OneMoSalah

Billy can play higher up too but hes not the right option either. Just depends. I think Mount is becoming a bit jaded, hasnt scored in how long and his last assist was vs Burnley and while thats not a fair representative of his performances, hes played a lot of games this season. When Ruben comes back he will be a big plus.

Well I thought West Ham would be an easy win for us so now we have to definitely beat Villa and then Everton to have more control in the top 4 race. Must win. Just get it over the line. Not bothered if we play shit or not. Villa wont be pushovers either Grealish and McGinn have got something about them.

Think as long as his recovery goes well a 433 with him taking Masons place will be likely, cant see him slotting in anywhere else unless he plays off the front as well but I dont know. His physicality and ability to break the lines with his direct powerful runs is a huge plus.

Mourinho with a point to prove v United? They will win it. I have a feeling he will get a result against us too (lets be honest who wouldnt be surprised?), just think we will play into their hands like with United on opening day.

Not even mentioned Arsenal who can still make up ground too, having sacked their manager too que the new manager bounce when they appoint one, I havent got full faith that we will get 6 points from those games (Ajax, Valencia, United and City all sufficient evidence we need a lot of work still) although I do think Spurs and City will beat United but you never know. As Frank said this is a reality check, people wrote Spurs off too soon (11 games into the fucking season....) and 2 PL games in with Mourinho, theyve won 2 and jumped like 8 places in the table and are right where back in it, still early days too but the Mourinho being finished and going to destroy Spurs bla bla bla was daft to presume.

How the fuck did we manage this? West Ham's beem playing shite for weeks on end. No striker on after 60 odd minutes, for me, Frank got it wrong again. Same mid week and same v City. Still plenty games to redeem ourselves though but if United win as well they will be chasing too for the top 4 with Spurs too who despite conceding are still getting results. We need to make sure we win our next few and those 2 drop points to give us a bit more clearance again, 6 points isnt a lot and considering we have to play Arsenal and Spurs soon too.

And where are the folks who thought Spurs were out of the top 4 race after 11 games now???? Funny thing that. We need to win our next few games get out of this run of losses in the league.

Yeah if anyones in a good mood after losing to City and drawing with Valencia in the last week then they need their head checked.

For me its a pointless comparison. Kylian Mbappe is a once in a generation player who is already so far ahead of Sancho, who has delivered on the biggest stage in world football, the world cup. Plus he has never displayed any sort of attitude issues, been fined for being late, subbed off by manager for poor team contribution in a derby game or took the huff/felt he was scapegoated because of that sub... I can see why people wouldn't be worried about his pricetag because he has no baggage to go with the fact hes already an unbelieavle player. Sancho is a good player but has already slowed down from last season and looks like he will be trying to force a move already with all this bullshit he has come up in the last while.

Tbf out of the Turkish, Portuguese and Chinese league, it is only really worth judging his stats in Portugal where the standard is higher unfortunately and even then weve seen players do well at Benfica and struggle in the PL such as Lazar Markovic. 20 goals in 77 games for Benfica is not bad either obviously but the other 66 goals he has scored since then came in Turkey and China. I think this guys chance of a career at a top top team has passed for whatever reason be it money, lack of ambition or laziness. He had promise but hes 25 now, he probably is leaving it very late.

Sancho signed a new big contract last summer. No way they will sell him for less than 100m euros, pissy behaviour or not, just look at the Dembele situation a few years ago.

Sancho again, good player, obviously got a bit of an attitude problem though because it looks like this is something he is using to try and force an exit. At his age and having only played 2 seasons of top flight football, it is extremely worrying to see especislly as we are continuously linked to Him too. If he was late here, he would be fined 20k wouldnt he 🤣?

True but they also had a settled team, they didn't get many clean sheets but in key moments in games they remained solid enough to withstand pressure spells, the Man City and Ajax games for instance despite playing or not playing well in spells of it. That comes from having good players, collective shape and organisation in key moments. Obviously the ideal thing would be for us to be really solid but I understand that with this way of playing, Rudigers injury and as well as arguably having 2 CBs who havent really kicked on in Zouma and Andreas and still not being able to balance Kante in the midfield while keeping Jorginho and Kovacic in, it is hard. I mean when we play bad we cant seem to stop conceding chances far too easily, there was times where even if we didnt play well or were under pressure in a period of a game we had enough about us to be solid and not concede chances.

