Pata

Strong disagree on this, CM for example was a mess basically all season.

People need to chill. It's quite staggering what I've been reading in this thread. Pressure on Eales, Mitchell gone soon, WE LOST MINTEH, Howe only wanting this and that etc. It's bullshit speculation without any merit or need. PSR, Euros and Mitchell coming in late made it a tough summer but I'm 100% certain we'll make 1-2 class signings before the window closes. We are in a much better shape now compared to most of last season in any case and Howe actually has a squad to pick his team from.

I don’t think that midfield works.

Always thought he would be too expensive for us considering he turns 27 next month, no matter how much Howe loves him.

Getting into the Red Bull system is hardly bad for his career.

Two former players!

Yeah, he should really learn the stop start run IMO. I'm not very confident with his pens and stop start is OP with the current rules.

Probably but it's such a bad take. I don't think anyone who watches him regularly would ever say he isn't comfortable with the ball no matter what the stats say and I'm usually a stats guy. But then again stats also say he isn't very good aerially, such a weird take. And if you are a football journalist specialising in Premier League you are bound to have watched him loads in the past two seasons.

Sport magazine in Finland released their 'legendary' season preview. They had us at 8th stating lower Euro places are the best we can hope for and money can't buy success. Also said about Schär that he's really strong in duels and winning aerial balls but struggles badly with the ball at his feet. Seriously, what the fuck? Has that journalist ever watched us? Complete opposite is the truth and it's not like our fabulous Swiss CB is new to the league. Thank god I was able to read our page on my parents and not give money to these cunts like I usually do.

Looking at the online numbers and many of their young players are on relatively low wages. Enzo £180k, Caicedo £150k and Mudryk £100k are pretty low considering the fees but they all earn a lot more than previously considering where they came from. Palmer £75k, Jackson £65k, Madueke £50k, Gallacher £50k, Gusto £45k and Lavia £45k seem very reasonable. Think all of these players would earn a lot more if they were signed by Man City, Arsenal or Man United. Big contracts under Boehly are Sterling £325k which seems like an early mistake that they learned from. James £250k and Chilwell £200k are both IMO understandable as England internationals if they weren't injured all the time. Fofana £200k and Cucurella £175k seem high but both came from PL with huge fees. Generally I think the cliche of going to Chelsea due to massive wages they offer is not really true under Boehly. Plan seems to be to buy young players who haven't had massive contracts before and then giving them long years to get the money down a bit. Really happy Pochettino walked, IMO with him they would have been really colse to finishing in the top 4 but with Maresca it's a big question mark once again.

Also works the other way. If he’s the only threat it’s easy to commit defenders to him. ASM was so often doubled or tripled when he had the ball, I really don’t see it as an advantage.

It’s not really weird though for anyone who has seen you play under EtH and the underlying stats are horrible.

Fucking hell.

Why would Liverpool even need him? He's really good but splashing the cash on him when they have Diaz and Gakpo playing the same position wouldn't make any sense from their squad's perspective. Honestly think it's a load of nonsense and not worth thinking about.

Yeah, I have no idea what he thinks of his career now but he must realise he's firmly behind Kane, Watkins and Toney in England squad and there's no major tournament coming up next summer. It's also a fact that NUFC is the biggest club he will play for in Premier League in the remaining years of his career. Maybe he loses some of that competitiveness with age and is fine with being a backup here in a settled environment which would put less stress on his fragile body that would maybe extend his career. If he was up for it I would probably offer him a one year extension and have the same dilemma next summer. We would carry the risk of his knee exploding one last time though but I think I would be fine with that.

Yeah, just think that the injuries are the main thing on people's minds right now and many have forgotten how good he is when fit. Non-penalty xG+xA per 90 of 0.95 (22-23) and 0.89 (23-24 although on half the minutes of the previous season) are ridiculous numbers for someone who is seen as a clear backup now. Isak's numbers were 0.53 (22-23) and 0.83 (23-24). I wrote a long post in his thread after the season that we can't really fail with him and both selling and keeping him have merits. He's a brilliant backup when fit but also getting the £10-15m fee would help instead of letting him walk next summer. Still think it's true, if he can score 10 goals in the league with limited minutes like last season (actually 9 but close enough) he could easily be worth that 10-15 million fee we could have received for him. Finding a replacement would be very expensive like you said in a window where we have two very clear big money needs (RW and CB). Osula really helps as now we have someone who can play striker on the bench when Wilson is injured unlike last season.

Think he's really good but simply too expensive and old for us to buy at this stage. Resale value means a lot and he turns 27 soon.

Great signing! I didn't know he existed couple of days ago but he's exactly the player profile we sorely missed last season and our academy hasn't been able to produce. Absolutely no risk involved either with the low fee and means we can spend more on a RW and a CB. Think Wilson has become underrated here too lately, he's still one of the best backup strikers in the league even with all the injuries and no Europe means Isak should be available more often which should be good for Wilson's availability too.

Villa are in injury to Watkins away from starting Cameron Archer in the Champions's League. Lukaku is still good but they would surely need help with those wages.

I don't think we would get enough for Joelinton to replace what he brings to the team, £40m max and I have no idea who would even do that. It's different with Bruno and Isak, there aren't many clubs in the world who wouldn't like to have them and the money we would get would be so much higher. It fucking sucks but we have to be able to sell players at the right time and Bruno turns 27 soon, pretty much the last age where we could get maximum money for him. Isak being two years younger means he's more likely to leave because he's a top 3 striker in the world than us being forced to sell due to his age. And I'm in no way advocating that we should sell them, just getting personally ready for it when PSR and FFP are still a thing.

Why would Howe say we want to get rid of a player unless it's a Fraser style freezeout situation?

The first few pages of this thread are juicy.

Ooh, this is a new one.

Not a huge fan of the Adidas kit last season, just looked like Spain. Usually they are the lushest kits around though.

IMO Barnes was an opportunistic signing but there's some history being re-written here. Gordon hadn't nailed down that LW spot when we signed Barnes and one reason we went for a pure LW was that Gordon was seen as a LW/RW/SS. After few games into the season Gordon had been so good at LW that moving him to get Barnes in to the lineup didn't make sense anymore and the void at RW started to look worse. Didn't help that Barnes wasn't fit during the autumn/winter injury crisis when we had so few players available that we probably would've needed to move Gordon to RW for some games in any case. In hindsight it's easy to say to that Barnes was unnecessary signing and the funds should've been used for a RW but it wasn't that clear when he was signed. In other universe Gordon was injured for most of the season and Barnes carried us at LW, there's always some luck and chance at play and criticizing decisions afterwards is never hard.