LDN Blue

today's like a throwback. Long story short: Antagonist of TC, you could say 'controversial'. Actually could argue his points well initially but took it slightly too far when it came to disagreeing. That's really all anyone needs to know. Argue well, but don't get personal.

Come on Eden, we need you bruh

Yeah I read Boro tried a £10m bid in June that got turned down. I guess Blackburn are pricing him out. You say loyal, but I say lacking ambition to an extent - He's 25 now and he can't really afford to wait much longer before he begins to breakthrough at the top. With his goal record, he should be seeking a PL move asap. No offence to Blackburn, but they're still far off from being considered promotion candidates.

Is this a joke about Remy? Increasingly becoming Sturridge mk II. Remember when Torres & co were suspended/injured and Sturridge would pick up these odd knocks to keep him out too.

Yea, I mean don't get me wrong, if Wilshere could come back by Feb and consistently put in good performances then England will benefit. Alli would be a worthy understudy and learn a lot from him in that sense. But as you said, England have the pool of talent to no longer be reliant on a single-trio of player anymore.. Even Joe Hart who's been so assured is now facing increasing pressure from Butland. It's actually a great time for England to use Euro 2016 to experiment because, let's be honest, there's no expectation this time.

I agree he's a good player, but the notion that he's meant to be ready simply for the Euro's without actually seeing how he comes back seems a bit ridiculous. I don't actually find him consistent, when he is fit as well, he's capable of having worldies but they're too seldom imo. Injuries don't help and I'm not suggesting they haven't made an impact on his ability to stay consistent but he hardly helps himself sometimes. But as you've shown in the rest of your post, England do have players to fill this gap left by Wilshere. We're quite packed in C/DM, so the importance of Wilshere in this setup is a bigger exaggeration imo.

seriously? We need Eto'o!

(Mods hope you don't mind - all fair in love and war, right?)

Really makes me laugh how this country still believes Wilshere has some divine right to play for England whenever he's fit Hasn't put in a good performance, and I'm talking Barca a couple seasons ago, in years.

Whether it's him or not, I just had a good laugh reading some posts TSE slagging off TC - I even see Sloth joined them xD

I just don't get one thing. I've heard his form for Spain this season has been brilliant, even getting a MOTM here and there (Iirc). So what's the difference between him playing for Spain and playing for us?..

This match is literally now a case of who's worse out of these 2 failing teams? Got 0-0 written all over it.

Yeah, but also you find team are now gaining entry through the 'fair play league' as well, which is why in rare cases even 8th will get you in the EL. I do accept that a big enough team with depth (as we're supposed to be) can manage both EL & League obligations. But it wouldn't be the worst case if didn't make the EL, would it?

Fair enough, my assessment of him wasn't that great imo I guess. Slightly unnecessary and the deal was done before we'd even secured a new manager.. It was Hiddink's parting gift so to speak. But either way, don't think he should have much say in transfers considering how long he's going to stick around for.

Idk if he should have control though. Iirc, the last time he 'signed' a player for us it happen to be one Yuri Zhirkov. Aside from that blinder vs Spartak(?).. He pretty much did eff all? Made a good emergency left-back mind you.

What about Saido Mané? 23 currently iirc.

See the thing is, I do agree. I don't know why Hiddink did that, because if Mikel was coming on I thought for Matic would've made more sense. But this brings me back to Cesc being too poor right now, for Hiddink to sacrifice him like that must be something attributed to Cesc himself. But that being said, Mikel hadn't done much wrong when he was playing. He did the job. Didn't play overly well or overly poor. It's a flaw of playing Cesc in that role. Everyone know, this is just a very wild example, on Fifa when you play 2 proper DMs then it's almost impossible to get past such a defence at times. Maybe Hiddink wanted the back 6 to be solid as possible to give a free license to Pedro (Hazard), Oscar, Willian & Costa.

http://www.thesportbible.com/articles/romelu-lukaku-absolves-jose-mourinho-of-fault-over-leaving-chelsea Can anyone verify this? Sports Bible is hardly the most reputable source.

Well if he consistently did a job, he'd probably continue doing that job - I mean I'm under no illusion here, he should've really been sold a long time ago. For his own career as well, no reason he couldn't have become that CAM he was meant to be. For some reason, managers seem to love him

They don't want you to have Christensen, Kalas, Ake, Van Ginkel, Romeu, Pasalic and Bamford.

I think he's still walking down the guard of honour he left in 2009

Well considering Hazard missed the last few he was involved in.. Plus I don't think it's a management decision per se either, players clearly have their input to that decision too.

Tbh, they're not really comparable for what they do lol. I was speaking generically in the moment we're in now. I mean of course Fabregas is capable of much more than Mikel. That's quite obvious. But he's not doing it now and when he's become such a.. passenger(?).. It's easy to point to Mikel being able to 'do a job' higher than Fabregas not being able to.

Lol 'vent' wasn't meant to offend you mate, I do apologise if it came across that way. With Luis. Even I didn't agree at the time we signed him, everyone was saying he was one Europe's finest LBs at that point in his career and it was a no-brainer between him and Shaw. I always wanted us to sign Shaw ahead of Luis. But when you come with the label of 'Europe's best' you don't really expect to have such a long period of adapting and adjusting. If Azpi (who let's not forget Mourinho dropped at RB) can fight the great Ashley Cole out of LB then Luis should've had no trouble doing the same. I also recognise that many posters, in the time KDB Mata Etc were sold, were vocal in their criticisms of Mourinho's choices. Again I'm not disputing that. What I'm saying on that point was I do believe Mourinho saw Oscar, Hazard, Fabrgeas, Costa etc as the main spine for the team for years to come - His words, not mine. So at the time he was getting rid of KdB, Mata, Luis, you could somewhat see what he was trying to do. Hell it was true at the time, because the level Hazard Fabregas and Oscar were playing at was great to watch. It's unfortunate you see my views as clutching at straws, when you wholeheartedly believe Mourinho came here to set the squad up to their own detriment. But hey, I guess that's part of debating.

You learned that on TC hey? I learned that watching the latter two fall over themselves.. Those two might be great player individually but they're not 'great' for the team and that's quite evident. You don't need us to tell you that. The fact Hiddink and Mourinho have both dropped Cesc at various times most recently highlights that? The fact Oscar hasn't put in a worldie since Juve 2013 should be evident enough. It's not so much that Mikel and Cahill are great players either, it's that at least their flaws don't come at a higher stake than Fabregas and Oscar's