Magic Lamps

Would have been a humiliation otherwise. How did they even qualify for the EL? Lemme guess some BS like fair play ranking.

Never said he was shite. He is good, no doubt but I just wonder whether this will be enough. We lost Bertrand because we signed Filipe, now we sell Filipe and replace him with this guy. It is not his fault, but I am a bit frustrated with how we handled this situation. Especially selling Bertrand so cheap.

Very decent salary, somehow remedies the outrageous pricetag. Not that we don't have the money, we surely have but that is like 28m €, the 5th most expensive foreign signing of a Bundesliga player ever. Right now he is just above average imo, especially defensivelyhe has to improve. Surely not the level of Bertrand or Luis yet. Not sure if he will ever reach that level at all.

Yeah but why? We are filthy rich. We don't even need to spend big. There are a lot of decent players that would improve us, like Witsel, Aranguiz, Pedro out there for decent prices. Because of the EPL TV deal we won't have to worry about money in the future. Even teams like Hull, Burnley or Crystal Palace can outbid a German CL-team like Gladbach or Leverkusen with ease. We made 100m from TV money this season alone +40m yokohame + the adidas kit deal + luis sale. that should cover the wages. So we can reinvest the major part of all merchandising and ticket revenues, which should be about 200m every year withour making a loss. What can that be? it is definitely not some marquee signings. Those are cheaper earlier in the market and if we had someone in the bag it would have been already done. It is obviously not down to money, it is not that we have to pay the stadium in one year.

He die cost 6m € in the first place from sigma Olomouc. We should at least recoup that. Or give him a chance. Every time he played he bossed it. Suarez was the best player in the world at the time we played them and he had him in his pocket all day long. Sth. Boateng, Thiago Silva, Kompany failed to, regardless of tactics

24.5m for him is the bargain of the decade. Why did Juve sell him so cheap? I have heard from a tifosi that Juve think there is an issue with his knee and that if his antics will get the better of him at Bayern too. Also he badly wanted to go there. But I am not so sure. Bayern have the BuLI in the bag already so they can keep Vidal fresh for the CL. Also nightlife in Munich is so boring, he might discipline himself.

Has always been a decent player. But has stagnated since we signed him. Always had great potential but never quite got the finishing touches to his all-round play. This is probably his last chance to make it here. Would surprise me. But if he did, Jose would make us all look hasty for demanding Am squad signings.

Still very raw. Played a couple of nice passes and has the confidence to shoot himself. Needs some work on his ball control, dribbling and movement. Remy should have scored from his great second-time cross though. Maybe it is only me but he is a lot like Schürrle, very direct.

I only saw the highlights but IMO he wasn't entirely shite. More like extremely unlucky and lacking sharpness. The equalizer was entirely the fault of the backline playing useless 5m square passes when pressed and of course Terry's lack of concentration or anticipation. In situations like this you should either make an opening pass early on hoof it forward/make the goalie hoof it forward instead of waiting till the spaces get so tight that an error is more likely. When Begovic made the tackle in 8/10 situation the ball ricochets out of the danger area but he was unlucky that the attacker got a strong foot to the rebound. But Begovic had no other choice than storm out of goal there and go for the slide as it was a backpass. For the 2nd and 3rd goal he was wihtout a chance because of our defence's horrible positioning. Terry is somehow screening Zouma, whilst Traore is at CB and not catching the attacker's run. Also for the 4th goal, Terry is in no man's land, Ramires takes his position and makes a horrible clearance. The shot is straight at Begovic but from short distance. On a good day he keeps that one out.

Never mind the result of those crappy pre season games after a late start to training. But did the game give any useful insights? HOw about Traore and Moses. Is it possible we might have underestimated them? How about the Zouma-Cahill partnership? Not sure if serious... Lampard plays for New York City FC not Red Bulls.

