HawK

Toney not being in the top 10 strikers in the league is a mad take, he's quality. What he's done since leaving us has been remarkable, I think some here might have a chip on their shoulder because he didn't make it with us for whatever reason.

Would take him over Wilson in a heartbeat. 

Not seen a striker with so much presence and authority on the pitch since Drogba.

8 minutes ago, brummie said:

 

That's a bit harsh.

 

Although I just watched his post match interview and he looked edgy as fuck.

 

He looked like i do when my Mrs looks over my shoulder at my internet banking and notices something I'd rather she didn't see.

 

Yeahbutnobutit'slikenothingit'ssortofyeahbutyeah *wobble*

Just now, Beth said:

They both are most effective on the left. Getting a top class RW in the summer would be ideal as we could rotate them as necessary and keep Almiron as back up. Sell Murphy to a championship play off standard team whilst he still has some value.

Yeah I don't disagree, but we've got 9 or so games left to go this season

I'm not sure about Gordon through the middle to be honest. I do want to see him right wing with Barnes on the left, though.

8 minutes ago, Matt1892 said:

I don’t need to clarify it as we have all seen the footage, you come across as taking this to heart in your response like it is some sort of attack.

 

I can’t think of any penalties off the top of my head but if one of our players was through on goal and was about to kick the ball, then a defender put his foot in the way to stop me having a clear strike of the ball and instead kicked his leg, then I would be arguing for the penalty to us, rather than a foul the other way.

Gordon took possession of the ball just as defenders take possession shepherding the ball out for a goal kick without touching it, it's clear cut imo. 

7 minutes ago, Nucasol said:

Loved Sir Les but what Andy Cole did was exceptional. I’d have both of them above Isak for now.

Amazing goalscorer, can't disagree. Let's see what Isak becomes in the next couple of years.

1 minute ago, gbandit said:

Fair enough. I think Isak’s ability exceeds Ferdinand’s by a distance but Ferdinand was an incredibly good goalscorer. He was like a better, fitter version of Callum Wilson who was also better in the air. Isak offers the team more than just goals. If Isak’s here next season he’ll move past Ferdinand unless he has injuries that keep him out for large parts of the season 

Good points - I do rate Ferdinand in leading the line though, he was way more than just a poacher and he completely bullied defenders in a way that Wilson never has. He was a battering ram. I think if Isak had someone like Ferdinand to play off, we'd have one scary forward line. But it's a bit like comparing apples to oranges - up top you've got Shearer and Ferdinand in that line-leading role, then you have someone like Isak who should be drifting about more as others make space for him to exploit. Hard to compare him to another player, he's pretty unique.

Just now, gbandit said:

Who are you putting after Shearer and before Isak?

Ferdinand

Bruno is our best ever midfielder in the PL era whereas Isak is debatably our third best striker.

Bruno would start for any team in the world, Isak wouldn't.

That's not to say Isak can't become the player we all think he can be, but he's still a lot of potential right now wheras Bruno is pretty much the finished article.

Thought he looked class tonight

2 hours ago, 54 said:

That not the point is it? Lamine Yamal is playing a lot, but that doesn't mean that its the right thing for him, just look at Gavi who by the age of 19 has 111 games for Barcelona, and 27 games for Spain, with barely a summers break, and he's now got a serious long term injury, that by all accounts is due to being over played at a point he was still developing as a person. 

 

Or Pedri who played 133 times before 21, and now has had back to back muscle injuries. Or Ansu Fati, who got over played and who's development has been massively stunted and he's now been farmed out to Brighton. 

 

"Protecting a player" isn't about the here and now, its about protecting players who are still developing, and maturing, to ensure their career doesn't get hampered by injuries and he is able to reach his full potential. 

But with respect you're not talking about the 'point' either, maybe it's pedanticism on my part, but what I was saying is age alone isn't something you protect a player because of - it's age-related things. For every Pedri there's a Rooney, there's examples either way.

In this instance of not playing Miley and forcing Longstaff to play through injections though, I can't see how 'protecting' Miley is the right call here. 

Int it great that two people with a Joelinton avatar are taking opposing views on stuff on the internet. I love it

6 minutes ago, Yorkie said:

 

 

What does any of this prove? That we shouldn't bother to take care with a young prospect?

 

Daftest thing about this debate is that he's still featuring in every game. The difference in contributions between him and Longstaff are negligible anyway. 

It proves that age itself is irrelevant, if a player is ready, they're ready. I think you can make an argument for maturity, physical development, player's game not being rounded enough etc. (the further back you play from the front, generally the more experienced you need to be), but purely based on age alone you don't need to protect people.

Howe might have meant things like that behind protecting him over 'age', but I can only go one what he's actually said.

2023/2024 - Lewis Miley - 17 years old - 1701 minutes played

13 less appearances than Yamarl and 415 less minutes played.

11 players have played more minutes than Miley this season.

2023/2024 - Lamine Yarmal - 16 years old - 2136 minutes played

Edit - Only Gundogan has made more appearances this season in their whole squad.

He's fantastic at carrying the ball, we need him at left back overlapping Gordon with Trips back on the right when he's fit again. He gives so, so much to the team.

Bit of a learning moment from me that, I always jump to the lazy/disinterested/moody/unhappy/doesn't like the manager reasons for players who seem to be underperforming for periods.

Playing through injuries must be a lot more common that I would have thought from playing FM at least. On FM you always send them to a specialist rather than do injections, and just play the 16 year olds to keep everyone happy. But it's not your livelihood on the line and you can't save-scum IRL.

On 29/02/2024 at 08:49, SUPERTOON said:

 

1 hour ago, Newcastle Fan said:

Doubt its his ACL as he was able to play for a while after he got it. if it is an ACL we better plan the operation now to have him ready for next season.

Did my ACL and kept going for 45 mins after. What was initially just a feeling of soreness just got more and more sore.

58 minutes ago, RobsonsWonderland said:

Klopp did the same thing at Dortmund and Liverpool... with his ultra press, lung bursting playing style.

 

Both went off the rails when players were burnt out but he has managed to build a stronger squad that he can rotate or bring in quality youngsters.

 

We are not there yet with either the squad or the academy graduates

But going hand in hand with the high intensity press is an ability to keep the ball when it's won, we don't do that, we just don't have the quality. So the amount of out-of-possession running is multiplied by our lack of technical ability on the ball. Liverpool and Dortmund have and had much greater quality across their squad to retain the ball. 

2 hours ago, Joelinton7 said:

Injury is our identity 

Came here to say pretty much exactly the same thing.

Training with 100% intensity is fine if you're just playing 38 PL games and a domestic cup game here and there, and able to take a rest when other teams are playing in Europe. 

But with our CL commitments this season, I think many of us were quite rightly asking the question before the season started as to how Howe was going to approach this season as anyone could see training with and playing with 100% intensity every single time, with our full court press style, wasn't going to last. I'm not surprised at all with how bad it's been. Correlation does not mean causation, there's other factors as well of course, but playing nearly the same unchanged XI every game and not protecting players when given the opportunity is something I'm disappointed with Howe about. Using your full squad of players is basics at the high levels we're aiming for. There's definitely some aspects to squad management that Howe needs to go away and take stock of for next season.

There's a reason that the best teams in the country just don't simply out-run their opponents like we often did last season, because they can't do it every game with the schedules they have to keep. If we're going to mix it up with the big boys, we need a quality-focused approach rather than simply running teams off the park.

Agreed, it's not just one thing. He hasn't progressed as much as we thought he would. If anything he seems to have gone backwards.