Vesper

I honestly do not know what Sarri thinks on Kante v Kovacic in that hybrid b to b role I do see what my eyes show me Kovacic is far more integrated into the offensive flow, and is deffo a more than adequate pressing disruption force I see Kante oft-times struggling with link passing I want Kante on the field, but back in a destroyer role (which is supposedly not possible) and that is why, after a lot of effort, we came up with a 3-1-3-3 formation with Kante as destroyer in front of three CB's and a triangle of MF'ers in front of Kante, with Jorginho as the base, the other 2 MF providing rotational width and coverage, as well as feeding the front 3 LW CF RW Its one of the few ways to get Kante, Jorginho, Kovacic, and Barkley (or RLC) all on the field together as MF'ers AND Kante back to destroyer (the 3 CB's and Kante would feed off to Jorginho in his DH MF role still)

Number one, you are using USD, not Pounds sterling (I will post both figures for all 3 billonaires ) and Forbes is notoriously inaccurate as they oftentimes use older data and simply state it as new Ratcliffe 6 months ago was worth £21.1 billion. (thats over 27 billion USD at current FOREX rates) https://login.thesundaytimes.co.uk/?gotoUrl=https%3A%2F%2Ffeatures.thesundaytimes.co.uk%2Frichlist%2Flive%2Frichlist to show you how rapidly Ratcliffe is gaining, in 2017 he was only 17th richest Briton via the same metrics, same source. Now he is a clear number one and pulling away. The Sunday Times 6 months ago (same sorce) indicates that Abramovich's net worth stood at £9.3 billion (11.9 billion USD). That is a billion usd higher than what you listed I also figure Kellner real time at $11.3B USD (£8.8 billion) as his main source of wealth PPF group, has been hammered this past year, he is DOWN close to 2 billion usd https://www.bloomberg.com/billionaires/profiles/petr-kellner/ add 8.8 billion quid (Kellner) to Roman's £9.3 billion £18.1 billion, or less thn half of what Ratcliffe is worth Ratcliffe was worth £21.1 billion 6 months ago (so there is your double, and that giving all benefit of the doubt to Kellner and Roman) (btw the ruble has crashed the last 5 years v the pound and usd in FOREX too, losing almost half its value, over half at one point as oil prices fell off the table, although rebounded now) Ineos, the main source of Ratcliffe's wealth has exploded in value the last year and a half, so I am sure he is northwards of £23-25bn by now (maybe a shit tonne more, as he gained 15 billion quid from 2017 to 2018 https://www.ft.com/content/26be7496-56a2-11e8-bdb7-f6677d2e1ce8 Mr Ratcliffe is worth more than £21bn, according to the Sunday Times, having boosted his wealth by £15.3bn in the past year compared with the nearly £6bn he was worth on last year’s list. Most of this figure comes from his 60 per cent stake in Ineos. The newspaper calculated the value of the company at £35bn — or about seven times profits. btw, a P/E ratio of only 7 is an extremely conservative valuation INEOS GROUP HOLDINGS S.A. 2017 ANNUAL REPORT https://www.ineos.com/globalassets/investor-relations/public/annual-reports/2017-igh-sa-annual-report_final.pdf

Lolol you need to update your figures. And I dont lie.

Pulisic has been hurt twice, and Sancho was shifted from LW to RW (Pulisic is almost always RW) and has just even dominated more on that side. Plus, Dortmund have multiple great options at LW besides Sancho: Jacob Bruun Larsen is a 20yo (just turned) Danish LW who looks a soon to be badass Marco Reus can play LW Raphaël Guerreiro their starting LB played there (LW) today and tore shit up, lolol they are so fucking loaded with versatile players and they are doing this with 4 starters out injured, including the 2nd hottest striker in Europe, Paco Alcácer Jadon Sancho so far looks better than Pulisic, but wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy too early to tell if he hits his tracking numbers 20 goals 32 assists <<<< insane! then hell yes I would have to say he is and 6 months ago he was 17yo! its not like Pulisic has had any huge seasons except one time in one category (13 assists in 43 games 2 years ago but that was with Aubameyang banging in 40 goals and Reus and Dembele another 30 ) the last 2 seasons he has only scored 5 goals each, and that is in 85 total games

yes but my formation is unlike any of those typical back 3 Conte style Italian set ups. I do not like them either boring as fuck footie, even when you win, which soon doesn't happen, especially if we played Conte ball with some of the shit we have now oh, that's right, we did that last year, lololol

