Viper22

If they get 2 of a) A Top Class DM, A Top Class GK or c) A Top Class CB then yes. But otherwise I don't think they can match up to us or City.

What in the christ has happened here? Suddenly people who are usually so level headed (Mak, Choulo) are losing their freaking minds?!?! Look everyone, if Remy leaves then yes that would be disappointing as he's a more trusted player. But if he leaves then it will have been his choice before this. If he wants to leave for first team football then I guess we have to accept that, but he would have wanted to leave in that case whether or not Falcao signed as he's definitely behind Costa in the pecking order. So this transfer will have nothing to do with Falcao, whether Remy leaves or not. Falcao is still a good player. If you watched his performances last season then you'd see that he was severely handicapped by LVG's moronic formations and tactics. Not saying hes anywhere near as good as he was at Atletico and Porto, but he doesn't have to be. As long as he's alright then he'll be a decent 3rd choice. Also, we have not signed him, it's a loan deal. We don't have any details about it yet but the suggestions that I have seen are that it is £4M with an option to buy at the end of the season for £35M (option to, we don't have to and 99% chance we won't) with wages that are around £175k p/w. For those kind of figures I really don't see what the fuss is about. If people wanted us to sign another striker then they would have cost much much more than £4M and would likely want high wages considering they'd be sitting on the bench as 3rd choice, if they even wanted to come at all!!! As for Bamford. Now, I have been one of the biggest advocates of this guy. I love the way he plays and IMO he's ready for the Chelsea team. BUT if either Jose doesn't think he's ready or thinks he'd benefit from a PL loan then so be it. Jose has obviously decided this well before deciding to sign Falcao, so this signing is not pushing Bamford out of the team as he was already out anyway. Whether Jose is right or not to do that is a debate for another time, but i'm happy to trust his judgement. So if Bamford has a good season at a PL club he'll be ripe to either be sold or brought into our team if there is a space. And the 1 year loan deal of Falcao means that there will almost definitely be a space for next season in our 3 striker system. Everything about this deal makes sense. Please think about it some people and actually read what I just wrote. It seems as if people are either having a moan for the sake of it or laying into him just because he's a big name player and just because of that it's giving people weird flashbacks of Torres.

Away games in 4 of our 6 games after CL games. City away in only 2 of their 6 after CL games. That could be a telling difference, especially if we get an Eastern Bloc team in our group and have miles to travel.

Fixed .

Everyone needs to remember that Szczesny counts as home-grown. He came through the Arsenal academy so he wouldn't be a bad signing as a backup. Tbh if Petr chooses Arsenal i'll be gutted. But i'd take any one of Walcott, The Ox or Szczesny in a swap deal, that really wouldn't be the worst thing ever.

£25M or less - yes please £30M - alright £35M - no thanks £50M -

Getting more and more into the idea of this signing. Quite excited tbh. Signing Falcao on a free loan as a backup striker as our first transfer of the window really is a signal of intent to the rest of the PL!!!

If that money was £30M or less it would be a good deal for everyone. Oscar, Pogba, Chelsea and Juve. Don't think anyone loses out from that.

I guess we'll have to agree to disagree, I agree we should aim as high as we should with the HG backup, but IMO Butland is the 3rd best English GK around at the moment so... him for me. I would be happy with Ruddy too. As long as they're HG though it should be fine, whoever it is.

Stingray for funniest by a fair distance! Most liked is Barb, although WHS jumps up in everyone's estimation when he posts some amazing inside info!! Madmax for wisest, although both nominations for this are just perfect! Sorry to FB, he's just as deserving but I went with my initial gut reaction.

Went with Term-X for most controversial as I don't feel he is deliberately controversial and just fiercely defends his own opinions, which is admirable. Lionsden is decent poster and I often enjoy reading his posts believe it or not, although I can imagine he really doesn't like me!! LMAO that I got nominated for analytical. Thankyou for the nomination but I genuinely didn't think I was that thought-provoking!!! I thought I just spouted articulate nonsense, but there you are. Thankyou anyway. LDN Blue for me, I should've nominated them in the first place tbh, great analytical poster. Most helpful is Alex for me, always there to help and run a lot of this forum . Special Juan is a close 2nd if for nothing else than his recently found ability to storm into an argument unrelated to the thread, piss off everyone on both sides but always get the thread back on track! It's brilliantly done .

Well I like you, and surely that's all that matters? .

Skipper for best football knowledge. He seems to understand the intricacies of tactics so well I genuinely believe he'd be a better manager than half of the dickweeds in the PL. Choulo for best general knowledge is the easiest vote i'll make out of all of these. His knowledge of worldwide politics is the best of anyone I know and he seems to know a lot about a lot of things. Bets newcomer is a really hard one, I went with supporter because the insight and politeness of his posts are just fantastic, but it's really unlucky because Celery has been brilliant too!! Sorry for not voting for you .

Voted for Jason for biggest contributer as I see his posts everywhere. In a good way . Voted for all 3 of the others for MOTY as I feel confused but pleasantly surprised that i've even been nominated!! WHS to win for me, his inside info was pretty amazing .

Always rated Butland. Was gutted when he chose Stoke over us when he left Birmingham. He's the best young English GK around ATM. The only one anywhere near him is Bond. I personally think he's the best English GK that is gettable as Hart and Forster are settled at their clubs and any other good English GKs are starting at their respective clubs and are unlikely to want to move onto the bench, even if it is for Chelsea. Butland has never been even 2nd choice at Stoke though so pilfering him would essentially be upgrading him to 2nd choice and will give him the chance to maybe play in Europe and likely win a fair few medals in his career.

