TRon

He can hit the ball well, he has the power, we've seen that from previous goals. We also know he can jink his way into really dangerous areas of the pitch. It's just lack of awareness or judgement once he gets there which stops him from having far more impact. The extra touch, or the extra check back to fool his opponent quite often just give other defenders time to surround him and cut off the avenues to get the shot or pass off.

This. Because Spurs, Liverpool and the other big hitters have massively superior squads, built over a long period with substantial investment which we couldn't touch. Brighton have just been very well managed, and in fact probably had less resources than us, but have over-performed massively. They should be far easier to overhaul considering they have had to sell players and lost their manager this season.

My expectations at best were to finish 7th and I would have been delighted by that. But that was because I assumed we couldn't finish above the big six ( and in reality probably still won't) but considering Brighton have lost a couple of key players, and their manager, I would be disappointed if they still manage to overhaul us. Not massively, because you are right, they did have a head start, but still I would be disappointed. Just a tad.

It might not have any material impact, but psychologically it would detract from our achievements this season. Instead of people admiring how much progress we'd made, there'd be more comments along the lines of, well they let Brighton overtake them after being in a CL position for a good stretch of the season. I think the players want to be looking up at big six rivals, not down at smaller clubs still achieving more.

I agree with Kanji tbh, it would be even more deflating if the Big Six's domination was broken by a club like Brighton. It would only emphasise that we had this in our grasp and blew it.

What happened to him at Fulham do you think? He had a decent set up there. I do actually agree that he's a level above Lampard and Gerrard, he always came across as a considerate coach for what that's worth. Beyond that I'm just going off him not really doing much at any of his clubs other than getting disenchanted after a season or so.

I doubt there's much calculation going on, probably just based on the hunch that Chelsea and Liverpool are well capable of going on that sort of run.

That's because this looks like the easiest fixture we have out of the next batch of games coming up, as I'm sure we have a run of away games coming up. You cn never guarantee a win in this league, but we simply have to win this one if we want to stay in the mix for top 4.

Gah.

Pass on our thanks to your manager anyway, means less chance of Isak picking up an injury on international duty.

Yeah, unfortunately they've built enough of a profile over the last 10 years so even if they are having a bad season, they will still appeal to a lot of foreign players, especially being based in London. Plus they just seem to be able to throw endless pots of money at players and keep them on board until their reputations have dived so much no one wants them any more. I suppose playing CL football helps, they can sustain a massive squad where clubs like us can only dream of it (for now).

I always thought Gullitt just had a totally different way of seeing football from the rest of us, have to remember he was part of a great Milan team which played fantastic football, and he was part of a pretty good Holland side as well. There was all the talk about sexy football at Chelsea, and when he tried to bring that here, we just didn't have those type of players. He didn't rate Shearer despite his fantastic record of goals, but he would probably have loved someone like Isak with his pace and movement. Shearer was more the old fashioned striker who relied more on power and finishing.

Targett was good enough at £15m and for a team still in transition, but since we've progressed a lot quicker than we expected this season, not sure he's still going to be considered good enough going forward. He's a great defender, but we might be looking to bring in someone who can offer more going forward for next season.

Honestly speaking, I would rather have either of those two over Watkins. Even without the goals they bring more box to box.

You must be watching a different footballer to me if you think Joelinton is a defensive footballer. He's actually more of a forward driving player whose been reinvented as a midfield enforcer type, even then his attacking instincts still show through. He's just not very good at actually producing much at the end of it, but he's still got good feet for a big man, and he causes teams plenty of problems in a different way than Willock.

He was getting plenty of stick on here too, that's why it's been a pleasant surprise that he's getting some credit after Sunday. I think people are starting to look beyond his facial expressions and the goals he's not getting this time round.

They'd be mad not to accept £100m for Watkins like. I'm sure he does lots of great running, but for a striker he doesn't look like much of a finisher.

If no CL club comes in for him, then I think he'll be coming here.

Yep. Two totally different players, bringing different qualities. Willock is more skilful, but Joelinton plays more of an enforcer role, he's in there biting at the opposition and roughing them up a bit while he's at it. He's pretty good at keeping the ball as well in the middle of a scrum. I think it will take a really good player to replace Joelinton right now, and it would have to be one with a similar style breaking up the opposition. They can both play anyway, they were doing it pretty successfully earlier on in the season.

Looked like Trips was just making sure regardless of any call by wellying it clear, but he slipped while doing it.

Tbh before yesterday I wasn't convinced he could.

Good to see sense prevailed and Gary didn't have to back down. The backing of his fellow presenters made a huge difference, nice to see them make a stand on principle.

£20m looks like a steal now. Even if he doesn't develop into the top echelon player, we are going to have no problem getting our money back twice over. Not that I'd want to sell him like, the goals are still in there somewhere, maybe now he's more of a box to box midfielder he's not getting in the box like he was in his loan spell.

Fuck off.