Pizy

I don’t even just mean playing Havertz up top so he can score more. It’s just that we look way better and more dangerous without a traditional forward. I would MUCH rather see Havertz as the striker with Pulisic, Werner, or Ziyech alongside him and Mount just behind him.

If we had a second forward (a Giroud type) who could rotate with Lukaku when he’s out of form like this we could get by. But it’s just our luck that Werner doesn’t score either and for some strange reason Tuchel won’t just go with Kai up top these days.

Starting to feel like a few years ago (was it the Sarri season?). We’ll finish top 4 because everyone behind us is even more shite than we are.

Moments after I say that Spuds collapse apparently. 😂😂😂

Spuds definitely the biggest threat behind us. United and Arse are so sporadic and have big question marks around their managers. Conte will be a massive advantage in their race for top 4.

Imagine being one of the poor supporters who have traveled to Abu Dhabi to watch that shite. Palmeiras will have watched that and laughed. They’ll wish the game was tomorrow because they’ll be so excited to play us. Two matches in a row against opponent who are leagues below us talent wise and we look equally shit against both. I honestly fear for us holding on to top 4.

There is zero invention or sophistication to our play. Just blind hope that someone will get on the end of something. We look like a midtable PL team.

We have Kova and Kante in midfield and we’re being carved through by a team that would struggle at the bottom of the PL.

We’re letting a fucking Saudi side take control of the match and dominate us. For fuck sake…

We’re so unbelievably shit in the final third that we’re just asking to let them fluke a goal and force extra time.

This is a shocking performance. Again. Likes of City or Liverpool would be 4-0 up by now.

Is it my eyes playing tricks on me due to they yellow kit or does Lukaku look straight up fat? Anyways, this is another poor showing from us thus far. No pattern or cohesion to our attacking play at all.

At least CHO isn’t starting. Hopefully we can put this to bed in the first half and then coast. You would expect Al Hilal to come out of the blocks quickly to try to catch us cold so we need to be ready for that. Would be annoying to see a repeat of Plymouth where they get a goal first and we batter them without being able to score for an hour. Lukaku 100% needs to score at least 1 here to justify him starting all these games lately.

This guy Ronald Araujo that we’re being linked with seems to be well liked by Barca fans and he is apparently in negotiations right now to extend his contract. So that’s likely the only reason our name is being used. Seems he is future captain material there so I highly doubt they’d allow him to go. Going to be a whole lot of this kind of thing for the next few months. Every CB under the sun will be linked with Chelsea.

Militao looks average to my eyes. I see we’ve been linked with him as well as one of the Barca CB’s. Hell, I expect our name to be used with every CB in Europe that’s on the move this summer. With Süle off the table we should try for Ginter. Again, that’s if we assume Rüdiger can be convinced to stay.

If anything his injury history may have scared off the top teams. Because his football ability is world class. But again, perhaps he just wanted to stay home.

You trolling? Süle is exceptional on the ball.

Multiple PL clubs will surely have offered him a much better salary than BVB could have. But he must’ve really wanted to remain in Germany.

Think AC has long since had his mind made up. Will almost certainly have already agreed to join Bayern. He would’ve signed by now if he was staying. It’s Rüdiger we need to worry about. Losing both on free transfers would be HUGELY embarrassing.

Fuck. Would’ve been a real steal to get him on a free.

Yeah. Clubs in the PL are absolutely swimming in money now. Even clubs like West Ham, Villa, and now Newcastle will be spending sums that were previously reserved only for the elite sides. City have now set the precedent for English players moving to other English clubs. Now if a young superstar Englishman emerges in the PL the asking price will be £100m if they still have years left on their contracts. Which Declan Rice does. Don’t think he goes for a pound less than that. And WH will be shopping for a much higher caliber of midfielder than RLC or Barkley to replace him.

Wet Spam are an ambitious club now who probably see themselves as an established top 6 club who want to push for a CL place. I highly doubt they’d be interested in Barkley or RLC. They can probably buy players for £30, 40, or £50m these days. They know that if they sell their best player by far their fans would revolt if they didn’t replace him with someone class. I just really hope our board are ready to pounce ASAP if he can be pried away. He has been doing a little “wink wink” flirting with Man United lately (saying nice things about Old Trafford, Ronaldo, chatting with Gary Neville). I would be annoyed as fuck if we watch him go there because he’s exactly what they need.

Süle would be a terrific signing if it’s us he has chosen. And upgrade in literally every facet to AC. And wouldn’t cost us anything. Think he’d be a beast at any of the big PL sides so I hope he doesn’t choose anyone else. First choice back 3 of Süle, Thiago Silva, and Rüdiger has everything. If Azpi goes as well then we’ll probably go for Koundé, too.

The most frustrating thing watching him currently is his total lack of anticipation. Ziyech will curl in a beautiful cross or someone will play in a nice through ball and he’s always a second late to react. The one thing he has been doing consistently well even in this shit run of form is hold the ball up and lay it off to a teammate. But after he does that he just kind of casually jogs around. If by some miracle we can offload him this summer we need to find a proper footballer of a striker. Someone who is highly involved in the play and who can create for themself. A Luis Suarez or Harry Kane type. Coincidentally, a Lukaku for Kane swap would suit both clubs well but Levy would never allow it.

If we could at least see some idea of what Tuchel wants from our attack I’d be more positive about our future outlook. Some patterns of play, some attacking moves that we try repeatedly, some chemistry between certain players. But there’s none of that. All season (and last) we look like an assemblage of random strangers who have never played together before. Even when we were at our flying best up to that Juve match it was our two wingbacks looking like our most dangerous attackers rather than the actual forwards. I ask myself what a attacking genius like Pep would do with our current personnel. He’d likely go with Pulisic left, Ziyech right, Havertz up top, and Mount in behind. Lukaku wouldn’t get a sniff because she’s not good enough technically and CHO wouldn’t either because he’s dumb as a rock around the box. We need to work on quick, short passing, triangles, one touch football. Not what we’re seeing now which is dominate 70% of the ball but grind to a halt over the half way line.