OneMoSalah

The chances of us winning the PL with or without Reus are still high but think back to Jose's second season here in his first spell in charge, did he really need to go and buy Michael Essien? Not really, but he did didn't he? Its not just a matter of improving the chances of winning the Premier League or Champions League as such but improving competition and strength of the squad as well so we can compete across every front. Also having a very good wide forward in Reus playing on the right? He has an impressive goalscoring record, probably better than Hazards and much better than Willian and Andre's as well as being a much superior player to both of them so what harm would it do? Honestly if it was someone who is like 21 and needed regular games to develop to a certain level then yes signing him would be pointless but signing a player better than anyone we've got really is not pointless.

Laporte is comfortably better than every u23 center back we have so arguing against signing him just because we have Ake, Zouma, Christensen or Kalas is stupid giving how we need to find a long term successor to John Terry who is going to be at a good level to come in and hit the ground running as well as having a lot of room to improve. Its not a given Ake, Zouma, Christensen or Kalas will be a regular here you know were as Laporte has been playing a lot with Bilbao in Spain for the last 2 years and looks better and much more ready than them to come in and replace someone like John Terry in the summer or the next year or whenever (I doubt John Terry will retire in the summer and hes at a level where he can keep playing for a year at least).

Really? Lol I really don't think thats right at all... Busquets was a superior footballer to Toure and suited their philosophy much better. Next you will be telling everyone that Messi only scores so many goals because teams take pity on him for being so small or something. Also Busquets father isn't even on the Barcelona board, hes a goalkeeper coach which makes sense seeing as he used to be a goalkeeper.

Please just stop man, its getting hard to take this bullshit seriously.

Lol you really are digging your own grave here.... hes not Walcott you know he has an all round game.

No not really. Given Ozil and Cazorla are number 10s for Arsenal as are Coutinho and Alberto for Liverpool. Other than Sanchez, who is the only great player in that selection of wide players he should easily be competing to be a regular there and if not a regular at least someone who gets subbed on regularly. Sterling got that green light role or whatever you say it is due to performances where he obviously delivered, Oxlade-Chamberlain very much could do something similar but he hasn't and he isn't at the same level as Sterling but obviously you know you have your opinion and I have mines.

Jesus man I don't know how to respond to all that bullshit about green lights or whatever but I'll try.... When Rodgers promoted Sterling into his first 11 he didn't let him do whatever he wanted, he had strict tactical roles to do, tracking back, pressing high up the park, sitting spare and basically marking space if his full back was inside following a player. He was hardly the main man at Liverpool and I still don't think he is, Suarez was the main man last season without a doubt, Gerrard is perhaps still more of the main man this year. Sterlings earned that role because of his improvement and quality since playing against City 2 seasons ago or whatever year it was he made his debut under Rodgers. Oxlade-Chamberlain has hardly matched any of Sterlings performances or stats from the last 2 years when he wasn't even the main man so are you gonna tell me hes better because he scored 10 goals in League 1 with Southampton or claim that he is better than Sterling even though he's struggled with injuries and consistency at Arsenal?

I think the thing that helped Steven Gerrard look good last season was teams reluctance to press Liverpool at times because of Sturridge and Suarez's pace and movement up top. He had all the time he wanted in some games and could do whatever he wanted because the game was in front of him. When people started marking him he struggled. I honestly don't get Rodger's comments about Gerrard being a top top player in that position or whatever it was that he put it, defensively as the third center back or quarterback or whatever you want to call it he is extremely poor. Lucas Leiva's defensive side of his game is 10 times better than Gerrards but sure he can play a 30 or 40 meter diagonal pass if you give him time and space I mean even I can do that if I've got all the time in the world and I'm certain most people could do the same.

Hes just an all round better footballer, better football intelligence, tactically better, dribbling and probably his final ball as well.

I don't get why Rodgers thinks hes good there. Hes very much an average player in that position and when Rodgers claimed he was one of the best in that role last season I couldn't help but laugh. I watched Liverpool play Real Madrid the other week and Lucas Leiva looked every bit better in that role than Gerrard. I mean you seen it yourself Oscar, Ramires, Hazard were bypassing him very easily, in that clip he constantly gets too tight and gets spun away from in the middle of the park and then Hazard or Oscar or Ramires or someone is running directly towards their back 4.

Lol so your now saying that Arsenals physios are at fault for him not kicking on as much when hes been fit as well? Remember his first year for Arsenal, he only kicked on the second half of the season and the year after he was very much pretty poor and also injured a lot. So your telling me you watched Oxlade-Chamberlain in League 1 with Southampton? I doubt that very much mate. Sterling has gone from strength to strength under Rodgers since making his debut vs City, Oxlade-Chamberlain hasn't improved as much as Sterling has.

Exactly people seem to think thats it nailed on that he will not be a regular in other than the cup games, hes a top quality player he will get in eventually. Ivanovic and Azpi are gonna need rests and they will probably pick up an injury between them or their form will drop a bit, who knows? It happened with Cole last year and Azpi got in and stayed there for the rest of the year really so theres not a chance that it won't happen again.

Barkley and Sterling... both better. No doubts about it, although Oxlade-Chamberlain is certainly a talented player wouldn't say hes as good as those two.

