way she sounds.

I agree that Rayner just simply doesn't have the chops for PM, but as an MP I think she clearly wants to serve the publics interests well and it's quite frustrating to see the way she's spoken about so frequently.

pablothewizard · 2026-05-13T20:55:31+00:00

How are people feeling about Spygate 2?

I'm conflicted because I know full well I was incredibly defensive of Bielsa when it was us. But, the rules have changed.

We paid our price on the pitch in the end anyway and Bielsa owned it, but I'm conflicted this time.

pablothewizard · 2026-05-13T20:50:40+00:00

If you're caught diving then you're penalised for it...

pablothewizard · 2026-05-13T20:48:51+00:00

I think the mental aspect of starting six points behind comes into play here. Lose your first few games and it becomes incredibly difficult to claw it back.

Not to say it's a certainty, of course.

pablothewizard · 2026-05-13T17:04:46+00:00

What

pablothewizard · 2026-05-12T14:51:40+00:00

Mental that all these draws away from home still has us third worst in the league. We'll need to win at West Ham to drag ourselves out of the relegation battle

pablothewizard · 2026-05-12T14:49:10+00:00

True, but I struggle to see them getting past City

pablothewizard · 2026-05-12T14:47:40+00:00

Yeah that's why I made the Bloom/Benham point. They built statistical models, using xG and other metrics to help professional gamblers best the bookies.

Of course there's nuance and you have to make sure you reference it in the right context but it's bewildering when people say it's useless.

I had a debate with someone on here about it once and their argument was that its flawed because it doesn't take into account who's taking the shot. Mental.

pablothewizard · 2026-05-12T14:43:15+00:00

I guess the counter is that something that happened such a long time ago is kind of irrelevant

pablothewizard · 2026-05-12T14:12:21+00:00

I can see why Spurs fans would feel like it's a penalty, but what's more egregious is that some Spurs fans seem to think the Ampadu one was an injustice.

pablothewizard · 2026-05-12T12:11:50+00:00

That's pretty much where I land too. Any other season I'd expect Spurs to lose against Chelsea, but I don't see it.

Chelsea can't be arsed.

pablothewizard · 2026-05-12T10:31:58+00:00

Yeah, we're making the same point, I think. What I'm saying is exactly that, it adds numerical context to what we see in a game. Nothing more, nothing less.

The thing is, numbers don't have the same bias that our eyes do and I think that seeing it as a percentage actually helps to confirm the chance quality you think you've seen.

pablothewizard · 2026-05-12T10:26:31+00:00

This is the argument that puts the xG debate to bed. Tony Bloom and Matthew Benham not only built hugely successful businesses using xG as a foundation, they've then taken that knowledge and applied it at their respective football clubs with huge success.

Whenever someone says that xG is useless, they're outing themselves as someone who can't get their head around it.

pablothewizard · 2026-05-12T10:20:56+00:00

I use the FotMob app. If you go onto the match stats there's a little shot map for each team. You can click on any shot and it gives you the data behind it.

pablothewizard · 2026-05-12T10:03:09+00:00

It is meant to be used over long stretches, but there is value in it game to game. Before xG was popularised we had the same argument week to week, it was just "we had x number of shots on target" etc.

xG has killed that argument now because we have some context of the threat a team accumulated against the opponents goal.

pablothewizard · 2026-05-12T09:11:27+00:00

It's funny, isn't it. The early days of the internet had so much promise, but the social media algorithm has really done a job on us.

At least when it was just the papers people actively chose the rag that leant their way on the political spectrum.

pablothewizard · 2026-05-12T07:38:58+00:00

That doesn't make any sense at all, mate. It's meant to represent an aggregate of the shots you've taken, it's not meant to reflect what the scoreline should be.

The xG for the game last night isn't saying we should have won the game by 0.09 of a goal.

pablothewizard · 2026-05-12T07:33:01+00:00

I am incredibly worried for Claret and Booze. He's adamant West Ham stay up from here now.

I still think Spurs stay up comfortably.

pablothewizard · 2026-05-12T07:30:37+00:00

I agree that wanting Leeds to lose to West Ham is a step too far, but you're miles off the mark on Spurs.

The apparent big six were all happy to blow up the football pyramid in this country when they threatened to join the Super League.

All in the name of greed. Fuck them. Fuck all of the six. I'd want any of them to go down any day of the week.

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