Tomo

This reminds me of when we sent Meireles out on loan and left ourselves with 3 CM's when we had a potential 70+ games season on the horizon.

Not happy with this atall myself, he's a proven squad player who makes decent contributions over a season. Him standing up just before lockdown while we had an injury and suspension crisis was (in my opinion) one of the key reasons we made top four. In a season like this he would have been needed at some point. Unless Barkley pushed for this I think we've made a massive error.

Would be a mistake to throw them into a league game, especially in Ziyech's case as he's had zero competitive match action since March. I really hope he goes away and plays for Morocco, his first 180 minutes of match practice being done for us would come in very handy.

I can't be bothered to go back and source particular quotes but fairly certain the gist of it was I was encouraged by how comfortable we were playing out of the back and in possession (despite the eye pleasing side of things not living up to the hype) and thought it could be really built on on time and let's just say you challenged me on it quite a bit.

Weren't we regularly clashing in the Sarri season because i could see the projected end product and you couldn't?

You like to peddle this untouchable thing but last season he was on the bench in many big games. The last two CL group games with qualification anything but secure, the super cup, Arsenal and United at home, City away, Liverpool in the cup, United in the cup, that's eight big games he wasn't selected to start in. Not to mention he was took off at half time by Lampard on a couple of occasions and also against Liverpool aswell as in the cup final while we were losing, not exactly the rap sheet of a player who will always play no matter what is it? Regarding why he's played every game so far this season, I'd hazard a guess it's because we're overhauling over half our side and we need a bit of continuity else it's going to take longer to mould together than it already will, for the same reason I Willian would have also played every game so far (and more than many would have wanted to see atleast in the short term) if he was still here.

The Emery comparison is inaccurate, as much as thing aren't great right now they're nowhere near that bad. His teams were outshot and lost on XG in almost every game regardless of opponent and were getting somewhat ok results due to Leno saving their backside and Auba's clinical nature. If we were playing like Emery's Arsenal with Kepa in goal and our shite finishing we'd be in a relegation battle.

Ah so you can be constructive without insulting our players. Wasn't that hard was it?

It's not so much he didn't get to them, more didn't even look like doing so. If he went the right way for a couple but was beaten due to the quality fair enough, but he was sold everytime. It's not a dealbreaker as i said Cech and Tibo were equally shit with pens but we may have to consider doing an LVG if/when we next head to a shoot-out.

The ironic thing is out of all our #1 keepers signed in the Roman era Kepa is probably the best at pens, Cech (Munich was an anomaly) and Courtois were crap with them aswell.

I can't really comment on RDB's Ajax as I never seen them but taking a keen interest of Ten Hag's (not just in CL) I'd think he would be well suited to the squad we have with his style of play. I wouldn't want Pochettino for reasons I gave the other day. He's awful in the market (look at his transfers with Tottenham, the majority were hopeless), doesn't really play a style that suits our current squad, he isn't really that good at promoting youth either as many claim (Kane fell into his lap and Alli was signed from MK) and there's still huge question marks on whether he can keep his cool when the heat rises, 15/16 run in especially he totally cracked up.

I think he's overcomplicated things since lockdown, i was by inlarge happy with things upto then.I wonder how different things would have looked if the shutdown didn't happen and we maintained the Gilmour inspired momentum.

Carlo was hired for CL and couldn't even match previous efforts, so he was always going to be in trouble even with good league results. Apples and oranges!

Absolutely no Pochettino and most definitely no Simeone. If the time comes where it's clear Lampard can't take us to the next level then Ten Hag is the perfect choice.

IF time comes for Lampard we should go all out for Ten Hag in my opinion.

Tbf there isn't exactly a shortage of people happy to bring if,buts and maybe's to the table whenever we narrowly win, like recently vs Brighton.

That was my main worry about him, his lack of aggression going forward compared to the likes of Robertson, pre injury Mendy and even Tierney really stands out.

Yeah no way did he want his record vs Frank creeping into the territorty of his vs Wenger.

Yes there's a difference between constructive criticism and the bile and hatred you spill. There's a club in the Spanish capital that suits your style of support, maybe you try them out sometime.

I went mad when Cech saved from Olic but when Bastian missed I got Moscow flashbacks.

How did I survive the Munich shootout

@Jason surely constant abuse of our players is grounds for warnings?

Where you the one that said "0-0 and Drogba got both" in his first season?

Quickly back after your cowardly hiding act after he got us back in Saturday I see.

Do players reguarly piss during a game? I know Auba did it last year but never heard of someone doing It before that.