robsblubot

Agreed. He's by far the better fit for Maresca's system; Alvarez is even already adapted to that system.

You see Kepa was an obviously great name for a goalie, and it did fail miserably, so our savvy owners are trying the opposite approach with flip (flop). 🙂 It kinda makes sense in some bizarre world of baseball.

Given the ownership, I'm sure it's The Curse of the Bambino at play here.

Well, W. Fofana is playing without legs, so gotta give him some credit for that. Now, "can they do it on a cold rainy night in Stoke"? 😆 City moved the target way beyond our reach. Then Arsenal followed suit. We have no choice really as the positional game is simply better for the PL, so we either simply give it up and focus on cups, yup even CL, or we embrace Maresca's way and try to implement it here. Nope not with these players I'm afraid, so it needs some tweaking over a window or two. I can see a lot of disappointment from people who believed in the strategy so far: it was not really that good for Maresca's way of play. Positional play defending isn't all about the CBs. So, I'm not that worried about that atm.

Enzo Fernandez could help with that. They spent a lot of time together not long ago. I think that playing nice football becomes a possibility once you have multiple skillful players in your team, and signing Alvarez would def move us towards that direction esp considering what the manager intends. I honestly think a signing of this caliber would put us back at the top. Yes, we'd still have weaknesses, but IMO players like Alvarez raise the overall level of play of a team. I'd not be surprised if Enzo himself improves having Alvarez around, and the club may be thinking that as well given the investment on Enzo. His xG is irrelevant in my view, because he's a player who can help increase the 'x' (expected) variable. Oh well, let's hope.

Qualifying for the Champions League used to be a lot cheaper back in the day. 🙂 No wait, didn't Aston Villa qualify for the Champions League? https://www.transfermarkt.us/aston-villa/transfers/verein/405

For me, the pre Clearlake success ratio is frankly fairly normal at this level. After all this is supposed to be the Elite, and not everyone makes it -- even good players may not. Now, I honestly see a single disappointment of over 25 signing during the Clearlake regime: Sterling. The others were just over-the-hill, free, Loans. Disasi just a bad signing from the get-go -- nobody rated him and he does not even look the part (heavy). Goalies should not count given that you can count in one hand Elite sides playing with a U24 goalie (our next goalie signing will likely be over 25). Nkunku yet to be seen depending on fitness... injury history is not a mystery tho. Ironically the list does not include the absolute worst signing so far: W. Fofana -- big money for someone with such a troublesome injury history. All I see from the list above is incompetence.

That we can agree on. With the caveat some of us think getting a couple of more experienced players, with renown, could actually help in the development of these younger players. Now, the complicated part is "the bar." It's so freaking high here. Say, take Jackson for a sec, he's a very good player in my book. I think he improved quite a bit and became more of a team player towards the end of the season. Now, maybe this is it for him -- this may be as good as he will ever get. If that's the case, is he good enough? maybe... maybe not. It's hard to say for sure, but I think the opposition would then have better options. Of course, I hope he keeps on improving. Yeah I cannot comment on what other people wanted back then. Folks get upset for a number of different things. I certainly did not want Kai and Mount out. Mount with a single leg shits on Mudryk IMO. Disagree, Kova had a lot of important starts and performance. How about Enzo's or Caicedo's goal ratio? Trev has done shit tho. He's a good squad player, I agree, but that's about it. So, I know that some people may think that the current team is better than the CL winner one. It makes no fucking sense in my mind tho. In the end though, it's all about achievements; if in a few of years this crop of players don't win anything, that's how they will be remembered.

Fair enough, like I said, we all have our own preferences... this is entertainment after all. Incidentally, I think the only over 30yo player who started that final against City was Thiago Silva, who was signed on a free deal. That was a pretty young side esp with Kai and Mount at 21-22. The buys were Jorginho (well under 30 and still in his prime), and Kovacic who was 25-26 and very well in his prime. kante was 30, but obviously not acquired in that season.

Love when people conveniently ignore the biggest silverware a club can win. 🤷‍♂️ For the record, I certainly don't. Like I said earlier, to each their own I guess. Also, what is exactly *better* right now? You can argue that it's likely to get better in the future, but right now there is no competitive advantage from the time you complain about.

It's probably wages again. 😢

Don't get me wrong, I haven't seen enough of him (Lavia), so I trust the multiple opinions stating that he's a very good player. My point is that from that "very good player" (for his age) to an elite player who gives you a competitive advantage against CL or PL powerhouses should not be taken for granted however promising a player may be.

Fair enough, but "amazing for us" is a tall order considering what this club has accomplished in the past. Not long ago we had prime Kante having MotM after MotM performances in CL knockout stages. We won a CL outplaying Real Madrid and then City. Nowadays we don't even play CL. From experience here, but the idea that a player who is 20-22 and, is a good player, will automagically become much better later is simply wrong. I'm probably with you on D, and am more worried about the attack esp our dependency on Nkunku remaining fit. On the other hand, Maresca demands different characteristics from his D players, I also fail to see that in our group.

Heh, I'd actually say the same for the people who celebrate young (development) signings instead of silverware. To each his own, I guess. 🤷‍♂️

I don't think Lavia should be added to any success list until he plays for a season esp considering he apparently had some issue at the time we signed him. Nkunku would also deserve a mention on the "let's hope" list. We have historically signed good players, but ultimately a group of players is evaluated based on their success. Reckon it is just too early to know how well the transfers will turn out to be, esp given the development time involved with many of them.

Without info on whether the matches are really comparable, it's not really that useful comparison IMO. The issue is mostly about pace: Disasi is very slow and pretty average on the ball; while Trev has much more pace, even if he's just as average on the ball. Disasi is the worst by far because he forces a low block and he only did well when Poch lowered the lines towards the end of the season. Reckon Maresca won't be doing that tho.

Goalie is the hardest position to scout: for professionals and even worse for fans. I'd trust any goalkeeping coach's opinion vs any stats on a web site; there are so many variables, like the quality of the D as mentioned earlier. BTW, even my "quality of the D" is a simplification.

likely yeah I feel that W. Fofana needs his own category though -- what a strange buy. I suspect a favor for his agent to facilitate other deals? no proof of any of that, but I really can't imagine any other reason.

Well that's the visibility part that I referred to above; the new accounts thing is indeed weird to say the least. Regarding his opinion on the game, I'll stand by what I said. I absolutely don't have to agree with someone's point to take something from it, which was often the case with him.

Same here. I don't have visibility into everything he did, but I thought he was a good poster too. "Every donkey was young once." was a good one 😆 and very pertinent for the times we are living in.

Hmm then maybe he's been offered wages way beyond of what we can offer.

That's an interesting idea; would he leave tho? He's only 30, so I'm not sure why City would let him go.

He's standing and not on crutches -- context enough for you now? 😃 Seriously though, only one dumb ass was not thinking about his teammates and his club, and that was Enzo. I'd also give a shout-out to Argentina to not have anyone around to prevent that kinda of stupid behavior.

That's perhaps the difference between you and me: you may think that Haaland is not that unique, while I think Haaland is a freak of nature; and that expecting u18 players to be another haaland (or Rooney or Ronaldo 9) is unrealistic. That was literally the point I was making all along. 🤷‍♂️ Here's one in case you missed:

That's my point exactly. It's how *rare* it is to find elite players who delivered at such young age U20, in the case of our specific player, 18 years old. I wrote the folks have unrealistic expectations with very young players, which is the post you replied to. Haaland was 21 when he joined City, and is 23yo now. It's pointless to discuss theories when we disagree on facts: what a U20 player is, for example.