The College Dropout

If we are to be successful Coloccini needs to performing close to his best, at least 80% of the time. He's been poor all seasno and has gotten an easy ride. He's a big player and he needs big performances. If Krul, Colo, Cabaye & Cisse have excellent games - we win imo. So I demand a lot from them. Colo + Cisse in particular have been poor and it's not anyone else's fault largely. The freekick was legitimate poor defending, within excellent range of a freekick. The poor challenge/late reaction was exactly that. Can't afford your star CB to be so cheap/weak/slow.

For as much as Tiote is wrongfully booked/sent off due to reputation, YoCabs gets away with murder. Nothing malicious but that tackle near the end.....

Glen Johnson is excellent tbh.

That penalty at Euro 2000 though.

Doesn't seem much like a wide man to me.

2 CB's is very ambitious. Taylor, Mbiwa are considered first team, so we'll only be able to bring in another first-teamer there. Probably able to play left-back too ala Bassong. Leffe - why doesn't AVB start Benoit-Ekotto?

He didn't have a large part to play in both goals conceded on Saturday? He's been unsettled and hasn't been performing defensively for large parts of the season.

He's faster than Both Willo & Colo and has played a good period of his career at fullback and was rarely caught for pace. Don't think Simmo is any faster either. Agreed with lack of agility on the turn. Willo & Colo also suffer from that. Colo tends to get too tight and thus turned too easily where as with Taylor his reading of the game lets him down and he's half a moment behind play too often. Willo's lanky so obviously he can't turn fast.

Directly at fault for both goals on the weekend. Being powder puff against Stoke and getting beat in the air by Rodallega stick out in my mind as well as a stupid red card.

Think we should treat Taylor like Wenger did RVP. Would love he and Mapou to get some game time together but the lad can't play 3 games in a week.

Marv will be cover for wide and AM IMO and we won't add someone in that category unless they're young and very cheap like that lad we where after. It's not particularly needed. A striker, yes, I hope so. Very much needed. I hope they don't think Gouff is enough but knowing them it;s likely. Really do need another CB as Tayls injury record is horrible.

Colo's been poor defensively this season. As bad as Williamson imo, just been excellent on the ball. Can attribute at least 5-6 goals conceded to some bad defending on Colo's part really.

First start in months tbf. Benteke's also a beast. For a CB, Taylor's pretty quick. Real pace gives any defender problems but Colo is especially slow. Ba's no slouch but the way he tore into Colo for his injury chance was a bit scary like.

IMO a first team striker and CB would be great.

exactly. With this squad i'd settle for top 8 and a big push for cups. If not that, closer to the top 6.

They've had pretty much the same squad and manager for 5 years. 3 additions plus a Colo replacement is 4 first-team players. That's a lot of improvement to be made. They're also 6 points off 4th without ever really playing badly or going on a run of bad results.

This.

On paper that's great but let's take a closer look. The CB's - One is unproven in this division and will probably need time to adapt like other French CB's in the division. The other has been poor this season largely and is unlikely to be here next season. Both fullbacks questionable defensively. 1 needs time to adjust to the league, the other needs development time. Will they both have caught up to the pace/positioning defensively by the start of next season? Midfield does look strong. We may even be able to loan out Bigi. If Cisse has another season somewhat similar to this we have a MAJOR problem. There's not much off the bench in terms of goals either.

What makes you say so? most think with 2-3 quality editions we can finish top 6 and on paper i don't see a reason to disagree. We definitely shouldn't be below top 8 on paper, no way in hell the likes of West Brom and Swansea are better. We finished 5th last season and since then we have added Sissoko, Mbiwa, Debuchy, Gouffran, Anita and a few more fringe players. This season has been awful for many different reasons but we still have quality players in most positions. People are saying CL places a lot. I'm not so sure. Defensively, 3 out of our 4 defenders have questions over their ability to defend well in this division. It might take another year for them to adapt. The other defender is Saylor, so we need another CB to replace Colo who will also need time to adapt. Up front I don't know where the goals will come from if Cisse has another quiet season. Last year between him, Ba, Best and Shola they got 36 league goals. He and Ba alone got 30, another 4 from Best. We are also more reliant on a good injury record and form than everyone in the top 8 except the L'pool teams. Spurs have done well without Adebayor and Defoe as well as Sandro for large parts of the season. Without Cisse, Gouff, Tiote we would lose to any first choice Spurs side imo. Colo & Cisse have been poor all season and we need them or their equivalent to be on form 90% of the time to challenge top 6.

Think many over-rate our squad.

Think our squad is over-rated.

Aye, one that's not scoring. A different type of striker would be an all-rounder or maybe a playmaker forward. Cisse's a goalscorer.

I think he's can be a quality player but this season he's been shit. And it's mostly his own fault. Not scoring. Not really benefiting the team.

"The lack of service" stuff is annoying. Ba managed to score goals with this lot.

Without a striker/player or two scoring 15+ the top half 8/9 is the highest we could hope for. Last year we got 30 from Ba & Cisse with another 4 odd from Best.