I can't believe I never noticed that!! Likelihood that we'll have a new GK kit for the next season and keep the red kit as the backup then. Let's play guess the colour!! I'm going to go with Black/Gold.

Oh I know the ruling was worded to allow them to do this, i'm not debating that. We all knew UEFA would give them a loophole in this transfer 'ban' and lo and behold, they have.

The first part is well put and a decent argument, but opinion. From my knowledge and from people I know who solely watch the BL they said he was no better than 6/10 at Bremen. Good stats, not great at staying involved in games especially when the going got tough. But like I said, that's opinion. I understand why he moved, especially if his main aim was to play for Belgium at the WC, but the stories that have come out (there are many of them, and while they all could be lies I seriously doubt it. No smoke without fire and all that) have shown that, like Lukaku, he had a serious attitude problem and essentially demanded to be the main man. Now, don't think I am criticising that, I do like a certain amount of arrogance in players and love the confidence that players like Zlatan and Pirlo carry themselves with. All the top footballers need a certain amount of arrogance, it's only natural. But IMO you can only be that confident in yourself and your own abilities when you have proved that you really are that damn good. KDB hasn't proved that yet and when he was at Chelsea he definitely hadn't proved hardly a thing. He demanded a move, forced a transfer to Wolfsburg, fine. If that's what he wanted and he felt like he had to be the main man at whatever club he was at then fine, Chelsea under Mourinho obviously isn't the place for him. Mourinho demands that all players work their nuts off for him and club, it's just his way, hence the whole Hazard issue that arose where Mou laid into him a tad and RLC recently even though he's fairly obviously one of Mou's favourites. I get that Mou's dominant nature can clash with some egos and it has done in the past but if you're at the club then you have to work under him, KDB obviously clashed and wanted to leave, fair enough. My point was more that he should prove himself fully first before throwing shit around, especially at a club that he left. Now I can understand his reasons for doing so and everyone can see that he wasn't given a fair chance but acting like a bitter child so soon after leaving the club comes across as just that; bitter and childish. As for the part of your comment that I have emboldened: Firstly I think you'll find that Mourinho copped a fair bit of flack that season. Both from the press and especially on here. Many people didn't buy into his 'little horse thing'. I personally think that Mourinho did almost a well as someone could have done considering the mess the club was in after having problems patched and not solved by so many short term managers for such a long time (pretty much since Mou left). He transitioned us from a team that was in the EL into a team that competed for the title in 1 year. That was more than enough for me. The next year he transitioned us into comfortable title winners. That was brilliant for me. The signing of Salah obviously didn't work out but that's not really the replacement you should be looking at. Mourinho chose Oscar over Mata and KDB, that is that comparison that should've been made. Now, obviously Oscar is far from perfect and had some serious issues in the 2nd half of the season but I greatly doubt that having Mata or KDB instead of him for the whole season would have made a large amount of difference to where we finished, our main problems were goalscorers, especially against the lesser teams that defended tightly and KDB and Mata are not that. As for the 2nd bolded part, that is just plain wrong. At the turn of the year Chelsea and Man City were level on points, so it was hardly as if we built up a top lead early on then lived off it during the 2nd half of the season. We played very well and very smartly through the 2nd half of the season to pull away from the challengers. We played like champions. Your last statement is bang on correct though, that we can agree on. Look a quality player but not a Mourinho like playing style, or attitude.

---------------Courtois------------------ ---Azpi---Terry-----Zouma---Luis--- ----------Matic-----Fabregas---------- -Reus---------Willian---------Hazard- -----------------Costa------------------- 2nd team: -----------------Ruddy------------------ ---Ivan----Cahill-----Kalas----Ake--- --------------X--------RLC-------------- (X = Schneiderlin, Nainggolan, Imbula or someone else as good) -Cuadrado-------Oscar-------Remy- -----------Falcao/Bamford------------ In: Reus, X, Ruddy and possibly Falcao (only if on loan). Out: Mikel, Ramires, Cech, Moses, McEachren and Drogba. That's really not asking for much . Reus could be replaced with Griezmann and i'd be just as happy too!

It's more that he's been top quality but for only 1 year. Is Harry Kane world class? No. Neither is KDB. If he can maintain last season's form for another 18-24 months then yes he can then be classed as world class, otherwise, he might just be a flash in the pan. Anyone remember Michu?

Lol come on dude. This is UEFAlona we're talking about here. They've already made 1 signing this transfer window: http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/33044583 UEFA are just as corrupt as FIFA and love their little Barca and will do anything for them.

To be fair how wouldn't someone be a miserable bastard when you support a team that has loads of money yet buys young nobodies and up until a month ago had won 1 trophy since fucking facebook was founded?

Reus might be seeing as BVB finished lower than expected and Klopp is off. Di Maria might be gettable from Man Utd seeing as he had a poor first season there and it sounds like Utd are getting twitchy. Griezmann has been linked many times with the club. No smoke without fire and all that. There's at least 3 options that I reckon would be available. Even if they all aren't though, then we could aim for a world class CAM/CM instead and keep Willian at RW. Just think that with Bamford already at the club, Falcao on loan and Austin/Ings cheap/free and wanting to return to the PL a 3rd choice striker isn't a huge priority ATM. That's just me though, I'll trust Jose and Emenalo whoever they choose. They rarely lead us wrong.

Lol bless him. Good player but obviously rates himself better than he is. Stop taking shots and focus on maintaining this years performance to prove you're a top player mate.