TRon

Use him Eddie. He needs games and we need to use our squad.

It's turned out to be a great night tbh.

Quite staggering that it can happen at two levels. On the pitch and in the VAR box.

£50m or fuck off Palace.

Both look better technically than the rest of our team today.

Along with Willock which says a lot.

Was going to post at half time that Willock was our best player so far anyway

They are making our players look like 3rd division shite.

Up yours you cheating cunts!!

Don't worry about the poor first touch. You only need to get it right once....

I'm really looking forward to it, less tension as I think we are big underdogs. I do think we'll be undone by their superior quality and technique over the 90mins though. Think that would happen whatever side we put out.

We've got a weakened team with two first choice midfielders out. We need to win away against one of the top 3 teams in the world. Whichever side we put out, what have we got to lose?

Was thinking exactly this. A lot will depend on those two and maybe Ramsey breaking beyond Wolt for the layoffs.

Thought he might have gone 4-4-2 with Wolt and Wissa up front, but might have been risky so can understand why not.

The Ekitike deal second time round was hijacked by PSG, then this time round by Liverpool. He's not going to pick us over either of them. I do agree though that he never seemed that keen on us, he seemed to believe he was always destined for a super club. Pedro was all up for signing first time round, it was us who pulled out because Isak became available. Last summer Chelsea were in for him and again, he's always picking them over us. Most players will currently.

Those goals are similar to the ones he's scored here. He's a poacher and he will get plenty of tap ins. Pretty much the opposite of Woltemade, but that's no bad thing. Ideally you'd want someone with their qualities combined but those type of strikers are rare and already at the major world clubs so out of our reach.

Isn't that why we signed Ramsey though? CM we are pretty well covered at the moment, might change if Willock is sold this month I suppose.

None of it is easy, but I still think a player like Ekitke or Pedro will come here ahead of Brighton or Bournemouth if that's our competition. For the same reason those players chose Liverpool and Chelsea over us. The really top young talents will have enough self belief to fancy their chances of breaking into the side sooner rather than later. We are the next rung down after the cartel clubs.

Not sure if Howe is a fan of Cunha but we definitely wanted Mbuemo. Not much we can do if the Big Five clubs are in for the same players though. We can't match them for either wages or stature yet.

I agree, I said all through the summer window that we needed to be targeting players from a different pool where we weren't going to be gazumped by the cartel clubs. But the club wanted either PL proven, or really highly rated youngsters who were on everyone's radar. Truth is we can't compete with the big boys, we have to beat teams like Brighton and Bournemouth for the latent talent. Riskier as those players might not come off, but at least we would be in pole position in that market.

Some of those were way down our list on potential signings. We bought them because the Big 5 clubs were taking all our preferred targets and offering them terms we weren't in a position to do yet. I suppose the question then is, should we lower our standards and buy whoever is left. In hindsight it's easy to say no, but once we sold Isak and let Wilson go, we needed two strikers from somewhere.

Just more confirmation that we are doing things the right way even if progress is slow under PIF. That is how I have ultimately judged the ownership. Are we recruiting the best in class within the financial constraints imposed? In my opinion YES.

Think this is true. We were down to the bare bones when Miley got games two season back as a 17 year old, and he didn't feature much once Tonali was back in the side. I think all managers want experience in their side, that was the case for Amorin and Maresca I would imagine. Club priorities are sometimes different than managers, because managers are looking to immediate results, clubs are looking at long term financial health.

One clarification here: I absolutely hate it when a player gets the ball 35 yards out and the whole crowd shouts "SHOOOT!!" It's not that I want us to be taking hopeful potshots from anywhere and seeing 90% of them sailing 10ft over the bar. It's more that I'm not seeing that many of our players actually have much shooting quality from anywhere. I think that is highlighted by how few of them step up and want to take a free kick 25 yards out.

The two he scored against Liverpool on his debut were hardly worldies though. He was put through and he finished clinically one on one. I don't really recall him playing that much in his first season as he was alternating with Wilson so not really sure I would make a judgement that he wasn't there for the tap-ins. We just might not have seen him doing it early on because he was adapting to how we play.