Vesper

My only interest in him is as a striker. I do not even know if Sarri and the board see him as an option there. Surely they must, as other than a dice roll on Piątek the other options are insanely expensive and/or not available, or are ageing stopgaps or even bigger gambles.

Great news! January moves on a loan are usually not good outcomes.

I love Scotland, just not for footie. Maybe if Rangers get on level terms with Celtic again it might make for a decent Old Firm game, and I really do hope Hearts (I prefer Edinburgh over Glasgow any day) can take Celtic finally out, but the level of play and players in the SPL just isn't there for me overall. Only leagues I truly watch are the EPL, Serie A, and the Bundesliga. I will watch (only to scout) La Liga (unless it is a big 3 game, then I usually watch) and Ligue 1 (only to scout a certian player or maybe Lyon v PSG or Lyon v Marseille or PSG v Marseille) a wee bit. La Liga has almost no players I want who are truly available. Most I would love to have will never be sold in their prime. The only established players who are actually available would be (besides Firpo and obviously, hopefully our own Kovacic) Malcom (huge mistake by our board and also Barca's, as he is simply not playing), LW Mikel Oyarzabal, AMF Carlos Soler, AMF Pablo Fornals, CMF Manu Trigueros (poor mans Cesc), RW Iñaki Williams, AMF/RW Rafinha (Barca are fuckers to deal with when its a player they rate, and they rate Rafinha higher than Malcom atm), AMF Pablo Sarabia, and CF Maximiliano Gómez. BTW, I am not slagging off Tierney, the main reason I didn't list him is that he will be more expensive by far than all above except Firpo and perhaps RB Achraf Hakimi (if Real Madrid would even sell him). Firpo is worth the extra quid over Kierney IMHO at LB. Atm I cannot say the same for Hakimi over Valentino Lazaro. That may well change but Lazaro is REALLY good too. I also rated Nordi Mukiele and Wan-Bissaka as great values. RM almost never sell young players they rate, and when they do, it is for insane prices. Asensio is perfect example. £100m for him is NOT a great price, yet RM offers him up at that and acts like it is a monster bargain. He has regressed in my book, and is not remotely near a Hazardian level. To sum it all up. I would be over the moon if we sold Alonso and Emerson and bought Firpo AND Tierney (or Ferland Mendy). Same with Azpi (I can hear the howls now) and Zappacosta and buy Hakimi (for fair price) and Valentino Lazaro. Azpi is 30 next season, and fullbacks age horridly. Marcelo (always horrid on defence) is now falling off overall at 30yo. Injuries also pile up much more easily. Jordi Alba is literally the only other WC LB over 28. Had someone tey to say Filipe Luís (33yo) was still! LOLOL. Go watch the AM v Dortmund game and get back to me. Fortune favours the bold, and all my picks play at high level (including Europe) and thus are hardly academy level dice-rolls. I know we never sell all 4 at once we have now, but we really need to at least being in great young players who can eventually bench Azpi and especially Alonso. The way things are going I am not getting my hopes up, but I am nothing if not an incredibly stubborn bish, so I will keep on posting.

I rate all Firpo miles more than Tierney. Mendy too. That whole post was to point out young fullbacks who won't cost 70m plus quid. Scottish league footie is a joke, so hard to splash the cash Celtic would demand. We could try a loan with option to buy (not obligation), and pay 50% above fair market 1 year loan price (so probably a couple million quid extra) as a sign of good faith. Doubt Celtic would go for that though. Firpo was imperious versus Milan last night. I think he would be aces here. We are stuck with the turtle Alonso for years I fear, so all this is apparently meaningless. Azpi also needs to step it up, he has been the biggest drop off from last year so far. You can't count Willian and Morata as they were already shit. Azpi was a top 5 RB. The best defensive RB on planet. This year, nowhere near that. His offensive input is underwhelming at best, and has strangely been off the mark on defence as well. If you want to see a RB playing great football in high intensity pressing system, look at 19yo Achraf Hakimi of Dortmund. Unfortunately Real Madrid owns him, he is only on loan. They will never sell him unless we waived insane money at them.

Fuck Courtois. His parents on honeymoon:

GK Kepa CB Rudiger CB Luiz LB Alonso RB Azpi DH DMF Jorginho CMF Kovacic AMF RLC LW Hazard RW Pedro CF Giroud Bench Willie AC Emerson Kante Barkley CHO Morata

Fans mock Tottenham over their advert boasting new stadium is 'the only place to watch Champions League in London'… with them now on the brink of being knocked out before they play there https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-6315245/Fans-mock-Tottenham-poster-Champions-League-games-new-stadium.html

Fabregas was positively shitarific. So was Moses. Willian was his usual ball hogging shoot till you drop with no results self, and Giroud couldnt buy a goal if he had Roman's quid. All the rest were solid if not spectacular. Emerson and Zappa looked really good. RLC was out of this world.

fucking goonas pulled it out 1 nil that cunt Welbeck in 77th minute

LOLOL my wife goes CRAZY when they do that

Yes, he had a pretty good WC and it was time to cash the fuck in instead Marina took almost A FUCKING MONTH HOLIDAY!!!

and Drinkwater and Bakayoko all the rest we can argue about but those 3 are just HORRIFIC

Moses is the Bakayoko of wingers

Juve and PSG are the two teams who would most want him, and they both have players I would kill for

We don't know till we try it, if he is shit, I will be the first to say no more, no more

Its a chess game, especially with Roman closing the purse (compared to other of the massive teams) lately. If we are not going to play and develop young players and only buy well established WC players, we need to raise massive capital, and Kante would do just that. He simply is replaceable in the Sarri system. Harsh but true. Chelsea: Sarrismo has no place for a fully defensive N’Golo Kante https://theprideoflondon.com/2018/09/24/chelsea-sarrismo-ngolo-kante-midfield/ still the best article explaining this

wooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooot

Ampadu is still injured. Also, I think it madness to turn him into a MF. Not saying you suggest this. Just a general comment. Now, IF we go all bully boy world class buyers again and grab de Ligt, then we can talk about Ethan at MF, especially if RM wont perma sell us Kovacic.

He just isnt needed in this system and to toss away £135m plus is crazy now. Only if you think Sarri is sacked in next 14 to 16 months is it worth keeping him.

Mayne Barkley in at RW and CHO at left!

Sad to see Cesc at this level, he is well and truly a spent force. Wilian is still a fucking ball hog and selfish All the rest, great!!!! Emerson has finally looked a bit like Roma Emerson, although BATE are complete shit, so hard to gauge. Every game I see I lean more and more to selling Kante (for £135m to £150m) We simply don,t need him in this system, he doesn't bring enough to the table to justify blocking a £135m plus sale. Sorry if this offends anyone, I have read 50 plus articles, seen every pro Kante argument tossed out there as long as Sarriball is the order of the day, he is not a player worth the quid we can get for him we need to use him as leverage to get either Mbappe or Dybala he is just being wasted here he deserves better

I would rather Pedro stays on and gets some time

Pedro is RW, it would be Willian coming off PLEASE!!!!

Finally a devastating start!!!

Gennaro Gattuso is going to get the sacking, 1 2 Betis FT Milan looked shambles