Tomo

That just screams of trying to shoehorn Mount and RLC in like Sven did Lampard and Gerrard. If the system only allows one then we have to pick or rotate it's a simple as that. Furthermore the average age of the attacking 5 is just too young, we need some experience to balance that out, especially in times of adversity.

Personally i think 19 suits him. Unless he specifically requests 8 if/when Ross goes i would keep his number as it is.

The fact a lot of people had Spurs as dead cert for 3rd and even in some cases challenging the top two just goes to show how lazy the average fan and pundit is in predicting things. Any proper research and knowledge of Spurs's situation and you would know they are in a lot of shit, they started last season well results wise but performances declined then the results caught up with them, a riddled by luck run to the CL final has masked over what has been a spectacular collapse. I wouldn't be remotely surprised if they're the ones who end up 6th.

Tbh I would say is winning the CL when we did is one of the biggest miracles in sport, truly written. There's no logical way it can explained, even with Leicester you can point to Kante, Mahrez and Vardy in the form of their lives and just broken to world class level (Kante) or borderline (the latter two). With us we didn't have a single world class player. The old guard were long past their best , Luiz, Danny and Mata were good but flawed, the rest of the squad was awful, Di Matteo was in charge (I love him but he's not a great manager), absolute madness!

I stand by what I said re Loftus back then, he just wasn't impacting games atall. He would make one darting run or near turn every half hour ish which fooled people into thinking he's doing more than he actually was. That's why I kept emphasizing my delight at his progress from November onwards because I really thought it would never come, credit has to go to Sarri aswell for properly working with him instead of shoehorning/hiding him in positions where his weaknesses least hurt the side.

Early days but it feels like Hazard leaving has free'd up the attack. Hazard was such a good talisman that the rest of the attackers seemed to let him take charge and take a back seat which often lead to nullified attacking play when he was doubled/tripled up on effectively, in theory that should have meant our other players were more destructive with the extra space but it never quite panned out that way. There were signs last season we could cope well without him (we won 20/21 he didn't start although granted he did have to come on in a few of them) but at this minute it looks like we can more than cope. I thought we were better defending the open game today but set pieces is a serious problem, we look capable of conceding at every high ball into the box and so nearly did again, thankfully there's not really any Bolton, Stoke esque sides in the league these days, imagine us facing Delap's long throw's

The same age Salah got 10 goals in 50 games in the Swiss league and Europa, Mount looks a decent bet to trump that total playing PL and CL. Anyway i only made that point because i disagree with ML's assessment that Mason isn't on the same tier as what those two were in their early 20's as i firmly believe he is, time will tell if he has a similar career.

Not saying he'll turn out as good but Mount is better than 20 year old versions of both, especially Salah.

Most important thing is we have learnt and making sure this doesn't happen with Mount, Odoi etc

I wonder if he will do his interview wearing the club merchandise he told fans to boycott.

Worry about them losing another time, it's in our best interests to see Arsenal smacked right up in this one.

Palace have now won away vs all the top six atleast once since promotion.

We still need to in my opinion as we would be Tammy going down away from having a striker crisis all over again. Furthermore it will give Lampard the option to play the diamond. In the unlikely event Ole is happy to stay as #3 extend his contract for a year also.

Usually i'd be quite critical of a performance like that but he was drafted in the lineup in the 11th hour so that has to be factored.

Tbh i thought we did well against them all game, I've been critical of our defensive structure but today was more down to Norwich being clinical than our failings. They scored the two, had 1 chance after Pukki's goal and hit the bar from that corner but beyond that they didn't really create anything.

I thought he was sensational today, couldn't help but smile when he scored the opener. If he can carry this on and we get our new striker signing right we could wind up with our best pair of forwards since Drogba and Anelka.

This contract alone sets his family up for generations, i love the club but in the same situation i would do exactly the same thing. Taking £70,000 a week when you could earn nearly triple would be insanity.

That's not really the point i'm trying to make, it's a completely different discussion entirely. Any one that says in Callum's position they would take a 'modest wage' when there's a genuine chance of taking home treble that is either lying or thinking too romantically, he had strong cards and played them.

Callum is getting a very harsh press on this one. Player's will almost always use their cards to full effect in negotiations. Terry loves the club as much as anyone but in 2009 played chess with the board to get the best deal possible, Lampard manipulated the fanbase in 2013 to get an upper hand in negotiations, as did Terry in 2016. Don't blame any of them. If the club held all the cards and were able to stick Callum on modest wage (like they did with Mount) they would have done so without thinking twice, however Callum has us over a barrel even with his injury and he's pounced, fair play to him. I would be very happy if their genuine discussions on whether he gets 500k a week when he's 22, why? Because that will mean we have a truly world class player on our books.

It's well documented Wolves will demand a hell of a lot for Neves and there's no chance Leicester will accept anything lower than Maguire money for Madison. I do believe Kovacic and Jorginho are better than Neves (he really isn't what he's cracked up to be) and RLC is better than Madison and Mount won't be far behind for long if he is atall.

Wilfred Ndidi is that you?

The thing is i think he's wasted further up, his bursting runs from midfield is his key attribute and playing number 10 or worse up front will give him next to no space. It's a problem because in terms of how Lampard wants to set up Mount is already a key player but RLC has earned his place with his performances last season from March, i really hope this doesn't turn into a Lampard/Gerrard esque situation of shoehorning both in to the detriment of both's full effectiveness.

That would be a humungous waste of resources (the two combined would cost not far off £200m). Firstly because we already have better players than both in their positions, secondly because every other position bar GK needs reinforcements more urgently than CM and lastly neither are that good.

Will he interesting to see where he fits in under Lampard. I can't see him taking Mount's place as he suits perfectly the style Lampard wants.

I don't think that's true atall. I think footballing people below identify the targets and she tries to negotiate with whatever names have been given. I don't believe for one second that she has any say in picking which players to target, potentially she vetos some for financial reasons but I that's about as far as it goes. Maybe she does do things wrong but picking her out for something she more than likely has no involvement in just screams being critical for the sake of it, you may aswell accuse her of the Kennedy assassination while you're at it.