The only place to be

Wankers. First day of the season is all sunshine and short shirts, not a fucking Monday evening trek to a shithole. Oh well. We'll sell out our allocation but that's a toughie on the first matchday.

So we sign a deal with Adidas, and a year later they ink one with United worth more than double that for roughly the same duration. Hmm....I think I might remain silent on this issue so that I don't say something rude about Gourlay.

Just out of shot is Romelu Lukaku trying to tell the tape recorder that he is a complete striker and still hasn't made his mind up where he wants to play. (Also, as Muzchap says, that's a radio not a tape recorder...so ner ner )

What a fantastic young man and what a great attitude. Fought for his spot at both club and national level, didn't moan or throw a strop when he wasn't first choice and brought the goods when he got his chance. In fact he seems to work harder when he has these obstacles put in front of him and will now be a key part of our squad going forward. Always says the right things too and got the rewards he deserved. An absolutely fantastic young lad and a great role model. EDIT - oops, should be in the Schurrle thread.

Offers so much when he's on the pitch and excited to see him next season. Think he's a proper Jose-type player and would even move Hazard to the number 10 position and let Schurrle have the wing for a few matches. The guy might not dribble as well as Willian but he has twice the end product. Feel so proud of him and he's only been here a year. Love him.

Do you think Big Phil wondered if that was a good decision after the fourth or fifth goal?

Yeah probably. I dislike the 'cult of celebrity' where we confuse sticking one's tongue out for 'personality'. Maybe I'm old-fashioned but I don't think influence and leadership should solely be measured on Twitter followers or Instagram images. I think he's well-marketed but hugely superficial. If John Terry is The Beatles, then David Luiz is an X-Factor contestant. Lots of glitz and glamour, bright lights and even a nice little backstory but where's the substance? He's a defender whose biggest supporters will wilfully ignore the defensive frailties of, looking instead to laud a well (and oft!) taken free-kick. He's a player built for a particular type of modern day fan and I do resent it somewhat.

Who was the other club willing to spend £30 million on him? Spurs? So in their view he was on par with Lamela? I'm not saying he's that bad, but using the market to determine a player's quality sometimes has it's pitfalls. Willian looks like an incredibly tidy player but it's just the end product that he's lacking. Schurrle got double the number of goals in fewer starts and offensively you can see how he'd link up with a proper striker next season. He has that innate knack of being in the right place to get goals and I'd bet on him to get into double figures next season whereas from Willian you're looking at him being at best a facilitator. It's just sometimes hard to believe he's actually going to be 26 before the season starts and that we spent around £30 million on him. I think it's sometimes overlooked just how bad a bit of business that might actually be.

Last season he was one of four strikers who had about equal chance of starting for us. He was getting chances, and I think he would've received more as the season went on. This season he's definitely behind Costa. He's nailed on to start for us and the best Lukaku could hope for is second striker. He'll have to outperform an established, top striker. And the funny thing is it's his fault. He requested a move when he had every chance to play himself in, a chance that EVERY other youngster at this club would kill for. Last season was a once in a lifetime opportunity for him, and he threw it away. That's why so many of the supporters are bored of him, and his comments simply compound it.

Yes it was his first season last year, but did he ever really show what he could be capable of? Schurrle showed in the Fulham game exactly what we could expect when he's settled (and against Stoke too). Hazard showed in his first season how great he could be too (the West Ham match springs to mind). Even Oscar showed on his debut against Juventus exactly what he was all about. To my mind Willian still hasn't done that. He's a tidy player but he really needs to actually start giving an end product.

He's really not.

He was better than he has been, but I'd like to see him with a proper striker ahead of him to link up with and create some space for him. Showed a real willingness to get on the ball though which suggests he wasn't destroyed by the Germany result.

Shows absolutely none of the basic intuition or decision making you need in a defender. He's a joke, but people like him because he's 'a character'. He's like a Big Brother contestant or TOWIE character. No talent but somehow becomes popular with a certain type of person.

No he isn't.

