King Kante

Wow, I can't believe he signed for 8 years. If he turns out decent, we have him by the balls for all his prime years. Equally, if he is a dud, then we're going to have to hope Saudi keep wanting our surplus players.

The obligation has to match what Saudi are offering.

Utd have left the offer on the table by all accounts.

Can see TT wanting him. If he goes to the Bundesliga, he'll be a top player over there with the space he'll get and his work rate. TT also knows him and how to deploy him. If I were Mount, I would go there.

We paid £72m for Kepa and people seem to belive Onana is worth £65m. So, €75m for Costa seems reasonable when compared to that nonsense.

I think Mbappe is a massive Prima Donna; however, PSG signed that contract knowing what the kid's personality was like. That he is enforcing the terms of the contract should come as no surprise to anyone and particularly PSG - PSG deserve zero sympathy in this situation if they thought the kid just signed last Summer so that they could get a decent fee this Summer.

This should help us with the academy. We can loan then out/sell them and still controll their development, whilst they get good minutes in decent leagues. A Portugese team will be handy for South American players. That said, I don't want this to get mental and it ends up with 10+ clubs.

He will have to be ground down. His only option is either Saudi or rot here. With the money we're bringing in, I cannot see the club accepting Inter's proposal when we have another offer from Saudi. Club should just say 'rot with the reserves or go to Saudi, up to you'.

Any fee?

If we get £25m+ for him that would be decent business owing to his wages.

I didn't rate him then either and was always happy that we essentially traded him for prime Costa. However, that said, I wasn't posting here to back that up. As for moving forward, this guy just needs to go to Saudi for his own sake. No serious club in Europe is going to take him. Inter proved last season that a way past it Dzeko was still better than him in pretty much every aspect of CF play that matters. If he comes back here, he will get meme'd to hell then essentially sent to the reserve team for the rest of his contract. No way is he able to deal with any sort of low block with his limited skill set. For sure he could resurface with a mid-lower table PL club and probably bang in 15 goals a season for them. However, he would still get meme'd in the big games when he evitiably fecks up easy chances and loses the ball due to his dire first touch. He may as well go to Saudi and take the big bucks whilst scoring 25+ a season. Only delusion and absolute clowns blowing smoke up his arse makes him believe he is a top player and that he deserves to be at a top European club.

Can we use this kid next season instead of Kepa? I really cannot handle another year of watching Kepa with his t-rex arms.

Wouldn't say it was lucky per se. Ederson gets sent off if it doesn't deflect as it does. Question of course, is does he score if Ederson doesn't fly out.

Saudi coming to our rescue to KK, Ziyech and to a lesser extend Mendy. If we can get reasonable fees for those players then it has pretty much zero impact on us on the pitch (I still rate Mendy over Kepa; but recognise he isn't becoming No.1 again.) Kante, I can accept wants the insane money and his injury record means he is a massive risk. My concern is more over the targets and the sales of Kova and Mount. For me, Kova is our best CM and Mount has the danger of becoming a loss like some of our other big mistakes. As for the targets, Jackson looks like a Gamble based on two months of football and someone has got excited about some YouTube clips/social media posts. Caicedo is horribly over priced and strikes me as a player that could pull a Cucu once out of Brighton. Onana isn't worth the money and I still think he is suspect for a GK but has had his profile raised due to doing ok in Serie A - similar to Lukaku. Lavia has shown a lot of promise but looks raw still (however, I am ok with him if he is given time and isn't insanely priced.) For me, I just don't see a strategy, it all seems to be 'moving the deck chairs on the Titanic'.

Well if we keep acting like morons, you cannot blame them for treating us as such.

If sell Colwill then I will give up with following our transfers. Just won't be worth the brain damage anymore.

I told everyone at the time he was a complete utter waste of money. Most ridiculous transfer we've made and we have had a lot of those.

Agreed. It'll be a manager who can come in immediately otherwise they would've had him see out the season. Additionally, I doubt it is a manager who was available prior to the break, so that rules out Zidane, Poch and Enrique. Only two managers fit this is JN and Conte. I cannot see the club going to Conte in a million years unless the board are p*ssed off with the players. So, it has to be presumed it is JN.

The firing of TT only makes sense if the rumours of him loving blow/chasingevery 20-29 year old women that crosses his path is true. Otherwise he should've been told to see out the season. As for Don Carlo, he has always been a bit of a cup manager. For sure his record in the CL is second to none and he is the ultimate steady hand. However, if you want someone who goes head to head with Pep, you need someone who can get into his head a bit.

