Pizy

I was actually a big Tosin fan last season and was perfectly comfortable with him as a frequent starter depending on the opponent. But at this point he needs to be nothing more than a rarely used sub or only play in the Cups. He has been completely found out and is making mistake after mistake. He is shockingly terrible when the ball is played near him and it’s not a straightforward header away. Pure panic. So long as Fofana remains fit he should be the unquestioned starter. It should be Fofana + Josh for me.

We DESPERATELY need to invest however much it takes at the soonest possible opportunity on a world class CB to put in that Tosin spot. Then whoever you play together with that new CB would suddenly look better as we saw all the time with Thiago Silva. Don’t care how fucking much it costs. Go out and get a calm, classy, commanding CB who is a leader and general on the pitch. An organizer who doesn’t make clown errors and prevents other doing so as much as possible.

Maresca always talks a big game about not taking any opponent lightly and did so again before this one. Then he goes and picks this XI with Hato at CB and Tyrique up top who VERY CLEARLY is not a striker when we’ve got Guiu and Delap available. He really thought we could just show up here with anybody and stroll to victory.

We are just woeful and shocking defensively no matter who is playing. A disgrace to the club. Laughingstock to everyone watching.

Hato has been abysmal defensively since joining. Looks terrified.

Just don’t fuck about letting them hang around. Kill the game ASAP!

Reminds me almost exactly of Cunha at Man United. One of those solid all around attackers that doesn’t really have an obvious position and just kind of floats all over the place.

He plays the same kind of neat, tidy football that Maresca likes to and want to press and dominate the ball. Difference with them compared to us is that Iraola’s possession based footy is more intense and aggressive whereas Maresca’s is slow and ponderous far too often.

Despite them being behind, I have to say that I’m once again very impressed by how Bournemouth play. What Iraola has done there is incredible. If things go south for us the rest of this season and a change in coach is necessary he should absolutely be our top choice.

Overall, not a single player was poor today. Several were amazing in Moi, Cucu, and RJ. But this was yet another demonstration of how the likes of Garnacho, Pedro Neto, and Gittens are decent buy not good enough to be main men. They all 3 looked good in the build up and got into super dangerous positions over and over again but fluffed their lines when it mattered most. Like always. And João Pedro can look neat an tidy and pull off the odd brilliant finish but he so clearly is NOT a lone striker. His energy levels died for the final 30 minutes or so. He NEEDS another forward up there with him to press and occupy CB’s. I legit cannot wait for Delap to be fully fit. He changes so much for us if he gets settled again. Delap up top, JP behind him, and Estevão finally starting in the league and we look like a totally different prospect that is a nightmare to defend against.

Should’ve won that AT LEAST 0-4. A top team with killers up front wins that by like 6-7. In from Cole Palmer today would’ve had one of his 4 goal matches.

Shocking from the referee on the pitch and somehow even worse from the ref in the VAR booth. We’ve been getting fouled over and over and the ref gives us fucking nothing. Yet every little bit of contact is given a foul on a Spuds player. And if that isn’t a red card for that foul on Reece than what is? Does his ankle need to be snapped for it to be given? Because that was an ankle snapping challenge. If that’s a Chelsea player committing that foul it’s a red 10 times out of 10. But as for the game, this looks like men against boys. We’re completely bossing it. Literally the ONLY dangerous little moments Spuds had were of course from silly brain farts from the usual suspects Gusto and Fofana.

Has awful 0-0 written all over it with these lineups. Or us conceding a horrendous goal from nothing again and losing. I’m over seeing João Pedro being deployed as the lone striker up top at this point. It’s clear now that’s not where he’s effective. So we’re once again likely to see him completely cancelled out of the game by Spuds parking 2-3 defenders near him and congesting his space. The attack looks SO blunt with him as the 9 and with Garnacho + Neto who are solid at everything except for finishing consistently.

Absolute story of our season against every small team we’ve played. Carbon copy tactic from every one because they all know it works. And it’s the most basic tactic any manager can implement with minimal effort. Park the double decker, slow our attack to a crawl, and make the match an almost unwatchable shitfest. Then on the rare occasions they get the ball it’s random heaves up the pitch or long throws. And yet the manager of Chelsea Football Club who has witnessed this SAME EXACT TACTIC about 5 times this season in the PL has found absolutely ZERO way to counter it or get through to the players on how to deal with it. The blueprint is set. Sit deep and run around a lot and you beat Chelsea. Simple as that. We have no ideas, no spark, and no intensity against this setup.

Yep, seasons over now. Yet more utterly catastrophic self inflicted bullshit. I’m done.

The ease at which Brighton have been able to waltz comfortably through our midfield and play that same ball along the inside channel between Cucu and Hato repeatedly is very concerning. There’s almost no resistance and we’re allowing them to sprint at our goal over and over. We badly need Lavia to get and stay fit for even a little bit of time.

Only real surprise for me is Hato at CB instead of Josh. There’s a real lack of height in our team now because of that. Could be a worry on corners. Also thought Garnacho would’ve started to give Neto some more rest.

If I see Tyrique playing up top again I may end myself. I can’t deal with that shit any longer.

I genuinely think Brighton could batter us. A combination of injuries, terrible form, and Brighton playing really well lately. They always give us trouble even when we aren’t in a bad way.

Like the look of Buanonotte in each of his appearances so far. Tidy player who doesn’t hide from the ball. Should be getting plenty of minutes in the weeks ahead if Palmer is out.

Season unraveling just a few weeks into it. Our attackers here look like they’re seeing each other for the first time today and our defense is comically shit as usual. We’ll almost certainly turn this around and win it but Brighton and then Liverpool are going to slaughter us if we don’t improve dramatically ASAP. And if we lose those 2 Maresca should be under huge pressure. Completely inexcusable to keep looking this poor nearly every match this season.

I’m not mad at the players or even the bulk of our recruitment. This squad is more than good enough in MOST areas to be performing much better than it has to start the season. I’m starting to get more and more pissed off about Maresca each week. The stupid team selections, where in the formation he plays players, how he decides to rotate, his rationale after games as to why he didn’t play certain players. And most importantly of all, the fact that seemingly EVERY match thus far it feels like we’ve started so fucking sluggishly and only ever begin to look better after we concede. For me that’s on the manager. He doesn’t have this team mentally ready. He has to get a bit of slack because he is being undermined by the fact that the club refused his request for a new CB. But then at the same time he has been in love with Rob Sanchez since he got here and defends him no matter what. Don’t think there’s any chance he gets the sack during the season and tbh that’s not something we need. But if we finish outside of the UCL places he should 100% be replaced once the season ends. It would be completely inexcusable to finish lower than 4th with the squad we have and the money we spent.

I was seriously excited for this season. I never thought we’d put in a genuine title challenge where we’d be there until the very end but I thought with 100% certainty that we’d finish a respectable 6-9 points behind the eventual champion, comfortably finish in the top 4, and really kick on to build something special for next season. Now I would be STUNNED if we finish higher than 6th. The Colwill injury and subsequent refusal to replace him with a top CB + Sanchez in goal will kill our season within the first handful of games now. Our defense + keeper have produced catastrophic errors in nearly EVERY game so far this season. From extreme optimism to utter calamity in the blink of an eye. If we fail to beat Brighton next I may just give up on the season.

Worst Man United side perhaps ever, manager on the brink on the sack. But then Charity FC once again comes to town.

Weekend ruined once more.