My thoughts exactly. From the beginning of the transfer window, there has been a consent under us fans that we need reinforcements. No major ones but some tuning of the squad here and there. But your brilliant graphic points it out, one after another have been erased by Mou. Now, when JOse also has sold Luis. He does not want to replace him. I mean what the fuck? azpi and Iva have been tired anyways while Luis has not been used enough and now, they have to split his minutes between them with no single reinforcement on that positions, ake even loaned out? Mou has stated again and again that we aim to maintain the status quo. But given how much all our rivals have strengthened whilst we have possibly decreased our depth and quality this sounds like the receipt to certain failure. Not that I would have a problem with a season of modest success whilst promoting youth. But we all know this is not gonna happen. Some of our most promising youngster have already been loaned out. Even Zouma will not see much time when we also sign Stones, who imo should be further down the priority list given our lack of fullbacks and quality CMs. Those statements, that we don't need any players sound so defeatist. And that is so not Mou. I dunno. His reluctance to rotate properly has cost us already but it seems getting worse. Chelsea sits on a shitload of money that is only getting bigger. Maybe there are bigger plans like a new stadium that will cost a lot, but surely this should not stop of from making a few quality signings. Given many of those are also available to a decent price. Vidal left for ridiculous 24.5m pound. That is peanuts for CFC. Witsel would cost a similar amount. But no. Not even Aranguiz for a meagre 15m. The financial risks of those signings would be so low, in the worst case we would have another option for the bench if they don't work out. Quite simply , as of now we got like a dozen quality players and a few average ones but still many squad places to fill, so whether the signings are expensive or not, first team or squad fillers, the only mistake we can make is not to buy and guess what, this is what we do. I think we as fans, who worry about the club deserve an honest answer why the heck we are behaving like morons on the transfer market.

22.9m sound reasonable for s.o. of his quality. I just wonder whether we will sign him despite no cm leaving. Really should to have a chance of retaining the league. Without a major signing I doubt we will win a major trophy with our rivals strengthening like this. Witsel will not be the difference to do but he is exactly the kind of option for the league

Having thought about this for 3 days now, I have still have not found a different way to pronounce Witsel that does not sound completely braindead. Honestly I have no clue what can possibly go wrong pronoucing that name. I think even people in East Germany or Bavaria would get this right.

http://www.skysports.com/football/news/11668/9918013/mourinho-wants-one-more-signing So José wants one more signing. I just wonder whether he considers Witsel!or stones as signed already or if he is just trolling. E.g. he said no pedro unless one leaves us. When Moses goes on loan that will be the case. However I can't possibly believe that José wants to keep such an average player.

Yup. AS one pointed out earlier on, it is because of bis endomorph body type. You can tell by his wide hips and relatively narrow shoulders. But this is also the reason why he has that great balance. Further those guys dont need to eat like 4m cals to built some muscle unlike us lanky guys who can last a second on a slackline or lose weight as soon as we forget to eat our daily cow once

I know. Still, the point stands.

This. I only know about football agents that they receive a lot of cash every time they broker a transfer deal. Ibrahmivoic could have won the CL twice instead of never if he just had delayed his move to Barca by one year. Or never moved there or never left Barca. However you look at it, he either moved to often or too soon. Similar Lukaku, who is his agent and left us just before we became champions. Balotelli left ManCity before they won their second title because of being "homesick" for the sinking ship Milan and returned to England (the sinking ship liverpool) two years later? Maybe coincidences. The german term for agent is "Spielerberater' which would literally translate to "players' counsellor". I wonder what his counsels to Ibra, Balo and Lukaku were.

We could actually go full PEP mode and try something like this Iva Zouma. Azpi matic. Witsel Oscar. Cesc William. Costa. Hazard Not sure about which cbs but now I understand why pep has like 11 midfielders + 2 fbs playing there. The amount of running they have to do surely requires a lot of rotation. Did I say rotation? Yeah then it is a big no for mou

IMO he is completely different to both. Pirlo is playmaker who operates from deep, whilst Lampard is a b2b midfielder who interpretes his position very offensively. But I see were you come from. Oscar is a defensive no. 10. Hence he combines some attributes of lamps and pirlo. But the major difference is that he accommodates the team, whilst for lamps and esp pirlo their teams usually were accomodated to suit them.