Tottenham last season had the one thing we dont this season though, a solid shape and settled back 4 with 2 proper CBs who are leaders and organisers. Alderweireld and Vertonghen (even Sanchez is decent although he has regressed I feel) are very good CBs, aging but very good, but their team shape also helped them and although Moussa Sissoko was a bit of a joke for a few years his physicality and energy in there undoubtedly helped them in that CL run. Yes Rose and Trippier werent brilliant but they were reliable too. Throw the likes of Eriksen, Kane, Lucas Moura (who has surprised me since coming over because I thought he was overrated) and Son in any team that has good defensive stability and you have every chance of beating the likes of City and Ajax of last season. They even had a high chance v Liverpool. If we can sort out defensive aspects of our game out, we can certainly hurt top teams, I agree but I am not fully convinced with Zouma and Tomori as a pair or as I alluded to in another post, our team shape, we seem to defend well for a few games then look really open the next few. Rudiger has to come back yet though and I feel he is better suited to playing than Zouma. Zouma is good in the air though, probably better than Tomori in that aspect but again Tomori is better with the ball imo and despite not playing as well as he has, I think we should persist with him as theres huge potential there (shocked he wasnt loaned but the Luiz sale made it an absolute certainty he stayed) if he can iron out those wee things. Christensen looks a shadow of the player he was for 5 months under Conte but again Luiz excelled for Conte in a back 3 in his first season back, I said with Luiz then that I felt the system helped him because he had the 2 wide CBs who would engage players more and allow him to step out with the ball with less risk and perhaps the same can be said for Christensen.

Im gonna go back to pre-season, defensively weve never been completely right. This did improve slightly over time since that United game but it is regressing again. It is a huge issue. People keep saying not being clinical is an issue but conceding chances and goals is one of our biggest concerns. In Franks 2 seasons of management his clean sheet record is pretty bad. Are we going to say that is all down to players? Lets be honest there have been individual mistakes, yes but I still have concerns with the teams shape.

Got to be honest, not a good result. Infact both results against Valencia and the 4-4 draw with Ajax are not good enough in my eyes. Despite this team being "young" or "not the finished article", these are games where we should have played better in defensive and offensive side of the games. Conte or Sarri would probably of got cruicified for not beating Valencia in 2 attempts and defending in the way we drew with Ajax, thats the harsh truth. Luckily for Frank, hes still learning and doesnt have the luxury of the transfer window but we need to be blunt as well and acknowledge these results arent good. Round of 16 if we get through will be incredibly difficult, especially if we continue defensively in this manner against a much better team than Ajax, Lille or Valencia. Harsh reality but true. Good attacking football is all well and good but good teams are solid and hard to beat. At the moment, in Europe, we arent unfortunately.

It just depends. For me after first 30 minutes we struggled to move the ball fast enough, having commited men forward so City could just pick us off on transitions. They were happy to do that too. Felt we needed to be more balanced, yes we lost to a deflected goal and a individual goal but they could have scored more too as well. I think Klopps teams are very good against the likes of City but they arent all high press attacking for 90 minutes, they have periods were they arent as reactive. Fair enough they dont sit deep but make themselves solid, difficult to play through so the opposition teams work the ball wide and cross it, which is ideal as they defend crosses well with Fabinho, Matip, van Dij and Alisson. Then they go press at certain times and play direct long passes into the channels for quick counters. They have a mix of everything, they have a very efficient attack, legs in midfield and plenty of defensive stability with Alisson, Matip, Van Dijk, Fabinho and even Henderson (who I hate as a player makes me sick hes played in 2 CL finals 😂) Dont think its completely out of our capabilities to be more like this. On the front foot, pressing, then maybe be a bit more solid and then go after them again. Its in game management. I think Lampard is continually learning and maybe he will see that going to the Etihad and playing that way, having more possession etc is all well and good but still he will maybe think what if we were a bit more solid in that time of the game or whatever. Maybe not. Its just my opinion I think the big games he has to maybe realise that we can maybe be a bit more flexible, maybe sit 10m deeper in periods of games or maybe just control the game a bit better. Man City and Pep teams in general they will always prefer to face teams who try press or commit men forward because they are confident they can play through it and exploit the spaces. Similar to Sarri, at Napoli here and Juventus he wants teams to press them high so they can play through it and exploit spaces theyve left. Pragmatism has worked against Pep too, it depends on what your teams characteristics are. Dont think we could go to how Jose or Conte (2nd season) approached with Frank though not in his nature, hence why his teams havent kept a lot of clean sheets in his short spell as a manager at Derby and here. Contes team here when we beat them at the Etihad in his first season for instance though we didnt really press too much first half, sat deep and yes we went 1-0 down but equalized through a long pass and run off the shoulder of their defensive line who was higher up because we were deeper. Then second half we started nicking the ball 10m further up and went on to win. It just depends. Van Gaal's Holland team vs Spain again did something similar in the Euros or whatever in that game Van Persie scored that header. Played a lot more reserved in terms of going after Spain but then switched it up and got into them.

