Pizy

The Rice links probably died when Frank left. Think TT will probably want a player who offers a bit more going forward than Rice since we already have workhorses in Kante & Kova.

Think Kante and probably Ziyech are nailed on for the return leg. Kante for midfield security in place of Jorginho and Ziyech to play those through balls to spring the counter when Porto force things to turn the tie.

Thought that was one of the poorest performances of the season. Next to zero attacking threat, midfield buildup was nearly nonexistent, allowed Porto to bully us physically. And worst of all was the constant long, aimless passes from our players. We looked like we didn’t have a clue what we were doing. And yet two fantastic goals and win 0-2. 🙃🙃🙃

Jorginho has played well generally since TT took over but I sadly agree. After a top class #9 this summer, a CM who is both creative and very athletic needs to be the priority. When opponents turn up the heat and aggression in midfield Jorginho simply can’t handle it.

Brilliantly taken goal apart that was awful. We allowed Porto to play the exact game they wanted to and they executed it to perfection. Press us, rush our passing, take ages on every corner, free kick and goal kick, and dive with every bit of contact to win cheap free kicks. Our passing from so many players is so poor that it looks even worse.

I like it. And I hope our boys are extremely up for this after that horror show at the weekend. Porto really don’t have any scary names on their team sheet but will be big time fighters and grinders so this won’t be easy by any means.

He seems like the kinda guy who will go to Spain and live the easy life in the sun for the remainder of his top level years. Saying that, if the other big targets aren’t possible I’d take Aguero on a 2 year deal or something like that.

Huh? Real Madrid completely controlled the game for about 80 minutes and could’ve scored about 5 if they had just a bit more composure in front of goal. Then they just sat back and let Liverpool pass it around aimlessly for the last 10-15 minutes.

Every RM attack is targeting Trents side. And Liverpool going forward aren’t even making RM’s backup defenders work at all. Liverpool look like the side of a few weeks back.

Trent AA has been badly exposed defensively here again. Multiple times this match.

What a ridiculous pass by Kroos.

Have a bad feeling Liverpool will beat Madrid comfortably tonight. 😒 I’ll still watch that one instead of City v Dortmund which could be a waste of time.

More spent than any club in Europe and we’re currently behind West Ham. Fucking West Ham.

My big question is whether you would feel confident going up against the best in Europe or the PL with Tammy as our main striker. Is he good enough to consistently score against the biggest and best opposition? Key word consistently. For me he isn’t. And I don’t think he’s scaring any top teams at all in the way Lewandowski/Kane/Aguero/Haaland do. He’s a penalty box only striker. When teams defend that area well Tammy is nearly useless. He’s never going to get the ball and dribble at players, he’s not going to sprint with the ball and terrify defenders. I could probably count on one hand the number of times I’ve ever seen him have a shot from outside the box. He could become an excellent Plan B striker in the way Giroud has been for us but I highly doubt he’d go for that at his age. And he probably backs himself as a top player. But he simply isn’t.

For me his level would be somewhere like West Ham, Villa, Southampton. A club who would normally be in the 7-10th range every season where he’d be the main man up top playing every match. We need to find ourselves a striker who can instantly come in and be a 20 goal in the PL guy. It seems like every rival of ours is able to go out and find one of those except us. The one time in recent years we did was Costa and he was mental and forced his way out. We need our RvP/Aguero/Aubameyang/Kane/Suarez. Someone who you are extremely confident will put away any sniff of a chance they get.

Not good enough to be the starting #9 at Chelsea or any club with title ambitions. He’s simply not a good enough all around footballer. As romantic as the idea of a homegrown English striker leading the line sounds to the fans, we won’t be near the big boys in Europe with a striker who can max out at about 12-15 goals in a season. Don’t think he should be sold but also think we need a massive upgrade in his position or we’ll be fighting for 4th again next season.

Fucking pisses me off that United are so far ahead of us. Lucky as hell just like last season with that clueless clown as manager. The only difference between us and them is that they repeatedly play like utter shit and yet still get 3 points over and over again either by soft penalty awards, VAR helping them, or the opponent making a single dumbass mistake having otherwise been the better side all match. We play poorly or are subpar and are always punished for it. They play poorly and still win. So they’ll coast to 2nd place while we’re battling for 4th. I suppose the only good thing is that it’ll keep Solskjaer in the job for longer and longer. They’re never winning the league with him. Unless they get Haaland, anyways.

All the clubs around us have the one thing we don’t and that’s reliable goals from their forwards. Liverpool, Spuds, and Leicester all have that. Even fucking West Ham do. We cannot capitalize on ball dominance and get Werner into great scoring positions repeatedly and he fluffs them. This is why we will finish 6th.

With our remaining fixtures compared to those chasing us I don’t think we’re making top 4. It’ll take something like last season where everyone around us collapses and we squeak in.

Utter humiliation. Again. AGAIN against this shithouse, horrendous WBA side. They turn into monsters against us yet get hammered by all our rivals.

Un-fucking real. Totally asleep at the back.

This is so typical of us, you have to say. A match we have no business making tough and a match we must win and we do something crazy or flukey.

Jorginho has been direct,y responsible for both of Silva’s bookings. But fuck me, Silva barely grazed him accidentally and he jumps in the air as if he’s been shot.

I guess the sloppiness is to be expected coming out of a long break. Likewise from Jorginho and Silva who have been out even longer. But as a whole we look like we have been totally caught off guard by WBA’s tactics here. We didn’t expect them to actually try to play football.

Their strategy is surely going to be to frustrate and defend with their entire team parked around their box and then bring on that ugly mutant that scored a couple against us earlier in the season to try and steal 3 points. Only way it works is if we play slow zombie football like we’ve done in this sort of game many times in recent years.