forameus

Also, new promo tonight apparently - Shapeshifters. So likely another one that probably would be a great idea with the right implementation, done in a really half-arsed way that leaves everyone wondering what could have been. Except EA, who continue to roll about in their massive piles of money.

I think I'm essentially goosed with Twitch. I was already signed up (forgot to cancel it previously) but of course it's using any one of the multiple iterations of passwords I use. Got it wrong enough (and had to go through a fucking captcha every time) so it's locked out, and they tell me I need to reset my password. Great, that's fine, so send me an email? That didn't arrive, so please send me an email. Come on guys, send me an email. Requested 3 resets, got no mails, and now Twitch says I've asked for too many and won't give me any more. So I've got a locked account that they won't let me reset. f**k sake Amazon.

I thought this as soon as I saw the pots. With them fucking about with the top tier, a lot of the really nightmarish sides have gone up to the top tier, leaving behind a huge load of sides that are all much of a muchness. Pot 2 in that late is probably pretty fair, and its hard to see anyone in pots 3 and 4 we should be really scared of. Just a lot of teams that could give us a decent game. Pot 1 is all about avoiding Turkey and Russia, getting Wales, and making sure we get sweet revenge on the sheep-shagging, leek-munching, Simian-Bale-loving, we-hate-England-more-than-you-ing c***s.

You think they're thinking that far ahead? They'll ask the Serbian/Norwegian FA on the Friday morning after a potential win against Israel, not hear until Sunday, and then let you all know by Monday.

Come back to pars jojo Always amazed to see how well thought of he is at Dunfermline. I'm not saying he's a bad player, in fact when he first arrived he was the sort of player we really needed. Someone with actual pace who could be a bit direct, and actually do something, when all we had was a lot of...well, nothing. But recently he's hit some pretty bad form, and he just looks as though he is trying far, far too hard to bring himself out of it. There's a fine line at that point on how that goes. Either he picks himself out of it, or he looks like a complete donkey shooting from all angles and dribbling like he's a ringer in a primary school 5s game. Hopefully he picks back up, otherwise you can have him.

If McCall doesn't rest Cardle, who has been utterly rancid and trying far too hard, then I doubt he's going to rest someone he wants to build the team around unfortunately.

I'd imagine literally. Scrawled in big letters in crayon on the ballot paper. I saw that he was on his way back a week or so ago, that's great news. Seemed like McGinn at least had a chance of walking on two legs by then, at least in a Villa sense, so maybe he'll even have enough about him too. For once we get our injuries out of the way early enough, although still time for plenty of fuckery before the game,

Let's not pretend this guy is doing this for anything other than his own benefit. He's seeing where the winds are changing, and realises he can get an audience by bitching about EA. That's not inherently bad, but like I said there's ways and means to go about things, and he seems to be going about in the completely wrong way. He's not some brave soul standing against a corporation, he's a streamer trying to build his audience. He should know that his occupation is built on sand, and if you go too far with criticism then EA - and I'd imagine most companies if they were in the same position - can make things very difficult. Plus he's hardly risking his income. Build enough of an audience, and the sort of roasters who do get absorbed in FIFA channels (I watch gaming youtubers, but never FIFA as it seems incredibly dull, and all the people involved seem like absolute bellends) will follow him wherever he goes. Wouldn't be surprised if soon he throws a massive hissy fit and goes over to PES. This. Honestly, if some people managed to put a similar level of effort into something that actually mattered, we'd probably have a better society. It's a mug's game of whataboutery, of course, but it always amazes me the talk of petitions and "community action" over a video game that they could just not buy. When I thought FIFA was shite back in 15/16, I stopped buying it for a few editions. I picked it back up late in 18 and thought it was pretty good, and I've been pretty heavy on 19 and 20 ever since because I still enjoy the game. People that buy the game while actively hating it are a far bigger problem than those that buy it because they enjoy it.

At this stage we need to hope for one of two things His insane form is down to being around a very good team in Dortmund, and all of his Norway teammates are fucking shite He gets injured Given the first is likely wishful thinking and physically he looks like a car accident wouldn't stop him scoring makes the second unlikely, we're potentially in a wee bit of trouble. If we get past Israel. Why are you the way you are?

If it's a "big" PPV, as in what WWE consider big, then I can only really see Summerslam. Royal Rumble and Survivor Series are out unless you're willing to hold it indoors, and I just can't see them doing Wrestlemania over here (and you're still going to worry about the weather in early April. I always thought they'd bring Summerslam to Wembley in 2022. They can harp on about it being an anniversary, and probably completely miss the fact that it's a completely new stadium. Other than that I'd pick up one of the more attractive secondary shows and give it a trial run. The O2 got 17k for a RAW taping, and that seems to be the sort of venue and attendance they look for for a minor PPV. Unless they decide to flex their muscles and put something like Money in the Bank in a stadium just to show how popular they are.

