Pizy

I see him ending up at Pool simply because Klopp will be in his ear about how hugely important he’d be for them straight away. Whereas for us he’d probably be gradually eased in. Probably also comes down to length of contract offered. These players seem to really like the long term security of the 7-8 year contracts we’ve been throwing around so if we offer that to Lavia it could sway him our way.

Liverpool have apparently gone up to £60m for Lavia and agreed a price with Southampton. Guess we’ll now find out both how much we want him and how much he wants us. I really want us to get him now.

Yes, the price is indeed absolute madness. In the exact same way Declan Rice’s price was madness. I would say both player’s real value is probably around the £70-75m area. You throw in the fact that both are so young, still had multiple years left in their contracts, and were at clubs that weren’t in desperate needs for cash and you get hugely inflated fees. Both clubs not having to worry about their midfields for the next handful of years makes overpaying worth it, though. Especially us. Caicedo is not even 22 yet! A couple of years younger than Rice!

Is there not an alternative to Olise we could sign that can actually contribute straight away and who we don’t have to wait for for months? Other than Kudus, I mean. Is there a goal scoring right sided attacker we could get for a reasonable fee? Even if Olise was ready to go from day 1 I don’t think he helps our goal scoring issues.

Will be very interesting to see what Poch does formation wise if we pull off these two moves. He shocked the whole world by going with 3 at the back out of nowhere today and after a shaky start we dominated one of the best sides in the league in that formation. Will he immediately revert back to a back 4 when midfield reinforcements come in or ride out the back 3 until it stops working? As we’ve known for years now having played a back 3, it really suits our CB’s and wingbacks but isn’t the best for getting our attackers involved. A midfield 3 of Caicedo & Lavia as the base and Enzo slightly further forward like he was today could be unreal if we revert to a back 4.

This saga has been so insane that I wouldn’t be shocked to wake up tomorrow to news that Caicedo failed his medical after spraining his knee walking up the stairs at his house. 🤣🤣🤣

Much as Gallagher recovered from that first half horror show and ended up playing well and as much as Poch clearly likes him, I think we’ll surely start to shop him around if Lavia is indeed still a possibility. He and Trev would be pure profit and are surplus to requirements. If we could get £45-50m for Gallagher and £30-35m for Chalobah whilst replacing them with Lavia and Disasi we’ll have done exceptionally well.

When he’s holding our shirt I’ll relax, buddy! 🤣

Yep. Much like with Enzo who is also on an i year contract, no club in Europe will be able to afford these guys if they realize their potential. Not Real Madrid and certainly not Barca with their financial situation. And even if Real Madrid stumped up £200m for Enzo or Caicedo we’d still be making a profit with the sell in clause.

Lavia is always seen as a bonus. A signing that would put us over the top. Caicedo is top priority and is the one that transforms the side. At 19 years old Lavia would be allowed to steadily grow into life at a top club without having enormous weight on his shoulders.

If we want maximum control and physical domination in every match then I’d say yes.

We need Poch to give Boehly and the board one almighty last push. If we sign both we can challenge for the league.

Game fizzled out after all the subs from each side but WOW were there a lot of positives! Enzo was fucking AMAZING today and took the absolute piss out of the entire Liverpool team. What a player! Get him a proper setup around him and we can fight at the top of the table.

Gallagher AGAIN

Grew into the game and looked the much better team once we calmed down. Caicedo in this team in place of CG and we’d be bossing it.

Gallagher again. It’s comical now.

Gallagher acts like he’s got all day in the ball. How many times has he taken too long to pass or collect the ball?

I’m turning this shitshow off if that stands. Horrendously bad in midfield. Wtf was the game plan for the best attacker in the league here?

GALLAGHER SLOW AGAIN CAUGHT IN MIDFIELD

Gallagher the clear weak link of this side.

Quotes from Poch shed all the light you need for the surprise selection and formation. Says it’s what he felt was best with the players available today. A clear hint that had we had midfielders in on time there’s no way he’d have picked this team. People need to stop melting down. This won’t be our normal formation, surely.

Well that’s a shock! Didn’t see this formation at all in preseason. Shocked that Mudryk isn’t starting even with Nkunku out.

Rest of the Spuds side looks bang average but Maddison looks like he’ll be a great signing for them. Just about everything they do runs through him. Their attack could’ve been extremely annoying had Kane stayed. Now they’re as dependent on Maddison staying fit as they were on Kane in years past.

Regardless of what happens I hope we never deal with Brighton again. Even if they have someone super highly rated in a position we need.

Those people who tweeted that this was all done yesterday looking foolish once again.