Pull Hazard, Jorginho, Kovacic and Rudiger out and keep Sarri (and thus his system that nullifies Kante by putting him a bad-fit role) the team as it is now is fucked. Oh, btw, 2 of those 4 are probably gone in the summer

I would love to hear Sarri's thoughts on this Kante is the key, he is so unique I think he would just wreak havoc to the point where diagonals wouldn't matter, as we also have an extra CB to cover the flanks the overload pressure on the opposing team, I would think, would be overwhelming I don't think Hazard would have that much more defensive responsibility as we would have the other 2 MF'ers to give width defensive as well, with Jorginho floating in a regista role, waiting for the ball to set up play he would get the ball from either the front 5 or Kante behind/beside/in front of him (Kante can appear to be in 3 places at once after all, IN HIS OLD ROLE, lolol) OR one of the 3 CB's (who also give width to our flanking cover) I soo want to pick Sarri's brain on this!! LOLOLOLOL I am really good at spatial envisioning (not just in footie) so my wife and I have been talking about thsi for a month plus before I dropped it in here I can find NO trace on the web about a 3-1-3-3 (or another variant we came up with, 3-1-2-1-3 (which would have double registas (backed up by Kante again and giving additional MF deep covering width as they (the 2 registas) would play a partitioned (ie. half the field) Jorginho role) and an pure floating trequartista feeding the front three (thus the 2-1 in bold) Call it a 3-1-3-3 with a more pronounced forward triangle in MF (the trequartista being the tip of the MF spear) and then another (the front 3) triangle, which would be either inverted (wingers ahead of the CF) or forward thrusting (CF ahead of the wingers) depending on the game play situation leading up to the ball being in that last 3rd of the pitch in either (they are VERY similar) formation, the entire team would act with an accordion-like compression/relaxation action, and rotated to cover, so I truly think width issues would be solved

With no Hazard and both our strikers being absolute tosh (in terms of goals scored) I would LOVE to see Sarri just go berserk and play pinball footie versus a slow as fuck Burnley CHO (LW) RLC (striker, NOT joking) Pedro ( RW) Kovacic (CMF/AMF/Box 2 Box hybrid) Barkely (AMF/CMF, more emphasis on forward play) Jorginho (Regista) Kante DMF Destroyer (first mission after smash n grab is to pass off to Jorginho) LCB Rudiger CCB Luiz RCB Azpi GK Kepa

I am still down with Martial as our number nine TBH Sarriball would turn him into a goal machine, he has unreal pace at CF and can be a deadly efficient shooter (as he has demonstrated on numerous occasions) Plus he deffo can get physical, if need be and is a decent passer. Let's hope Mou doesn't get the sacking and he puts in his walking papers

But we would have an extra CB, AND an unleashed full destroyer Kante to cover the gaps plus the 3 OTHER MF'ers to press higher, and both the wingers too

