Miki-Liki

We'll just pretend that Conte never wanted Lukaku, not even at his previous club, and ignore all the reports mentioning that Conte had been in contact with him. It doesn't matter anyway, I think Conte would have been fine with either of them.

Not really a great comparison, Sanchez was actually an important part of Barcelona's squad for a couple of seasons, and became superfluous only after the signing of Suarez. Morata on the other hand has never been a first team player in his life. Sorry for ruining the mood and being "a prick", but I find it difficult to get excited to see the club break its transfer record for a benchwarmer.

Judging by the comments, one might think that the club had signed the Brazilian Ronaldo in his prime, instead of Real Madrid's waste.

Is this a 2016-17 article? It certainly bears a striking resemblance to last year's nonsense the experts were spouting.

It's the same with United fans. Lukaku went from being a donkey to being world class. Shifts in cognition are common among football fans.

I'm not, I don't post here that often, but I do lurk quite a lot. I'm not saying that titles are insignificant, but they are not the only thing that matters.

The only reason they took it seriously is because it guarantees CL football, so their celebration of the trophy is pretty much the same as Arsenal celebrating finishing 4th. The EL is a competition they should not even be participating in to begin with. Obviously, I do not agree with your statement that only titles matter, they can be quite misleading actually.

Winning the EL is essentially no different from being 4th in the PL.

That's like saying that Chelsea would have conceded after each shot on target if it weren't for Courtois. I rest my case.

And Pellegrini lasted for two more seasons after winning the title, his contract expired. As for Mancini, you could say that he lost the dressing room in his final season, and in addition to that, they finished last in their group in the Champions League and lost the cup final to Wigan, both of which are mortifying.

A voyeur, in other words. He only talks about Chelsea. How the tables have turned.

Four midfielders? So he's implying that he doesn't count on Mikel and Oscar.

He's basically confirmed what we've all been suspecting for some time.

Indeed. According to them, we would have retained the title last season...

Quite right, but they've hardly become "world class" during his tenure, have they? He didn't even play them that much.

Doesn't matter, he was 19 at that time.

He played a major part in Pogba's development, which is why it is assumed that he's good with youth... But as far as I know, Pogba is the only one.

Not necessarily tired, but at least we agree that he should be given an opportunity, instead of playing it "safe" all the time with Matic and Oscar or heaven forbid - Mikel.

We've seen Chalobah play in preseason and he was one of our best performers. And if I recall correctly, he looked good even with Fabregas next to him. We don't know what happens in practice, but whatever does, I'm not buying it.

But that's what I said in my following post, didn't I? I was pleased with our performance against Burnley, Swansea and WHU? Klopp arrived in mid-season, but since you've mentioned some results, in his first game avoided defeat against Tottenham, thrashed Chelsea at the Bridge, they beat Man City twice (1:4 away!), they beat the champions Leicester, they dismantled Everton at home 4:0, and had goal fests against Norwich and Arsenal. And their defense is arguably no better than ours.

True, nothing has been won and the season has just started, but what impresses most people is how quickly they managed to get their ideas across. Of course, it's not perfect, but you can see them building on something. We never really saw that with Mourinho. As for Conte, there have been some signs of the brand of football he wants to play, but only against the likes of WHU, Burnley and Swansea, it all went put of the window against Arsenal and L'pool. And I don't think it's a knee jerk reaction (not including those who want him sacked, that's silly), I think he should get enough time to create his own squad, then we can judge him properly. So far, my emotions are mixed.

Yes, Klopp is a fine example, you could see the signs of what he's trying to achieve from the first game. But since we've been taught not to care about the process, but only about the results, most people don't realize that.

That would be pretty ironic. Wanting your team to "have balls", yet being afraid of dropping underperforming players.

It could be because of Torres that the board decided not to overpay, and there's also the stadium. And according to various sources, Roman has lost quite a lot of wealth. We're trying to do an "Arsenal", but I fear we're doing a Liverpool/Inter/Milan instead. Wasn't Kante actually the alternative for Nainggolan? I haven't seen Koulibaly, so to claim he'd be better than Luiz would be a shot in the dark. Alonso, hasn't impressed me, and I agree that we could have signed someone else. Have we even been linked to any other LB this summer? Our defense is absolutely clueless without Terry, this has been proven today, and I hope Zouma will be decent after his return. Of course you can't blame everything on Conte, and he's right to say that everyone should take responsibility for the club's recent failures. But still, I think that he can do better, even with the current squad at his disposal.

To be honest, even if we had overpaid for Koulibaly instead of bringing back Luiz, the likes of Ivanovic and Cahill would still have played today, so I don't think it would have made a difference. Yes, the board may not have been successful in recruiting reinforcements, but that's why I think Conte ought to try out Chalobah, Aina and other boys, just like Tottenham a couple of seasons ago.