One mistake and if the ball didnt take the deflection its probably not going in.... He has been praised a lot this season because its been deserved. Give the guy a break. Probably been our best player so far this season yet one result v City where we lost and its basically all forgotten on here by some posters... I would question Lampards nativity (just a bit naive I felt) at trying to play away to City like that and really we played into their hands (just like v United on day 1), they normally have all the ball but probably knew they could get at us on the break/in transitions and they basically were happy to do that at home. Even then though, it was a deflected goal and a good second goal of individual skill. Defensive mistakes throughout the performance yes totally but nothing new in some of our games this season, particularly in big ones.

Fs it was one game. What a little whining bitch. He was really shite as well hence why he got subbed, didnt track his full back, wasnt productive, gave the ball away a lot... the sort of thing you get dragged off in the biggest game of the season against your biggest rivals. If thats him and his representatives mentality, I dont care how good he can be, screams avoid to me. He has been disciplined by Dortmund as well already this season for returning late from NT duty too. You'd think their manager had done something a lot worse for him to be feeling humilitated and like a scapegoat other than sub him for a below par performance. His team got beat 4-0 by their biggest rivals a year after theyd beat Bayern and looked comfortably better but weeks later he and his entourage come out with this pish albeit it indirectly? And the lack of support from senior players? Dortmund are one of the best clubs for a young player to play at. Just sounds like an excuse or a motivation for an exit. Fucks wrong with football these days?

Must win. No excuses. Simple as that.

Wouldnt say there in top 10 of Europe this season. Yes the footballs good to watch, Ill agree there but they arent in the top 10 teams this season. Yes Ziyech, Neres, Tadic and Blind all contributed last year but de Jong and de Ligt were the clear stand outs for me and Tangliafico (spelling?) caught my eye, the LB, looks like he could easily play at a higher level. Even last year, I would of still thought we could beat Ajax (would of been tougher than this season 100%), especially with Ruben and Eden. They are a good team yea, still though a team who have lost their 2 best players and quite frankly if we defended better in the 4-4 game we would and should of beat them. For me, we should be beating Valencia too, who yes are a good team but youd still expect us to win them games if I'm honest. We arent the finished article I know but games against Ajax and Valencia should be winnable for this group of players. Obviously didnt pan out that way but I wouldnt say they are big games, like the City and Liverpool games were. Given how we played against Liverpool (CL winners) in the supercup and got at City yesterday at times, not winning those CL games v Ajax and Valencia at the Bridge doesnt look quite as good either, if I am honest. Even at times how we got at United in the first game. We are definitely capable of beating Ajax and Valencias.

I thought in the games against Arsenal and Spurs last season he was good? Struggled defensively for a period v Arsenal in that 3-2 game actuallu but the whole team did and in the community shield he wasnt much use. Also vs Arsenal in the europa final as well as v City in the other final last season thought he played well too.... maybe just me. Struggled yesterday though for sure.

I get the CL games are big games usually but even then wouldnt necessarily say Ajax is as big a game to be counted as that. Theyre a good team but I did think we should be beating them for sure. They lost their 2 best players in the summer, who were hugely fundamental in how they got to the CL semis last year along with Dusan Tadic. The big league games weve played weve dropped points and that is a shame. Spurs and Arsenal to come yet hopefully have more luck, although big games were a problem even under Sarri and Conte in his 2nd year.

Bad result. Both City and United weve dropped points to. Defensive mistakes again. The top 4 race is going to be interesting, alaays was gonna be this season, although especially even more so if we cant keep clean sheets against top teams.

If he had said it, 100% Id get it but its all very much hearsay. An article from the Metro quoting Marca, who if I remember correctly are very pro Madrid and going on how his time there finished, isnt exactly the most reliable or unbiased source out there.