Took a wee while for me to work through it, but another typically solid NXT show, bordering on really good. But jeeeeeezo, those false finishes got tedious. I can kind of see them in the main event, I'd say they'd be almost excusable there. But there was one about 15 minutes into the show in the opening match, wasn't there? Think I remember a tope rope finisher that looked brutal just being kicked out of, which set the tone for the rest of the show. Reached the nadir in the main event, far too many to be believable. It's a shame too, because a properly done false finish is one of the best things in wrestling. It's really easy to ruin them though by just firing in a million of them to try and create tension. Surely it's not that hard to build up a match like Cole vs Ciampa towards, say, a couple of big false finishes before the true end? Also on the negative side (although it depends how it plays out) the big finish. Gargano turning heel looks like a crazy decision at this point. He's just not very good at it, particularly when he's opposite someone who made an absolutely incredible heel. Think Brian Zane put it that HHH is absolutely set on giving this storyline the natural conclusion it was robbed of, but this just feels like another third act twist just for the sake of it. It'll no doubt make a great match at the end of it all, but still, seems needless. I don't think those take away from the overall quality though. Lee/Deejackvic was very good, and I really got into the Nox/Kai match. They really made the most of their time (aside from the meh finish).

It's only Big Milinkovic-Savic on the other side with his band of hardened Eastern Europeans, nae danger. I'd still rather face them than Haaland at the moment, but f**k sake we have a tough tie awaiting in ANY potential final.

Decided to sell off the high value players who weren't performing in my "Isn't Ligue 1 great" squad, along with a lot of the fodder I had, which pushed me just over the amount I needed for one player I had never ever used. Big Lionel Messi has been fit in on 8 chem, and he is absolutely fucking incredible. Starting in a 4-3-3 with OTW De Jong linking him, just to the right of Ben Yedder, switching to a 3-4-2-1 in-game. Zambrotta and Roberto Carlos move up to LM and RM and set to get forward, and sweet Brice Ntwambe it is fun going forward. Often 6 pouring forward when we've got the ball, and I'd be unbeatable if I could a) finish all my chances, and b) keep them out even once at the other end. Still, fun though.

No UCL SBCs whatsoever and only a shitty wee Jumbo Gold Pack SBC instead. Fucking lol.

So with UCL SBCs probably coming tonight, I've decided I don't hate myself enough, and have decided to do some investing. A huge number of UCL cards bought over the past few days in the hope they'll rise tonight. As such, we'll probably get no SBCs at all, and I'll have to quick sell everything. Watch this space. I thought I'd roll the dice on them too, did quite a few. Untradeable - Hernandez (put in Joelinton) Tradeable - Hernandez (put in Hernandez) Tradeable - De Jong (put in some jobber) Tradeable - It's French...it's a striker...f**k I'm going to do th...nope, Haller. Tradeable - Jovic (put in Haller) De Jong is a win, and given his value has absolutely tanked thanks to this, I'll keep him for now in the hope that he at least rises back up a bit, or gets another IF. Biggest story of this though is the incredibly stupid decision in hindsight to buy OTW Ben Yedder just 24 hours before. He's now approaching 250k cheaper than I bid. For f**k sake.

Not really sure what EA have done wrong in this case. Sounds like Kurt is being a little pissbaby, and goes in hard on criticism (not that I watch it, but from what people say it seems to go a little beyond criticism, which is dangerous when you, King VL, have an audience of little VLs hanging on your every word). If he's streaming their game, and he's making an income from it, then I think EA are well within their rights (as things stand, no matter how ridiculous) to act. I don't think there's anything to say you can't criticise them without repercussions - go on any twitter post they make about the game and watch the HILARIOUS memes and posts that come out. Then go visit Reddit. It's very easy to criticise EA, and quite popular. But once you start making money off their product, you better start being a little smarter with what you say. Quite easy to be constructive with the many, many things wrong with the game. But given a lot of youtubers seem incredibly immature, seems a case of play stupid games, win stupid prizes.

Friday is usually the most unforgiving time to do it, so I'd wait if I were you.

Squad Battles rewards for Gold are roundly fucked. Seems like a Prime Mixed Players pack has been replaced by the above, which will crash the app if you try and open it. They're aware, trying to fix, blah blah blah.

Another game? f**k sake... We're utterly toilet, and I have no faith in anything turning around enough for us to survive. That's now 3 successive managers who seem to think the best idea is for us to play such pedestrian football that any goal we concede is basically a death sentence. Kevin Nisbet to score 12 and Brian Graham to have to be talked down from throwing himself off the Main Stand at half-time.

"Looks ahead to his time with Partick Thistle" *cut to a few weeks later, and he's threatening Mitch Austin with a knife*

Pack luck went up a wee bit recently. Got IF Ramos and sold immediately for 330k, then the refreshed Cornet card who slots straight in at RW. Also got Ikone Future Stars a few days back, so my team is pretty much set barring some more great luck. I picked up OTW Ben Yedder to fill my problem forward spot and decided against Mbappe, so hopefully he's finally going to be the one that gives me a forward I don't hate.

That's why I rarely went away from 3-at-the-back formations for a while, they are just so much fun going forward. You can get utterly torn to shreds going the other way, but there are just so many options going forward that you've got a good chance of making it a "score one more than you" game

Whatever ends up with you having more coins to be honest, I find keepers at that level essentially identical.

I just mute the game. There isn't one bit of sound design that is worthy of being played. Music's fucking shite. Commentary's fucking shite. Game "atmosphere" is fucking shite.

Also noticed the final is scheduled for the weekend between the two Scotland games. I'm sure whoever wins tonight will be looking forward to the inevitable lucky win against Israel, defeat against the Colts in a Hampden full of them, followed by getting absolutely ridden wherever we have to travel to for the playoff final.