best RW targets for us (other than Bailey) the first 2 are pipe dreams are pipe dreams Mbappe (lolol, I can by dream) Bernardo Silva (will never happen and this one is a killer as we could have had him from Monaco and instead went and took Bakadonkeyo) now back to reality Federico Bernardeschi (Sarri thinks he is one of top 5 players in Serie A) I would be over the moon if we got him (even with no Bailey) Malcom (he made a huge mistake going to Barca and is miserable) Christian Pulisic Dortmund Suso AC Milan (poor mans Pedro) Nicolas Pépé Lille 23yo, really has come on lately, great athlete Iñaki Williams Athletic Bilbao (Kepa could help) David Neres Ajax Hirving Lozano PSV Cristian Pavón Boca Juniors Maxwel Cornet Lyon Reiss Nelson 18yo on loan (from Arse, grr) to TSG Hoffenheim, HUGE potential Allan Saint-Maximin OGC Nice 21yo Best LW targets (far more loaded than RW, especially as Mbappe can play here too) Lorenzo Insigne Poison Dwarf FC aka Napoli (Sarri rates him the best player in Serie A atm, the poison dwarf rates the chances of him coming here as FUCK OFF, lolol) Federico Chiesa Fiorentina.....arffff) (although he is a more natural inverted LW, the opposite of Bailey. IF Hazard leaves we better be on him ASAP, Sarri LOVES him) Ousmane Dembélé Barca (another one who can play either wing, he started off great, not is back under the cosh with team and fans, he would be crazy expensive but has insane talent) Jadon Sancho Dortmund (can play either wing) hottest player in Eurpoe atm and he is EIGHTEEN, tracking to 20 goals, THIRTY-TWO assists, Shitty SO fucked up potentially (potentially to the level that we did on KdB, so karma is a bitch ). Obviously he needs to show he can do it at thsi level for at least 2 seasons, if he can and actually does turn into 20 goal plus, 25 to 35 assist winger, he will cost at least £150m plus in 3 years Leroy Sane (pipe dream BUT he is not a happy camper at Shitty) Thomas Lemar Atletico Madrid (pipe dream) Marco Asensio overrated and overpriced atm IMHO, BUT still has insane upside, it all comes down to price as RM will NEVER let him go now for less than £100m Vinícius Júnior 18yo Real Madrid, has potential to better than all on here except Mbappe, but again, RM will NEVER sell him atm, and we need to see IF he can actually do it at worlds highest levels Kingsley Coman 22yo Bayern Munich (they want £90m for him, so, erm, no chance) Mikel Oyarzabal Real Sociedad 21yo, left footer who can player either wing, super technical, insane skills, not the greatest athlete though, but in right system can be huge, one of the best passing younger wingers on planet Keita Baldé 23yo on Inter, on loan from Monaco Julian Brandt Bayer Leverkusen (yes again) Paulinho Bayer Leverkusen (of course, lolol) 18yo potential superstar Brasilian, needs to show he is up to big leagues Steven Bergwijn PSV 21yo (potentially better than Lozano) Willem Geubbels Monaco just turned 17, a potential CHO clone

He is having a bad start to the year, I have to admit, and he is surrounded by a bad group of family/advisers/hangers-on. Bayer Leverkusen overall is having a bad year as well, I would not be shocked to see Heiko Herrlich get the sacking by the holidays if he keeps up the turgid pace. He has crazy talent at his disposal and yet sits in 13th place in an 18 team league.

This article is just woefully ill-informed on the continuing geo-political situation vis-a-vis Russia versus the US/UK alliance. You have 2 pincer movements that are going to continue to ratchet up tensions against Putin and his Russian oligarchs (of which Roman is one if the his closest allies). First off, the American Democrats are almost assuredly going to take back the US House of Representatives and have a slight but not impossible shot at the Senate as well. They are on an all-out anti-Russian hysteria ever since the 2016 presidential election of Trump. Even with just the House under their control this is going to be ratcheted up to crazy levels. The second part of the pincer movement will be Brexit, especially a hard Brexit. The UK will no longer have any mitigating force from the rest of Europe to reign in the anti-Russian hysteria from our end, starting with further tensions building over the dodgy Skripal case. The UK will also be desperate to further trade deals and will look to the US even more. The Trump administration will be under tremendous multi-variate pressure to really go after Russia harder so as to defext charges that they are Putin's puppets. Look at what has happened already with the medium range nuclear treaty, where Trump unilaterally pulled out of an agreement that goes back over 30 years. The US will demand the UK take an even more aggressive stance. These 2 forces will more than likely combined to bring forth such hostility that I can absolutely foresee the UK government freezing all Russian assets in the UK, maybe even going so far as to attempt seizure. Hello CFC in lock-down mode. Abramovich may also have all his other assets frozen or seized as well. This is NOT some fantasy with no foundation in reality. This is something that very likely can and will happen. Imagine if Roman sees this coming and DOES sell, only to find out all monies sent to him are now under global embargo. Another possibility is that the US and UK put on a series of super sanctions that make it impossible/illegal to deal with all Russian based firms and persons, no matter how tenuous the connections are. I would feel a whole lot more at ease if the club was sold in full to safer ownership. We already are fucked on a new stadium, with the lack of revenues that is the result of no new modern stadium handcuffing us for years, maybe a decade plus due to FFP regulations. This is NOT a good situation. The author is just flat out wrong to claim this as some sort of wondrous news. It shows an extraordinarily myopic view of the complexities of the real geo-geo-political world. Roman is already under the cosh, it is only going to get worse I am afraid.

