forameus

He did genuinely look like he had no idea what was going on. Like he'd been told the finish, and that he'd be heading up the ramp as normal. Then this screaming mess of a man comes down. Anyone would've been visibly upset by that.

Come on Giles, didn't you see him screaming at Rusev? Guy backed down. He's a stone cold killer.

Technically, it could never be a flop or a disappointment, that's for sure. But then that's part of the problem. Is it just going to play like an extended tech demo with the developers always pointing to the technical marvel that it is? That's only going to go so far, especially these days when a good bit of imagination in development with indie games is often trumping those that have spent millions and millions on the superfluous. I realise I'm coming across really negative on the game, and not meaning to be. I really hope it is a big success for the developers' sake, because by all accounts they've had a brilliant idea and have spent a hell of a long time realising their dream. It's something completely different to what has gone before, and while it wouldn't really change anything industry-wide, it's always good to see things that are different being successful.

Looking very likely. Steph will do a heel promo saying something like they don't need the WWE title, because...wait for it...we've got our own title! Cue tiny pop, because it's pretty predictable. Still, decent way to raise intrigue ahead of Summerslam. Make it a bigger tournament too, let every singles star go in and have a proper long tournament. Obviously Rollins and Reigns can be the finish, and maybe that's where we finally get the heel turn,

Really? I suppose it depends how you define failing. Unless it's absolutely perfect, which is unlikely given the hype it's received, said hype is going to mean people will be disappointed. And it seems these days when people get disappointed with games, they turn into absolute VLs. When a delay was announced for this game, they threatened the developers' families, what do you think they'll do if they find the game itself disappointing? I'd take back the first line I said though, change it to "I can't see this game living up the hype it has generated, and it'll be disappointing"

We never really looked like it, but Germany were less than impressive for the most part. Had we gone and done something mental like beating them at Hampden - which could have happened given how out of sorts they looked defensively in that game, and how they let Ireland take them - then dropped more points to Poland, the group could have really backed up. Had we beaten Georgia, Germany and then Poland, we'd have probably gone into the Gibraltar game with a chance of that. It's massively stretching, but there was a point where it looked like Germany's troubles were opening things up for the rest of the teams in the group And, I can't believe I feel like I still need to say it, that points total was enough to mean had we beaten Georgia we would have been in the playoffs. Take out Gibraltar from Ireland's results and they got three points more than us. That's not exactly great either. Our group had no side going all out, so the points total were relatively close. If you ranked the 4th placed sides, we were comfortably ahead of every other side, because our group ended up all taking points off of each other. If you're wanting to take away results against the bottom sides, Netherlands got 7 points from 8 games, as did Israel, Bulgaria and Macedonia. Estonia had 6. Finland got 8, Montenegro got 5. Serbia got fucking 4. Of course we need to do better, but then I never argued about that. We could have easily qualified automatically the way this group panned out. But that doesn't change what I originally said. If we had bea...nah, I'm honestly sick of saying it, because you're clearly not getting it.

And yet none of that changes what I actually said, which was, again, if we did beat Georgia, we would've been in a playoff spot. How is that so hard to understand? I never said anything about the rest of the campaign. Although for the record, it's nowhere near as bad as people make out with hindsight. You talk about Poland like they were no-marks - a draw in Warsaw was a good result, and I completely agree we should have closed it out in at least one of the games - probably Hampden. But Poland have proved this summer that they are a good side. And we didn't "choke" against Ireland, we got it back to 1-1 after they scored first. The only reason I go on about the Georgia game in this context is because had we won it, and got through the playoff, then no-one would be saying a peep about the rest of the campaign. But we lose that one, end up not qualifying, and suddenly the retcon is that we were absolutely shite. We weren't. We were fair-to-middling for most of the campaign, and shite in one game. Ireland were pretty average for most of the campaign, and amazing for one game. That's the way it goes sometimes.

Yeah, realise that now. The season ticket holders behind me told him to GTF while Abzy was being club captain getting his photies taken.

No, I've very much not. What is incorrect about what i said? We beat Georgia, we would have been in a play-off spot. That's saying nothing about any other "failures", real or imagined. And funnily enough, saying nothing about those failures is exactly what people would be doing had we beaten Georgia, gotten through the playoffs and gone to the Euros. And as I keep saying, because it's true, the Northern Irish and Wales squads were chock full of "failures" prior to this summer. And now they're not.

Might well have been actually now you say it. I heard him mention something about twin brother, never got a look at the guy, but think they moved to the Weir Stand after, and Pogba was paying a lot of attention to there. Some pretty good stuff today I thought, but looks like we haven't really changed much from the usual going behind and then shiting it. At least we got back in front - had we scored earlier I think we'd have gone on to score a lot more. Azeez looks pretty promising too.

Pitch looking wonderful. I also had osman sitting in the row behind me with his brother. He was then told to piss off by some season ticket holders who I don't think recognised him.