So because he wasn't first choice, he should give up and go somewhere easier? Lampard could've done that when Roman took over because all the signs were that we were going to invest in world-class players, but he didn't. He worked even harder and became a legend. Lukaku got chances in three of the four games he was here for. He would've got more. He instead asked for a move.

And he couldn't have shown his hunger and ambition by fighting for a place here, when his competition was Torres, Ba and Eto'o? He had the best opportunity he will ever have to nail a starting spot down, but he went somewhere where there was very little competition for a starting spot. You can deride that as Dr-Phil (sic) analysis if you must. He's proven he can score goals in a mid-table team. He's proven nothing about playing at the highest level. He's proven nothing about dealing with competing against 'world class' players for a spot (if that's what we're calling Torres, Ba and Eto'o now). But I do see your point. We should ignore his attitude and just be suckered in by him scoring some goals. I'm absolutely bored of discussing him with people who wilfully ignore the most important aspect of a footballer in Jose's mind - character.

The difference between Lukaku and Ronaldo is that Ronaldo is a guy who doesn't shy away from challenges. Mourinho respects people who work hard and no-one in world football works harder than Ronaldo, whereas Lukaku (when presented with a challenge) requested a transfer. That's a severe character deficiency that some people overlook and think Jose will just ignore.

At half the price he might make sense, but no chance at £20 million.

£15 million for one of the best left-backs in Europe who didn't make the Brazilian squad because there's an unwritten rule that Thiago Silva is the only defender with actual defensive talent allowed to be selected. Beyond that I agree that Pogba as a replacement for Ramires and Mikel (£25-30 million between them?) actually makes sense.

Basically he's a perfectly adequate player who you wouldn't actually want to have to play for us, but as a back-up to the back-up he's perfectly capable so long as we don't expect him to do much going forward or a huge amount of defensive work. Based on these remarkable comments on his ability I feel I should add that I've heard he makes a great cup of tea, keeps his area of the changing room clean and always lets the other players borrow his deodorant. But there's a reason that everyone was surprised that he managed a move to Chelsea in the first place. In fact I've heard from people who played with him as a kid that he was pretty average then as well, which just goes to show what a premium left-backs have attached to them.

And what to you is a reputable source? Jason Burt in the Telegraph was linking us with Pogba in May http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/chelsea/10852796/Chelsea-want-to-sign-either-Paul-Pogba-Koke-or-Paulinho-after-agreeing-48m-deal-for-David-Luiz.html The simple fact is that we weren't linked with Fabregas until a deal was very much underway at the start of June. Before that all the talk had been about him going to United. Now I don't generally think that Pogba being in London is a sign he's coming to us, but let's not re-write history and pretend that Fabregas's arrival was predicted by 'reputable sources' that far in advance of it happening. Like a lot of our deals it came quickly out of the blue.

No they weren't. Up until 31/5 when the story about him leaving Barcelona came up he wasn't linked to us in the slightest. In fact it was a few days after that when we cropped up because before that (12 months before that in fact) he was being linked to United, first under Moyes. We've been linked to Pogba since at least the Luiz sale (as well as Koke and Paulinho). The two situations are absolutely comparable.

Suarez is Liverpool's Bale. Teams at that level don't come across proper world-class talent everyday and you should never exchange (to paraphrase Bill Simmons) a dollar for some quarters and nickels. That's to say that it's very rare for a team to compensate for the loss of a star with a few lesser pieces. Spurs became a worse team after losing Bale and I reckon the same will happen with Liverpool regardless of who they bring in.

Where's this Pogba going to see Eminem rumour coming from? Or has is just come out of Eminem being a rap artist and Pogba being black? Maybe he's going to see Wicked.

As a replacement for both Ramires and Mikel then he'd be ideal, plus there's the settling of the Mutu money which could be a very useful bargaining chip. I'd still like to see us develop youngsters like Chalobah and Pogba would be an obstacle to them, but he's got massive potential and if we could get £30 million-ish for Rami and Mikel then his fee isn't quite as prohibitive.