I am pretty sure if we sign Witsel, Aranguiz is out. However if we are to pay 34m for a cm or cm we could as well have signed schneiderlin who is younger , pl proven and homegrown.

It really does. Would have been perfect complement to magic and fabregas. Would be like the lamps maka ESS combo again. I wonder why players like him are so rare and almost never found in Europe anymore though neither his athletic nor technical attributes are world class individually, the combination is. Probably because of the tactics, double pivot, tiki taka, all this shit has condemned the b2b midfielder to the past. It might have delivered WC titles to Germany and Spain but this sole focus on skill in European football academies also wastes a lot of potential. Who doesn't like a midfielder who runs, fights, dribbles and shoots all day long?

Most German sources report the deal as done. Add one make the fee close to 40m euro. 6m wages. Absolute steal. What a player for Bayern. I just don't see him being a fit for pep. The square and the wannabe thug. But he will adapt I guess. Off and on the pitch. My only hope is that he is already running out of steam. Lacking tactical nous, he hugely relies on his physical attributes which are slowly but surely fading. Let's wish him that the copa and his lifestyle make his powers wane a little faster than expected.

Not sure. Yaya is 32, hugely reliant on his declining physical attributes. He will not play another season like the 2013/14 one. Fernando-Fernandinho or just above average. However Sterling is a step for them in the right direction. They need young, ambitious players with WC potential, as most of their major players are into early decline. But I reckon he won't make immediate impact. However it is worrysome that we missed out on another rare homegrown talent. We are reducing our squad size unnecessrily when not signing homegrown players while losing one almost every year.

You are right those stats look alarming, thanks for digging them out. But when one actually has seen him play, one knows that he can easily get past a player, play an accurate cross or a perfectly weighted through-ball when he wants to. But we have to understand the way Barcelona played that season. Instead of pumping crosses and through balls into the danger zone they passed the ball around until there is an opening. Pedro will be seldom the one to play that final ball then because he is the one creating the space with his runs and finishing them. Still he is obviously technically well rounded enough and has enough intelligence to play those passes and crosses when he is in the position. The point is, he is not bought to be a provider. We got Fabregas, Hazard, Willian and maybe soon Aranguiz for this. Thankfully MOurinho has spotted the lack of scorers in this team and hence we want Pedro. But obviously it is not only his finishing prowess we signed him for. We could just play Remy on the wing then who is an even better finisher and probably faster as well. But pedro is a better passer, dribbler, experienced on the biggest stage, a match proven winner and a very decent all-round footballer. If he fits the squad, when we have 4 senior wingers + Bertrand traore already + Remy who can play there is another question. Also whether he can quickly adapt to the prem is not certain. But what he adds is not another dimension to our play but simply attributes that have been missing with most of our wingers. Maybe, just maybe he buys us exactly the amount of time we need to establish a youth player on the right wing. On the other hand of course, with this transfer we do what we started with signing schürrle, Salah, Willian, Cuadrado. Throwing between 20 and 35m at the rw andhope we land a hit once. This is a costly gamble which proved hugely ineffective so far. We got enough depth in those position why not stick with what we got? I am sure one of Traore, Cuadrado, Oscar or Willian will come good at once. Nonetheless Pedro is a good player, decent signing. Just not sure if our strategy is the right one.

Hate the newcastle roof too. Looks like a greenhouse. But I guess ours will be a bit more classy. Still no clue why those bars. We got only 12 acres space and limit it even further by plugging pillars around the stadium? I would go as high and narrow as possible. If abramovich really pays the stadium on his own it would be too grateful even for his standards. Should call it abramobridge^^ . but I guess he is too modest for this. Actually great we stay at our venue other than some clubs with so called tradition.