There aren't very many, I can see why some people would perhaps think hes a bit overrated but he's hardly vastly overrated. Hes definitely the best English player of that U23 age group along with Ross Barkley and Jack Wilshere if he still falls into that group.

If he say mistimes it or catches it wrong with his foot and it deflects or he changes the direction of the shot and puts Thibaut off then he's made a mistake and cost us a goal so I can get the thought process of going for it with his chest to be honest. The way he went at it, if it hits his chest its only going to fall in front of him as opposed to the chance if he goes to try kick it away and say miskick it or effectively miss it, it could go in or go anywhere. I know it doesn't make much sense but he could of went to kick it totally fuck it up and end up scoring a comical own goal or something. I mean I've never scored an own goal quite like that but you know... I've scored own goals and you think after what the fuck did I try do that for haha.

If he is injured and is missing for a few games I don't think we will see a huge difference to be honest because teams have went to mark him in certain games but there will be a bit of a difference. Still I think Oscar and Matic are more than capable of running the game in central midfield but we will see. Its injuries like this one which sometimes leave me wondering what if Oscar and Matic don't control the games as well as Cesc does? Not having a direct replacement for Cesc is a bit difficult but we will see if he really is out injured for a few games, Ramires brings something different to the table though so if he does play next to Matic and Oscar continues to play as he does in tandem with Cesc and Matic, Rami's runs in more advanced areas could give teams a different issue to face. Although wasn't Ramires also not meant to have played through an injury too?

He strikes me very much as a confidence player who needs to be playing a run of games, even when he was playing the second half of last season you could see he was doing alright because he had a consecutive games or was constantly subbed in. Honestly Moses is the same, when playing regularly he's getting minutes and feeling confident doing things hes not like someone who can come off the bench and completely change a game if he hasn't been playing for a while, hes just not that good to do so. Someone like Hazard or Oscar can do that say if they've been injured and return you know they are back because the jump in quality is noticeable. People forget Salah is still young, he has a lot of potential and has a lot of ability to be fair. Remember the run around he gave us and Spurs in the Champions League and Europa League? Hes a very clever attacking player who has had a decent football education is Switzerland with Basel, he just needs to be playing more regularly to get into a run of games and form. Who gives a fuck if he sells a lot of shirts or not, Chelsea don't buy players just to sell shirts, they buy players to play for Chelsea and contribute in a footballing way first and foremost.

I remember a few months back when the 2013/14 season finished and we had all this talk about how we could have won if we didn't sit back and play so defensive and people were calling for Jose's head saying City played brilliant football or Liverpool played good football or whatever but I think this season you see just how good Jose really is in terms of making a team with variation and different ways of winning games. There is no one way to play football, the difference is Liverpool can only play if teams let them play and the same with City because they chose to play one way. Also look at City's transfer window? Would you say they've improved? 32M for a center half who has looked out of sorts? Fernando right enough was a decent buy but Toure is continuing to do what he does best: leave spaces in central areas. Liverpool's transfer window was embarrassing too really, who out of their new signings are worth the money? None of them really. Rodgers' transfer record since going there has been pretty bad to be honest, over 200M since getting there and he has bough one player that has been good: Sturridge. The point I'm trying to make as well, when we won the title under Jose in his first year, we strengthened signing players, again we finished 3rd last season and we strengthened in where we needed. We win the title this season and I bet he will still strengthen the team. Best manager in the world. Its a fact.

Obviously he's not been a regular since signing but its not like he didn't know what he signed up for, why would he want a loan? If he wanted to start every week and have it easy at a mid table team he would of went to Liverpool and not push himself as hard to get games.

Ryan Davidson right back Corona beer left back

Roy Keane wasn't world class? I'm sorry this is the guy who was assigned to man mark Zinedine Zidane... fucking Zizou of all people... and did very, very well, nulifiying him which was a big big factor as to how United beat Juventus and got to the Champions League final. Roy Keane was definitely a world class footballer in those days. Anyway about time Gary scored a goal....

He was obviously marked in the game today, Rodgers even stated in a interview somewhere after the game he wanted to man-mark Fabregas to null his influence. Anyway it wasn't the big games we had to improve on from last season remember, it was the smaller teams we played that set up to frustrate us that fucked us for the title, so if he doesn't score 23 goals, create 310 goals and make 49649 tackles in a big game (or whatever your 'crazy' expectations are even when you consider he was an Arsenal player who more or less struggled in big games 9 times out of 10) I don't mind because he does alright and he makes the difference in the smaller games, which is where we struggled last season.

Yeah I meant 2014 haha stupid keyboard

Well that is a load of shit. If a team has set out with a gameplan that is to man mark a player like Fabregas and the marker is doing it well then he is gonna struggle to impose himself as much. In other games Oscar and Matic have controlled the game in phases when Fabregas has been marked tightly and they continued to do so today. Lets be honest, hes played worse in big games for Arsenal than he has done for us, his mentality for the bigger games has improved under Pep, Tito and Martino at Barca and even at Chelsea now he seems to be better equipped to play in bigger games and he is a much more mature footballer.

I can remember questioning resigning this guy back in January 2014 but holy fuck, I think hes been Jose's best buy since returning to the club. What a player..