The College Dropout

This made me chuckle. That's like my position with my ex-girlfriend.

I've given up any type of financial support. While he's here I barely care about the teams performance. Once Rafa leaves, I won't care at all.

Hope I jinx it but Sarri ball has been boring as owt. Stick a proper striker on. Get Kante at the base of the 3 and RLC to his right and let's have some goals pls.

£100M which will pay for itself in the next 15-20 years. It's already been 10. A lot of money just on facilities, not including wages of players and staff to run it over that time and so far little return for them (we've probably received more in that time down to Andy Carroll) . The amount they've spent is not needed to produce top players. It's a lottery and if you buy more tickets your chance is higher, but still no certainly you'll win. It's most certainly not a lottery. Look at Chelsea and the players that have come through their academy in recent years. Abraham Hudson-Odoi Loftus-Cheek Would fetch £60m in one go, easy.

Few of the PFM lot are useless managers entirely.

Wasnt that the same with Fulham and the Serb bloke? Fulham more willing to back a new man and backed the manager in the summer. Huddersfield haven't gone all out to stay up. Burnley - i feel like them and Bournemouth have actually spent a fair wedge just not on big names.

Ashley's business model is always low-cost. Get something that sells and markets itself like sports clothing and football. Strip it to its core by lowering costs everywhere as much as possible and job done. A value-added service that requires more than cost-cutting expertise and significant investment in expertise? Not in his wheelhouse. The most astute thing he's done as Owner here was identify undervalued youngish players in France but he didn't even go full out with that. Had he pulled his finger out we could've had Auba and Laca imo. It was still done on a low-cost basis. Was it Marseille that identified attacking players sold for way more than defenders. So they prioritised developing the best young attackers they could and it paid dividends. IMO Ashley would totally cut the academy and reserve team if he could. He may use more of his business acumen for NUFC if it wasn't primarily an advertising machine. BUt the way to make money in football isn't in his usual skillset

I'll say it again. Rafa-ball is very difficult for attackers, especially the wide players. Murphy doesn't have it to succeed under Rafa. Perhaps at another club and manager he could succeed in the PL but I wouldn't bank on it.

Was meant to have been superb in pre-season and is one of many talented Chelsea youth products. I hope parents stop taking their children to Chelsea's academy. They'll waste the lads potential and they'll keep you at the club for a long time. At least City seem to let the youngsters go.

Conte's a defensive manager although I felt they played decent football. Sarri ball seems to be more possession based. Kante's role requires more attacking and there wouldn't be a natural role for Matic for example. Requires more technical players. I thought that first Conte side with Matic and Costa was brilliant tbf. Did seem like all the Chelsea players didn't like Conte's style of football. I remember Cesc coming out and saying after a win, that more focus on passing was the key to their win. Selling Matic and Costa for inferior players must've been annoying too.

I believe him. It would be such a weird thing to do, especially given his company at the table.

CRonaldo Messi Shearer Fat Ronaldo Bergkamp Henry Kluivert Villa Eto'o Ronaldinho Luis Suarez Rivaldo Neymar What is this list?

Aye there's loads. Those were off the top of my head. I would consider Figo a midfielder more than a forward but.. could be I guess. The list is so good, it's less about who is better ability wise or stats wise and more about how important they were for successful sides.

Think Barca have had the best forwards over the last 20/25 years. Try ranking these guys. Messi Villa Henry Eto'o Ronaldinho Luis Suarez Kluivert Neymar Rivaldo Henry's a strong contender for the best player in PL history. I don't think he cracks the top 3 here. Although his pomp was in England.

I've been watching Ligue 1 which has been ok. Now it's NFL. Sunday Night La Liga was decent. NFL is not. This sport doesn't even look good. NBA can look good. This sport is ugly.

Where are people watching La Liga this season (UK)?

Look at the players he was forced to sell and you get some idea of what he is dealing with. Sissoko, Townsend and Wijnaldum. I know many of our fans were cock-a-hoop when we sold Sissoko and Wijnaldum, but they have done better out of it than us. I felt the same as most others when they were sold - we were getting an excellent price for them, but we knew the money would be pocketed by the FCB and not spent on other transfers. We got rid of some overrated mercenaries, and replaced them with dog-s*** no-marks. If the club was run to succeed rather than turn a profit, we could have built up the core of a very good squad for the money we got for Sissoko and Wijnaldum. Instead, we are left with by far the weakest squad since before KK took over, and it's painful. Clubs not even run well for a profit. It's run to promote SD.

Real back to the glory days of battling for 4th place I see.

don't want Puel gone. Ricardo's a cornerstone of my fpl team. Leicester keep it tight and ol Ricky chips in with a few goals and assists

£25 million man Quite a few on here wanted us to sign him. i did. he's been so poor.

Liverpool were strongly linked a few months ago. They need another goal scorer outside of Salah so it makes sense. Do they? doesn't seem like they struggle to score at all. If you can point to anything that they need ( it's minor because they are great team) better CB depth and probably need to bleed Fabinho and Keita into the team more as eventually you probably need to move on from Milner and Henderson as there's probably a ceiling there. But goalscoring? doesn't seem like an issue to me. 3 biggest weaknesses of Liverpool for me 1. Potential over reliance on VVD at the back. Been a longtime since i've seen them play without him 2. Over reliance on Salah. If Salah missed 10 games, they would drop points. Sturridge is fine off the bench but couldn't step in for any significant time imo. 3. Lack of guile in midfield. Think this will only be an issue in the CL and if Salah isn't playing.

Their key players have been for all season. Allison Virgil Salah At full strength or close 90% of the time. City have had injuries to their star striker. Star midfielder. Second best midfielder. And left back. Most of which for. Numbers of games. If Salah and Virgil missed as many games as Aguero and KDB they wouldn’t be close. I do think Liverpool are a better unit and less reliant on individuals. Think their second choice midfield would do better than Scott’s.

Interesting take on this thread mind... https://twitter.com/beaumontdmd/status/1080751866227625985?s=21 Topple Celtic for 1 or 2 years. Job done. Also they could actually win the SPL this season. So why not?

Bernardo and Fernandinho in particular. Bernardo ended up doing his pressing and Aguero's. Aguero may have just been tired but he looked injured. Barely moved at all come the end. KDB, Kompany and Aguero. Fragile bodies for key players. Where Van Dijk and Salah haven't had an injury in some time.

Not sure who else there was tbf to McClaren. Ultimately though we were in that mess and still in a mess because of one person and one person only. Thauvin first half of the season.