Bayer Leverkusen, not Bayern Münich. If he was at Bayern we could forget about him altogether unless he totally crashed out.

Best wishes for a speedy recovery!

Outside the box thinking here... what about a 3-1-3-3 formation? GK Kepa LCB Rudiger CCB Luiz RCB Azpi DMF Destroyer Kante (who, along with the CB's instantly sets up the offence by getting the ball to Jorginho after a pressing turnover or a takeawy) DH Playmaker Jorginho CMF Box to Box/AMF hybrid Kovacic AMF Barkley or RLC LW Hazard RW Pedro or Willian CF Giroud or Morata would look like this: Hazard Giroud Pedro/Willian Barkley/RLC Kovacic Jorginho <<<<<<<< Kante >>>>>>>>> Rudiger Luiz Azpi Kepa It would seem to put Kante back in a position where he can go back to what he does best, wreaking havoc as a true DMF floater. It also takes pressure off Luiz and allows Azpi to concentrate on defence. Only player we drop is the turtle Alonso. Thoughts?

Because .... Cardiff, lolol

Sancho with a brace now, he is on fire, unreal his progression. Tracking to 20 goals, 32 (yes 32) assists in all comps.

Targets to watch Dortmund CB Abdou Diallo CB Dan-Axel Zagadou 19yo, huge (1.96m) and pacey LB Raphaël Guerreiro (playing at LW today) RB Achraf Hakimi (playing at LB today, so great battle with Valentino Lazaro) DH DMF Julian Weigl CMF Mahmoud Dahoud LW Jadon Sancho (playing on the right, just scored, one of hottest players in Europe atm, only 18, Shitty made a HUGE fuck up selling him) RW Christian Pulisic RW Jacob Bruun Larsen (great 20yo prospect) injured players: Paco Alcácer (one of hottest strikers in Europe, minor knock, not dressed) Manuel Akanji (their best CB is injured) Jeremy Toljan (another injured player, great young RB) Thomas Delaney CMF Hertha CB Niklas Stark CB Karim Rekik RB Valentino Lazaro (my number one realistic young RB target) DH DMF Arne Maier (great young 19yo prospect) CF Davie Selke Jordan Torunarigha (21yo German CB is injured, he reminds me of Rudiger a bit)

Borussia Dortmund v Hertha Berlin HD stream https://www.vipleague.bz/borussia-dortmund-vs-hertha-bsc-berlin-streaming-link-1 tonnes of targets Jadon Sancho just had a CRAZY goal called off for offiside

Do you rate Barkley then? Kovacic is not a true AMF (he should take Kante's place, as I discussed at length above) AND Real Madrid are more than likely going to NOT sell him to us (I desperately hope they do.) If you don't rate Barkley, then surely you completely agree the number one AMF who is remotely available is Kai Havertz. Nabil Fekir is damaged goods, Victimpool saw the likelihood of a catastrophic re-injury of his knee. Isco is a pipe dream, unless you think a straight Isco for Hazard swap is a good move (it is club-destroying madness). Havertz is 19, tracking to 16 plus goals, 20 plus assists in all comps and already is capped at Die Mannschaft level. Talisca, Julian Draxler, Aleksandr Golovin (especially if Monaco get relegated), Carlos Soler, Pablo Fornals, Amine Harit, and Lucas Paquetá are other viable options. Please explain what you think we should do at AMF, seeing as you obviously don't rate RLC. Edited to add I still have big hopes for RLC at some position.