I get your point about those teams, but we absolutely should be worrying about seeding. It can make a massive difference to who you get in a group. The higher you are, the more chance you have, simple as that. Of course a poorer team could beat us, and of course we could beat a better team. But I'd still rather face the weaker ones

I imagine most sides thought of Northern Ireland and Wales the same way before the last campaign. Like it or not, we are in the group of sides who can qualify. But that pool is much, much larger than the number of available spaces. One terrible match blew our playoff chances. We had a chance to qualify, we failed. But by all means, keep the wailing and the gnashing of teeth going about how everything is just awful. And I'm the negative one... MT said it best. Call you a moron, you post like a moron...aye, it's probably a moron. I'll take that back if you can actually come back to any of the post of mine with any coherent point, rather than...well, whatever you usually do.

Aye poor dears. So much quality in there that they just don't know what to do without a cuddle from the manager. Strachan is very far from blameless, but to absolve the players of anything doesn't really work.

All of that post, and that's all you can say? Suppose I shouldn't have expected much better from you. Actually, if you could point out where I actually mentioned him at any point during my post - in a thread about Jack Harper - then that'd be great. Seek help you absolute moron.

So you're saying the players deserve no blame whatsoever, and that the manager deserves it all?

The one thing Muzzy has going for him is his pace. He looks like he absolutely terrifies anyone he's up against, because they know he'll be able to run very quickly all day. Defensively he's not great, but going forward he's probably one of the better players we've had at full-back positions. I vaguely remember one game last season where we got absolutely pumped and he put in a shameful defensive display...post split was it? Aye, post-split Inverness. The one where our sole player tracking back for the first was Doolan, and Muzzy spent most of the game sauntering around not tracking runs.

Deary me... Since some people seem far too thick, I'll explain it in more words. Troopio said that " he couldn't do any worse". Let's analyse that. During this campaign, we didn't qualify, which was a failure. But in a wider context we improved. We improved our seeding to the point where we were one win away from securing pot 2 status. We had far better performances earlier on as well, to the point where it genuinely looked like we could beat Poland and Ireland to qualifying, and perhaps even finish top if Germany continued their difficult campaign. Alas, we lost in Georgia, Germany pumped us, and we blew it in the last minute against Poland (despite a decent performance). We finished in a position that would have been enough for a play-off spot had we beat Georgia. That's the reality. So, troopio's "he couldn't do any worse" pish. Of course they could! We could have lost both games against Poland. We could have lost both games against Ireland! We could have absolutely shat the bed against Gibraltar when they scored their first international goal and gone on to drop points there. It absolutely boggles the mind that someone can say "couldn't do any worse". That's the usual "och we're shite anyway" attitude that holds the country back. And it would be followed up by "see, I knew he was pish" when the new players you've brought in for the sake of it don't perform. This sort of argument is fine for a Gibraltar or San Marino. They're rock bottom, bottom pot, likely to lose every game in a qualifying campaign. To countries like that, you're absolutely right. They're as well throwing in any old player to see what sticks. Not Scotland, a team who are in a group of nations that start each campaign knowing they have a chance of qualifying. And the biggest irony in the shit sandwich that was your post was that my post was far, far more positive than the one I was quoting. So aye, "Lord of Gloom".

I can only see this failing unfortunately. Not because it's particularly bad - technically it's probably going to be marvel - but because of the hype it's gathered. Nothing I've read about suggests it'll be particularly interesting gameplay wise. You find a planet, you explore it, then you repeat that. I loved the exploration in Skyrim/Witcher etc, but you knew that when you found somewhere, just exploring would be the very least you could expect. A lot of the time you can find quests or the like that give you something to do. If they don't add more than just exploration, then it's just going to seem like an incredibly smug "look at what we did technically" without much depth to it. Just Cause 3 had an absolutely huge map, and it looked beautiful, but...well there wasn't really that much to do was there? Fallout on the other hand was much more condensed, and it was brilliant. It's not all about quantity anymore. And if that's all it is, it's going to get absolutely shat on in the current games climate. People can't wait for things like this to fail. Also, might be the cynic in me, but with the devs saying how many planets there are...they could essentially say anything when they're at those numbers. It's all done mathematically, procedural programming (which all the gaming VLs pure love talking about like they're hot shit) but I assume they're either making up a big number, or they're trusting in their equations telling them that's how many unique worlds there's going to be. No-ones ever going to be able to prove it, and it makes a great tagline.

Yes, he very much could.

Did they actually have the title rematch last night or was it just the draft? I was sure they'd announced a match but couldn't find any mention of it on Bleacher Report.

There's reports saying that they actually had a reason behind such a terrible finish to RAW last night, despite the poor execution. They're planning on having two world titles, so it could feed into that in some way. Dirtsheet of course, so could be rubbish. In fact, now I'm actually typing it, it makes little sense. What are they going to do? Say that because there was no clear winner, they both get a title? What a shit way to do it that would be. However, if it leads to them vacating and doing two proper tournaments to determine the Champion of each show, I'd be more for it.

From what I understand, Rollins "pinned" Ambrose in odd circumstances and was declared the winner. Then on the Network after RAW they declared it a draw, so Ambrose retained.

Sounds like an absolute clusterfuck of a main event, made worse by them completely changing the actual outcome but only showing it to those who have the Network. I'm sure the USA Network will be absolutely thrilled with that one. Roll on the draft and Battleground, because it feels like they're just treading water waiting for other things to happen now.

Is Saturday's game definitely on the season ticket?