Donathan

The big issue with the bunker system for me is that we no longer get to see the conversation between the TMO and the referee which establishes whether or not there is any mitigation. Prior to the bunker system this all happened openly so you could nearly always understand the rationale for why a red card has or hasn’t been awarded. Now, it’s done behind closed doors. For me the happy medium would be that the game continues and the player goes to the bunker but then when the TMO decision is made, we go back to the screen and you hear the TMO explaining to the ref what the decision is and why.

Just don’t think you want to see your top players knackered before the singles

I’d be tempted to rest Hatton, Rahm, McIlroy and Hovland this afternoon Rose & Aberg Fleetwood & Fitzpatrick Straka & Hojgaard Lowry & McIntyre

How come Koepka is allowed to play for the US team from LIV but Johnson and DeChambeau aren’t?

Brave to drop Rose and Fitzpatrick after their respective performances today but can’t blame Donald for sending out the same pairs from the clean sweep

For the foursomes I’d go: Rahm & Hatton Hovland & Aberg Rose & Fleetwood McIlroy & Fitzpatrick Rose and Fitzpatrick in for Lowry and Straka from this morning’s lineup with Fleetwood moving to play with Rose to keep the McIlroy/Fitz pairing that played so well in the fourballs. If Europe gets out of tomorrow morning with a 2-2 split or at worst a 2.5-1.5 defeat, I’d be tempted to rest some of the top guys for the afternoon fourballs.

All the headlines will be about the morning sweep and the Rory/Fitz pairing smashing their four balls match, but man, snatching three halves from games that were red on the board coming down the back nine could well be what decides this Ryder cup

Obviously very early days in the context of the weekend but I’m not sure Luke Donald would have dreamed up a better first three hours

Had a dream last night, 18-10 Europe with Straka holing the winning putt on Sunday

Precisely. Salmond predicted before the vote that a high turnout would be good news for Yes because long term apathetics were hardly going to come out to back the status quo. Then they did exactly that. The highest turnouts were in affluent No voting areas like Stirling and Edinburgh.

Hopefully we get at least one of Denmark, Hungary, Poland or Switzerland (preferably two) because it would be excellent to stay up in this pre-WC UNL and get into league A again in order to pretty much guarantee a playoff for Euro 2028. Conversely, relegation next time would be absolutely fine because it’s arguably better to be in league B for the UNL before a World Cup. Only group winners can achieve a playoff through that route so league A not a great place to be in that instance. Conversely, if we do go down this time then it’s arguably better to finish 2nd in our league B group next time than to win it. All of the second place league B teams including Ukraine who were runner up to us look like they’re going to make the playoffs anyway and doing so keeps us in league B for 2030. Being a league A/B yo-yo team is completely fine but we are currently out of sync with the ideal way to do it. We either need to avoid relegation once or stay down one to correct that.

AFAIK the seeding pots are completely fixed based on the last nations league campaign and no results between now and February will change them. Might as well do the draw tomorrow

He’s a decent player but which full back stays out to make room for him?

I would assume expansion is likely

The one Newcastle player that would probably say yes in a heartbeat is Matt Targett. For me he’s not good enough though.

Serbia have failed to qualify for the last five European championships but made four of the five world cups in that same timeframe. They’re the anti Czech Republic who, since going independent in 1993, have been at all seven European championships (and well on course to make that 8/8) but only made the World Cup once.

Starts today for Man Utd with Bruno Fernandes shifted out to the wing due to the ongoing situations with both Antony and Sancho. I reckon he will do well playing ahead further forward in that team.

I think Norway have the longest tournament drought of any team that have ever gotten through UEFA qualifying. Serbia and Slovenia haven't qualified for the Euros since 2000 but have both played in multiple world cups since. We had this unwanted record before we made the last Euros. The overall longest drought of UEFA nations is Israel, but they only qualified for the world cup before they played in European qualifiers.