Pep always out Pep's himself in the CL. What I find amazing in football talk, is just how much football fans don't realise Pep is incredibly aspergers. That bloke romps leagues with tactical genius because he is able in league seasons to largely size up the opposition, exploit their weakness and build his teams to exploit all those weaknesses over 38 games. He is the expert at bigger picture as he tries to play 'two steps ahead' the whole time (which he can do over longer periods.) Where Pep comes underdone is in the micro situations/cup games. I bet since TT got the Bayern job, he has barely slept pulling a 'beautiful mind' kind of tactical wall together to try and outsmart TT, whereas TT is probably spending his free time trying to bang the youngest Nanny he can find and get some of the best blow. Then when it comes to game time Pep loses his team on what they are meant to do as he has decided Grealish will be best in a DM position to deal with the counter press in the 76th minute, whereas most other managers tell their players to continue to do what they normally do and what out for x,y and z etc. As for JN as a whole, I think he is probably Pep lite. He loves the tactical analysis but does have the obession/focus of Pep. Hence, he'll always run a guy like that close in a league season, but won't ever beat him over a league season, but equally get a good run on him in the cups whilst also beating most managers. For me, that is probably the best we can ask for as I don't see many other Pep's out their due to his condition.

This is the problem with looking at stats in isolation. The difference between Kepa and TC are incredibly stark. I believe if you go to a full break down of all stats between Kepa and TC it becomes apprantly clear why TC is an elite GK and Kepa is a GK where you struggle to find another PL who would take him as their No.1. Kepa has far too limitations as a GK from the swinging of his hands behind his back before attempting a save (which cause his 'weak wrists') to his physical limitations to long range shots (which is why Tielmanns said after the FA Cup final of '21, that he only took on such a long shot against him as he cannot reach into the far corners; hence why his save percentage to long range shots is dire; I think at that point he has zero saves to shots for 25 yards or more to his top left hand corner in three years) to TC who had difficulty in his early part of his career to ground shots (hence the memes of him having his legs wide open) due to his height (which he has largely resolved by standing in a more statuesque fashion when dealing with 121's.) This is the thing. There have been a lot of posters on here who dropped to their knees and swallowed anything the hipster pundits put in front of them (particularly that 433 or that a back 4 brings you results) without looking to what our actual sqauds strengths are, which is clearly a back 3 and pushing James/Chilwell on. As a result, when playing a back 3, they would always jump on the weakest link (Mendy's ball playing abilities or, when he was here, Alonso's acceleration.) However, what is lost in all of this is that if you have a ball playing CCB (see Silva or Fofana and particularly a pressure resistant No.6 who can shift the ball very quickly under pressure (see Enzo and Kova)) there is no real need for a ball playing GK (if that means the basics of GK play is undermined) as the GK always has a passer on and can lay off fairly easily (something Mendy can do faily reasonably.) Not true. If you play a back three and you have both a ball playing CCB and a No.6 who can avoid the press by quick releases, the GK's ability to play with their feet is greatly reduced and their aerial abilities is much more valued as set pieces become a lot less fraught. All of Mendy's massive mistakes came when he essentially didn't have Kova as a secondary outlet to Silva. Mendy was at his best when he knew he had players he could play to when he knew they would face pressure quickly. Hence, why he always played well in teams who lined up with Kova and Silva in them and less so when one was missing.

Mendy isn't great with his feet. However, with a 343 formation the need to play back to the GK is a lot more limited than in a back 4, especially if you know the GK is vulnerable with the ball at his feet. I agree that either are the answer, but going forward this season Mendy needs to come back. Yes, Memdy does make mistakes but his mistakes can be mitigated against a lot more than Kepa's. Since the turn of the year Kepa has: Got lost at sea for Fulham's second when away. Like a coward, refused to collect a ball across the ground against City, in case he got clattered. Yet again, palmed one in against Everton. I think I have also forgotten another one. However, this is also before we get to the fact that he is woeful at saving shots travelling to his top corner from distance. Fortunately, teams haven't been doing this much recently but we certainly cannot afford Real start doing that in the QF.

Got to get Mendy back in the goal. Kepa is too small and weak and teams are waking up to this again. Mendy has his limitations but those limitations are not as problematic as Kepa's.

I remember Simon Jordan saying on TS that he heard something about TT and that Chelsea were right to get rid of instantly. Seems whatever it is, he is trying to suppress it from becoming public.

Possibly. He was very good there. However, there have been some hints recently that he has had personal problems off the pitch. So, some of his form/confidence could be down to that also.