Optimistic Nut

Lewis Ferguson ruled out for Scotland with an ACL. Big blow that.

Keeper off his line...

Dubravka & Gordon on the bench. About 40 points lost these 2 weeks.

Gateshead 45 minutes away from guaranteeing a place in the Play-Offs with 2 games to spare. Absolutely unreal achievement given they lost Adam Campbell early in the season, Williamson leaving, then losing a handful of loanees in January.

We could have done without Chelsea starting to put a run together. Some tough fixtures to come thankfully.

Luton to beat Everton in a couple of weeks, Barkley the scorer.

Bruno Gordon Schar Gordon has been great but there was a 2-3 month period where Bruno was pretty much running the midfield on his own for us.

So this summer and January might be a quiet-ish one, but next summer the January survival transfer window drops off plus our much greater commercial revenue should give us a big bit of movement 25/26 season?

Castore linking up with Umbro might solve a lot of the issues they've had with time scales, quality, etc. in terms of design I think they've brought out some quality strips, walkout anthems, training gear, etc.

It does seem like a hybrid of the Adidas 01/03 front, and Puma's 10/11 back from those images.

Wonder if the third kit would be the first move to simplifying the club crest? All for that one if it's something they intending on doing rather than a new bland one like Juve.

Could see Chelsea taking a look.

If we win the last 6 we'll finish 5th, like. Doubt Spurs will win 3 of their last 6 games. Just can't see us winning 6 on the bounce even if the fixtures are quite favourable. 13 points with at least 1 being against Man U will give us a great chance of top 6.

City have peaked imo. They'll always be strong now but we're probably seeing the best version of City that they'll ever get to. There's several clubs below with the financial means to trouble them (or who should have troubled them) the last couple of years from that "elite 6".

Let's not forget as well that Liverpool have still been able to win a title last 5 years, took it to the last day two seasons recently, will likely do the same this season. Arsenal have spent a shitload and continue to do so. They'll close the gap. Man Utd and Chelsea also have the financial means and have spent the sort of money that should have seen them competing. Can't be put on City just because they've been basket cases off the pitch. There should be scope for decent title races between those 5 clubs. It's just the likes of us, Villa, etc who might have the odd challenge but aren't allowed to spend to keep it up consistently.