Tomo

Said from the summer that Alvarez is a lot more suited to City's system than Haaland. No matter what goal records he breaks I'd feel a lot more convinced we could compete with City (if/when we get our house in order) with Haaland as the main striker over Alvarez.

I don't agree on that, a good projected end product is the deal breaker not previous record.

Speaking purely for on the pitch (ofcourse on a human level the injuries are horrific) I don't think we'll miss Broja that much if I'm honest but if Trevoh is injured while Forfana will still be rusty then that's a major blow.

Despite the recent performances it's not tactically I have worries about Potter, he's one of the best coaches in the league in that aspect in my opinion. He's won too many tactical battles against the likes of Klopp, Tuchel, Conte, Ten Hag, Pioli etc without parking the bus for it to be a coincidence (and apart from against the latter did it with a significantly inferior side). The big worry for me is if he can adapt his mindset required for a club with our expectations, fears that haven't exactly been eased with his recent interviews.

Unfortunately as @OhForAGreavsie said Real's pull is something we have to work round. Got mixed feelings with this one as I rate him incredibly highly but I'm also a big Colwill believer despite what is happening at Brighton.

We've literally as good as signed one of Europe's hot propertys and got arguably the world's best young defender saying he's seriously considering us.

I didn't realise Yann Sommer's a free agent next summer. We should be all over that.

Yep. I doubted my assessment after the summer when he stayed at Plymouth (a bit like @OhForAGreavsiewith his Havertz thoughts once Real etc passed on him I felt there must have been something I'm missing if no one even in the Champ is snapping him up) but after watching this season (and speaking to their fans) I'm even more convinced. Plymouth wouldn't even be in the play offs without him let alone top. I like his distribution a lot aswell, unfortunately a lot of times the Argyle players aren't clever enough to read what he's going to do but I think he will have a lot of fun with PL level movement infront of him.

I disagree. It sucks but teams have to look after their own interests first and foremost, they've done their jobs and it's not their fault the others haven't.

I've watched them a bit (due to living in close proximity) and Plymouth would be a good move for him. Likewise for Slonina if they lose their keeper (in my opinion a PL level keeper already) in January.

We've beaten United to many players in the past.

And they don't work together so one way or another a decision needs to be made between both.

If we can somehow get Enzo through the door alongside Nkunku and the Russian lad I'd really start to believe things will quickly get better.

Given a win would have won the group it would have made a hell of a lot more sense to go for a win tonight to allow full rotation in MD3.

For all Jorginho's faults he always makes himself avaliable for a pass in the build up even if he's tightly marked himself, Rice was actively hiding behind opponents. It's absolutely maddening how not even two years after we broke our transfer record for such an obvious stylistical mismatch I'm paranoid we're going to do the exact same thing again.

This 20 minutes sums up exactly why I think Rice will be a disaster unless we dumb down our system. He's literally hiding behind USA players in the first phase build up.

In an ideal (and hugely unrealistic) world we pull off both and get Jorgi and Kante to sign new deals on a reasonable length (2 years max) contract as squad players. Realistically however I'd take Enzo and another midfielder (hopefully our supposed new data analysis system can find a reasonably priced one).

I know it will be outrageously hard to pull off but I've become borderline obsessed with the idea of signing Enzo Fernandez.

I spent years giving the last regime the benefit of the doubt they will by hook or by crook find a way to build a new team to compete for the league but I gave up on that when they brought Lukaku back for £100m. I'm in the same position with the new regime atm but Rice's arrival especially for the price it will take will totally knock any belief in them.

Who did we have not long ago? One of the big criticisms of Roman's era was not putting this type of team together.

Lukaku is no different to what he's always been. Only difference is he's now (with us and Inzaghi's Inter) in squads that put an emphasis on possesion, pressing and high level tactical awareness he's finally getting exposed for the bang average player he always has been.

That's not true, in the calendar year of 2020 they made Tony Pulis sides look free flowing and technical.

Things change quickly in football. Casemiro joined United when they were looking like having a Chelsea 15/16 level season.

It's a myth it's (that much) harder to attract players without top 4. Maybe if it becomes a theme but for one year I very much doubt it. Ronaldinho went to a team outside the UCL places three times.