RIP Francis Lee. One of the superstars of my youth, great finisher, and in the days of Bremner and Chopper Harris, was not afraid to get stuck in and look after himself. I seem to recall he became a successful businessman with paper recycling mills. RIP, one of the greats.

By the way, can we now drop the “Rice announcement” pinned topic? I’ll unpin the pinned topic when you lot use the Rice thread for Rice discussions. Which , incidentally, is where this thread and similar threads will be merged into until then Well fair enough, you are the boss, but my post was abou...

The transfer money seems to have been well-spent, many seem to think we look better without Rice, Alvarez’ more defensive role is allowing Soucek more leeway to pop up in the box. With Rice wanting to push forward more to appear more of an all-rounder, it made Soucek hang back which suited him less....

Paqueta is not happy, it shows massively. Doesn't want to be here now and I predict an 'injury' that will keep him out for a few months He was certainly unhappy when he tee’d up Antonio and he fudged it. Towards the end of the game I thought he started going for tricks and flicks and blind passes, ...

Mavrapanos impressed me. I struggle to say his name so I call him Mary Poppins owing to the Constantinos Mavrapanos expe-alidocios ditty. Kudus was ok, he’ll get better. In the first half he was too far from the right touch line all half. He was constantly on the edge of the second stripe in the gra...

Good match thread starter Ibby. I was impressed with Mavrapanos tonight. Kudus needs a bit more time. JWPs contribution was great, my MotM, but that overlooks Benrahma who was over biggest threat, he created the Own Goal that turned the game (he ought get geeky an Assist for that. Also he had a grea...

At the game I remarked to my mate how much we were trying to play short passes in and around our own area in order to try and find a way out without just hoofing it. Obviously sometimes you do you just have to get stuck in and hoof it, but I thought there were enough players showing confidence on th...

An interesting article in the Daily Mail today. The digital edition doesn’t list the full teams, but Best played with the amateurs, West Ham Past and Present had Moore, Brooking, Lampard, Greaves, John Lyall, Terry Venables and Malcolm Alison, Harry Redknapp amongst others …. February 1976. https://...

Great thread start Ibby. Although I like Aguerd, he has more pace and is better with the ball, Haaland might bully him so I agree Oggy and Zouma to start. So I like your first line up, I’ve no problem with putting Kudus straight in to give them something new to think about, he must be match fit havi...

Given the summer signings, and despite Pacqueta’s talent, with his diving and propensity for a penalty or sending off, I’m beginning to wish the deal with City had been concluded a week before the betting investigation came to light. Perhaps if negotiations had got really serious it would have had t...