Nothing strange about that Its a 4 3 3 With RLC as striker (very intriguing, would love to hear other thoughts on this, it probably is just too cray) and the move I have screaming to try, Barkley at RW, replacing the human play delay that is Willian.

2 different roles really. Kovacic is actually better at the role Kante plays when they both start, and RLC obviously, is the more natural AMF (competing with Barkley). Notice that RLC ran riot with Kovacic in the Kante role. I can almost certainly guarantee you he wouldn't have had a hat trick had Kante been on the whole time. Kante is just very limited offensively. I do not see this changing to any massive degree. Kovacic is vastly superior in his forward flowing play. I DO understand Sarri needing high pressing defensive play from that B to B Alan role player, and why he obviously knows that Kante can do that, BUT Kovacic does provide that pressing too. Kante is the worlds greatest destroyer trad DMF who is now trapped on a team that never uses that role. In the box to box 'Alan' role, Kovacic is by far, from all I have seen, the more effective player. Let me sum it up this way. Kovacic's offensive transition flow is is better to a GREATER DEGREE over Kante's flow than Kante's high pressing prowess IN THAT ALAN ROLE is better than Kovacic's. Obviously it is Kante hands down over not just Kova, but any other human on the planet if we are talking pure DMF. We just don't offer that as an option anymore for the wee baldy man. Unless Kante adapts, we are going to have to start considering either sacking Sarri (ridiculous) or selling Kante whilst we can still get well over £100m for him. As long as Sarri is here, Kante will not play the only role he is world class at. IF we lose Kovacic, we HAVE to replace him. We also HAVE to replace the truly spent, shamefully ineffective Cesc. We have literally zero effective back-up to Jorginho at DH DMF. I STRONGLY suggest we grab the 3rd best DH DMF on the planet (after Busquets and Jorginho) in Rúben Neves. Neves also is unique in that he can also score from that position. Frenkie de Jong is by far my 2nd favourite at that position. He can play ANY MF position as well as centre back. Neves and de Jong are also both only 21 but already multi year starters. IF we lose Kovacic, then we need to try and buy Piotr Zielinski from the poison dwarf (arffff) or Tanguy Ndombélé from Lyon or Bryan Cristante of Roma or Amadou Haidara of RB Salzburg or de Jong's teammate, Donny van de Beek. Maybe even (I have changed my mind on him and now rate him) Matias Vecino from Inter, but he will be 28 next summer and that's close to getting too old to buy on long term. His teammate Roberto Gagliardini is also a legit option. Also we are crazy to not buy (and loan out for one year) 18yo Sandro Tonali of Brescia, as Sarri is obsessed with him and if anyone is potentially the new Pirlo, it's him. Juve want him BAD. Lets FUCK THEM for a fucking change! Only way we can afford to buy these players is to sell Kante...... because......Hell, the only way to buy Neves alone is to sell Kante, as we ALSO have to fix a nightmare at striker, RW (Willian is shit and only will get worse, Pedro is getting old and is very injury-prone due to slight build), and potentially the grand-daddy of all nightmares at LW if Hazard and CHO leave. We are going to lose £100m on Hazard alone in lost valuation.

Especially on days like this (One of my alltime favourite games and days!) https://www.skysports.com/football/chelsea-vs-wigan/210847 Chelsea 8 N Anelka (6, 56),F Lampard (32 pen),S Kalou (54),D Drogba (63, 68 pen, 80),A Cole (90) Wigan 0 G Caldwell ( 31) Chelsea vs Wigan Premier League 4:00pm Sunday 9th May 2010 Stamford Bridge (Att: 41383) Chelsea are champions 6 days later, we won the Double in the FA Cup:) One of my truly favourite teams.