Rooney

They will enter the tournament as the dark horses 100%. Problem is, none of their players have ever played in an international tournament before, which 100% matters. I think they will also end up in a difficult group too with the way the seedings work. You'd back them against most of the home nations, but the World Cup throws up some weird stuff!

Hard to say really have they played anyone good? Italy are not a good comparison. It’s a bit like England really at the moment they’re kind of an unknown. You suspect the conditions are also going to play a huge part. Kind of feel this Norway side are a bit like the golden age of Belgium. They’ve clearly got a good squad all coming through together at the same time.

It's a really good show, but I feel like the cast this time around is way less likable. All of the final players are pretty annoying. I get the hate for the bald guy, but also the yelllow team who targeted him can have absolutely zero complaints - it's a game. Get the feeling Trinity or 017 will win.

So after 7 months of tarrifs don' raise prices and they are good, the US are removing tarrifs on a number of food products. Kinda wish Liam was still around and posting to tell us all how great an idea this was. Who knew that tarrifs hurt people and push prices up because you can't monopolise manufacturing in every damn sector.

Reeves has allegedly now ruled out income tax rises, now the speculation seems to be about tax thresholds. Think it is inevitable at this point the current bandings get frozen again and certain quarters seem to think the current tax bandings might get lowered. If that's a case, all seems a bit daft to me as surely anyone with a brain can see that is tax rise.

But it's why did Amorim leave Champions League Sporting to join Europa League Man Utd? He has a lot of history woth Wolves, likely got a massive salary increase and is back managing in the Premier League. Boro are having a good season, but there's never any guarantee they would go up. Managers fall in and out of fashion so quickly, just look at Kieran McKenna as an example, just turned down loads of clubs 18 months ago, wonder if he regrets that now!? Who knows how good or bad Edwards is. By all accounts the brains (his assistant coach) is staying behind at Boro, so we'll see. But you'd expect even if Wolves get relegated he'll be given a shot to get them back up and will still be able to walk in to any Championship club is sacked.

Whoever wins the league this year, will be the team that adapts the most. The narrative switches (wrongly imo) so fast and avoids the patterns. Most teams look to be struggling away from home after the European games.

If this rumoured NI savings on pension contributions over £2k happens then I really don’t know. I’ve been supportive of Labour generally, but this is a really dumb thing to do.

I don't know, I tend to think the producers don't get involved that much in influencing who gets murdered. I don't think it makes a difference whether the Faithful or Traitors win at the end as it's all about the journey, I think at every finale there's always tension. At the end of the day, Nick was influenced by what Joe said when Cat got banished. In the show itself, the celebrities also know what makes good TV. Going by other series, the murders in plain sight get loads of suspicion, but Alan Carr just played his personality. From a few snippets here and there, loads of stuff was cut too. That's the only way the producers influence imo, is whatever narrative they want to shift on the audience with how they edit the show. I guess it's always different to X Factor, Love Island etc. as there is no public voting and the storyline already set

All good things come to an end, I think what is important is the show continues to innovate whilst not changing too much. There was no Seer twist in the Celebrity version. The ratings are huge and shows there is a lot of growth still, I know of a fair people who never watched the civilian version, but did the celebrity version. I guess the big challenge for the BBC is how they protect the show if a rival broadcaster or streamer came in for it. I absolutely love that it is 'event' TV though.

The finals didn’t go the way I expected it to - but great event TV. Suspect series 4 of the civilian series will be big. Wonder if this may go the way of Big Brother and the celebrity format proving more popular. Strange! As I think the civilian series is better, but personal preferences I suppose. The ratings for this are absolutely phenomenal though in the age of streaming. They had some amazing celebrities that you would never normally expect to do reality TV, hopefully they up the budget slightly and we get some great casting for series 2!

At some point, the council tax system needs re-designing. It is the easiest way to support local services, but totally agree the cost is expensive. But longer term, the cost will pay off.

Saturday 8th November Tottenham Hotspur 1-1 Manchester United (12:30) Everton 2-1 Fulham West Ham United 2-0 Burnley Sunderland 0-1 Arsenal (17:30) Chelsea 3-0 Wolverhampton Wanderers (20:00) Sunday 9th November Aston Villa 2-2 AFC Bournemouth (14:00) Brentford 2-1 Newcastle United (14:00) Crystal Palace 1-1 Brighton & Hove Albion (14:00) Nottingham Forest 2-0 Leeds United (14:00) Manchester City 2-2 Liverpool (16:30)

Not true though, I think we lost 5 home games in a row in 2021 and then that 2022/2023 season was absolutely painful watching Henderson and Fabinho's legs go A win today and we're 3rd, whilst a loss would have had us in the bottom half of the table. Fine margins! Much better today and we defended set pieces a lot better.

When you grew up in the 90s and 00s there is a reason why lots of people take great pleasure in the Man Utd misfortune. The same reason why I suspect people who grew up in the 80s have a distaste for Liverpool! Enjoy the good times, as they soon end fast :D