Does their win over Fiji last time count?

Jack and others will stay in the squad until someone comes along and take their place in it. Stephen O’Donnell eventually fell out the squad because of the emergence of Patterson, Hickey, and to a lesser extent Ralston. O’Donnell is still only 31 and a decent SPFL level player but others came along and removed our need for SOD to be in the squad. I’d still back him to come in to the squad if we had a crisis with our top 2-3 RWBs unavailable, like we’ve seen in the past with guys like Declan Gallagher, Paul McGinn and Steven Kingsley getting random caps in spots. With Jack though, what central midfielders are coming along to take his place? You could argue that it’s unnecessary to carry all of Gilmour, McGregor, McTominay, McGinn, Jack and McLean in the squad and his position could go to an extra defender or forward, but I’m not sure which CM would replace Jack in the squad.

Gunn Hickey, Patterson, Robertson, Tierney, Porteous, Hendry, Hanley Gilmour, McGregor, McTominay, McGinn, Ferguson, Armstrong Dykes, Adams, Christie About 2/3 of the squad picks itself barring injury. These 17 guys will surely be on the plane (if we make it, let's not count our chickens) So the question is how many of Gordon, Taylor, Cooper, McKenna, Jack, McLean etc make the plane as experienced backups or will SC turn it over to the younger guys? I'd imagine the former.

Yes, but it's incredibly feasible that they beat us by exactly 2 goals and end up level with us on points, then it would go to GD. Any 2 goal defeat for us would send us to GD. In the old rules, 2-0 (as an exact reverse) would do this would 3-1 or 4-2 or 5-3 would see us qualify on H2H away goals. Now away goals is scrapped so the H2H tiebreaker goes out way with any win, draw or 1-goal loss in Spain, and goes their way with a 3+ goal win, but in any case if Spain win by exactly 2 goals it'll go to goal difference.

About a month ago Craig Gordon was hoping to return for Hearts in October. Not sure exactly when in October he means and if that's still on track but maybe you'd think the next break comes too soon for him. Maybe the November window will mark Gordon's return to the squad but I don't think he starts over Gunn right now. Not sure what Grant Hanley's injury status if but if fit, I'd bring him back in. If nothing else he'd be a good dressing room mentor for Hendry and Porteous, but I'm not convinced he still isn't our best CCB option particularly against teams with world class centre forwards. Kane gave Hendry/Porteous nightmares on Tuesday night and Haaland got some change out of them in June and we were possibly lucky to escape with only 1 goal conceded from the spot. Maybe a fit Grant Hanley starts at CCB and Hendry and Porteous can compete for the RCB slot. Ross Stewart on the verge of returning for Sunderland having been out with an achilles since January. Again probably too soon for him but if he starts banging in the goals again, he probably gets in the squad ahead of Shankland or Nisbet. Doak could well get a call up this time as well. Maybe even Harvey Barnes if the rumours of him having a rethink are true.

I believe what's happened is that Ritchie was living in Bournemouth with his wife and kids when he played for the Cherries but he'd split with his wife before he went to Newcastle so his kids still live down on the south coast and he needs to make use of the international breaks to travel down to Bournemouth and see his kids.

Here’s an example of why they delay the flag. Without the delayed flag, the game would be stopped immediately as the ball was received by Joelinton, which would have robbed him of the opportunity to go round the keeper and score. Now with the delay, the attacking phase of play is allowed to play out. If the ball went out for a corner, the flag would go up so that West Ham get the ball back. If it went out for a goal kick or harmlessly back to the keeper they’ll just let it go. But the key point is that Joelinton scored. Either a goal (as in this case), or a potential penalty incident that happens subsequently, or even a possible red card foul by the last man defender, the process now allows them to go back and check the APP. Since the lineman has flagged for offside, they’d then need to go to VAR and prove that it was actually onside like it was in this case. In games without VAR in operation the delayed flag is not necessary.