Hutcho

He exists

I think Kova comes straight back in. But it's so hard to predict lineups without knowing who's going to be available. Kepa (doubt he gets swapped when the party line is he's gonna compete with the new boy whenever he arrives) Reece (don't think he will be dropped after that performance) Zouma Christensen (both played well and I think this game may be a little too soon to chuck silva straight in) Azpi (alonso will get ripped on the right and Emerson clearly isn't in the plans) Then I think lamps plays a midfield 3 of kante Kova and mount bringing on kai if we need an extra attacking threat. I would love kai to start though but i think lamps will wait for West Brom where we should have more of the ball. Hopefully I'm wrong and kai plays and he bosses it. If pulisic is ready (which I will hope he is and he was left out vs Brighton with this game in mind) then he goes straight into left wing. CHO on the right. If he doesn't go CHO again and Pully isn't fit then I'm not sure. Giroud up front with Werner on the left would make sense. But yeah shit tons of options available and even more to come when they are all fit. Which is a good thing of course.

I'm so pumped for ziyech. I said it before he was the one I think will be the most exciting to watch maybe barring Werners impact on the team. And just thinking about the 2 passes he made in a half of preseason we could have done with that sort of pass vs Brighton. Half a dozen times Werner made a good run and didn't get the ball.

Yeah he'll do the job for spurs so it's good for all parties. I'm glad we went chillwell than have what effectively is a loan though

My point was simply that he may play well out on the right and this was not fair to fully judge kai on 1 performance. Because injuries happen and have happened and we may need options. I would also rather he play Central. But my point was purely that he may have performed average if he played Central due to the other things I've mentioned such as match fitness etc and he may still be an effective option there if we needed it. I don't think we can make any judgements of him based on 1 game which was his first competitive match in over a month.

Who said they want him to play there? The fact is we have one winger available right now who struggled last season. I would have played CHO but Frank didn't so it is what it is. It's not ludicrous for him to have played him out there despite it not want everyone wanted to see. The point was purely that as is always the case everyone wants to make instant snap decision judgements after 1 game. Every player is either complete dogshit or the second coming of christ based off the first game of the season with no preseason when he fact is you can't really judge anything this early. He was very laboured. Had his big run to recover his error but was getting beat all over the place so definitely lacked some match sharpness as he was a passenger for a lot of the game. Which is a testament to the guy in that he was able to do what he did without having that full match fitness. He should be immense when he is in a few games time.

There's no fans in the stadium. Most of the celebrations are a bit subdued for that reason there's no atmosphere. This is really some pure tinfoil stuff to speculate they don't care or want to play for Frank etc. Brighton were always going to look fitter. They played more preseason games had a full preseason with most of the squad. We had like 5 days.

He's a villa fan playing in the prem for his boyhood club. Fair play to him. He is living every kids dream

Definitely think everyone's reading too much into the poor performance of players as being due to be being out of position rather than just being not match fit. Havertz will probably be very effective on the right but he was clearly not fully match fit which makes sense seeing as how he hasn't played a competitive match in ages. Same with a lot of them. The ones who played 2 lots of 90 mins with their country looked pretty sharp. The likes of Christensen, Werner as well as kante and jorginho come to mind. All of whom have had that extra couple of games. Play a fully match fit kai on right wing and we may be saying something different. I think even if he played centrally it wouldn't have been the kai we will hope to see in a few weeks (would have been better than RLC I imagine). But I think we need to get players back fit and get a bigger game sample size to be able to judge much of anything.

Slow start but he wasn't terrible. Can't expect everyone to dominate on their first game especially in the current circumstances. By next week he'll have doubled his time with the club. Add to that he hasn't played competitive football in ages and was playing somewhat out of position it's to be expected. When fully match fit I think he'll be an effective option on the right but hopefully we can get ziyech back so we can move him centrally.

Guy was elite and he didn't score which says it all really. His price tag will be a bargain I'm sure. Hope he's fine for Sunday as we will need him vs pool.

Be nice if Pully was back fit for this one and silva was ready but I can't see chillwell or ziyech making it. But I'd like to see a winger wide as we could really hurt pool with Pully and Werners pace against their high line.

You can't discount his running and pressing because he is an attacking player and then say he struggled defensively. I don't get why you hate mount but anyway, he was good today as most people saw. And he is probably one of our most consistent players. He was practically the only one running and pressing when our back was against the wall and had way more of an impact than any of the midfielders and wingers barring kante. Lamptey played well all game. He was clearly brightons best player and his pace was too much for alonso and whoever else was in there. But the difference is that mount effected the game out of position. RLC did not. He lost the ball countless times. Didn't win it back at all. So I don't get the mount hate. Based on other opinions as well as rating sites mount was above an average rating which seems about right.

He wasn't the motm but he timo and kante were the only ones always running and pressing.Saying he was second worst on the pitch is definitely a joke. Mount played well considering he was out of position And mount was our second best player all last season so no idea what you're on about with the barkley and Gallagher being better thing.

Gotta love timo in his interview. What a guy

Also worth noting that there has been 0 pre season and havertz didn't even get some game time with Germany. So it makes sense that many of them and him in particular were rusty. We got the 3 points and that's more than lots of these teams could say. No point overreacting to 1 performance

Wasn't pretty but we'll take it. Well done Timo, and kante. Probably the best 2 players.

Have looked so much better with barkley on

The team is gonna be rusty as we saw throughout the prem this weekend. Things are gonna take time. Anyone expecting perfection game one was really hoping. I know this is TC and we are either the best team in the world or the worst team in the world depending what game it is but chill.

Think CHO for Ruben. Or put giroud on and move Werner wide. With some better passing Werner would have been in a couple of times. Werner has looked very good. Havertz hasn't got into the game yet though.

Jesus Ruben. Come on mate

RLC mega struggling. Miss Kova in there at the moment I think

Let's go boys. Slow start but somewhat to be expected. Now to kick on

TIMO PACE

Mount I would imagine