Taylor Swift

So is it £12m or £20m?

We're signing both, man. Get with the program.

As opposed to Man U yesterday you mean? One game doesn't really make a good case for rebuttal. Before the away goals rule was introduced, teams did regularly go away and shut-up shop because obviously there's more of an advantage playing at home. The away goals rule was designed specifically to encourage away teams to at least try to score a goal, and from what I've seen, it does work (i.e. away teams do look to score). Unless you have some statistical evidence (which would be interesting if someone was that bored) that says otherwise, I think it's going to stay.

Worst team of the season will just be the Derby team. A more interesting team would be the 'underachieving' team. A few of our players will surely get a look in but even bigger players (like Ashley Cole) might be worthy of a place.

Almost spot on, but there is absolutely no way you can have Essien over Gerrard. Why? It's clear to most people that Gerrard and Torres has been the most formidable partnership in the Premiership this season, think about it, which two players have had a better link-up this season? Gerrard has scored 11 goals in the league this season and has directly created another 11 goals, aside from being instrumental in pretty much everything Liverpool do. He is the backbone of the whole club, and in my opinion has proved himself to be the best centre midfielder in the world this season. Essien on the other hand has scored 3 goals, and has 6 assists. He hasn't even been a first team player for a lot of the season and missed 5 games whilst he was in Africa alone. Essien does not do for Chelsea what Gerrard does for Liverpool and has certainly not been better than him this season. I think Essien is a big part of the reason why Chelsea are only 3 points away from one of the best footballing teams in Europe.

James Sagna Vidic Ferdinand Evra Ronaldo Essien Fabregas Young Adebayor Torres Subs: Friedel, Carvalho, Hleb, Rooney, Anderson, Santa Cruz and Barry That's mine after 5 minutes thinking about it so it's subject to change. What's yours? PS. I was tempted to put Beye in but Sagna's just been better throughout the season imo.

It was good to see Ronaldo showing up when it matters Who would have thought that after the first leg, the tie that was the most entertaining would be the Liverpool - Chelsea one? Honestly, what were the odds of that? Barca taught Man Utd a lesson today in possession football. As good as Man Utd are, when was the last time they only had 35% of the possession in any single game? When was the last time their midfield was penetrated so often and effortlessly? Tbf, even though it ended 0-0 and Barca didn't capitalise on all the possession, I thought they were only always about one pass away from scoring a goal and I expect them to score at OT considering that Man Utd will have to come at them.

van der Sar Hargreaves Brown Druggie Evra Carrick Park Scholes Ronaldo Tevez Rooney

Valdes Zambrotta Marquez Milito Abidal Xavi Iniesta Deco Messi Eto'o Probably my guess.

I think Bellamy would do an excellent job in Owen's current role

Scholes dropped? Thanks, Fergie, you're the man!

Will the top players want to come though? I see us spending about £35m (net £30m) purely because some of the top players will not want to come (yet). If we have a good next season (top 8 say) then I can see another £35m being spent next summer and us probably pushing on for a champions league place. Best case scenario anyway.

It's awfully frustrating at times when Martins has the ball and insists of slowly jogging with it. If KK can instill some ruthlessness and force him to take on more defenders, I think we'd have a cracking player on our hands. He already works hard and has an eye for goal. Just needs to be quicker in possession (whether laying off or dribbling) and we'll have an even finer player.

That's true. New regime, new style? Edit: reminds me of the sudden news of us having signed Viana. I do hope this secrecy thing becomes a standard way of doing business.

I don't even think we need a striker with good technique like Viduka if we're looking to replace him. We should be looking for someone with more mobility and pace because at least he'd offer us more of an outlet (since Martins is our only one atm) and when we counter-attack, we'll have an extra man to help (since Viduka's almost always too slow to get into the box). If we're sticking with this formation, he doesn't even need to be the most lethal of finishers because we're creating plenty of chances as it is and I expect the new midfield to contribute more in terms of goals.

Has anyone here seen him often enough to comment? Seen him twice in the Euro quals and looked like he could control the ball and pass it. I guess £20m sounds about right.

Would like us to sign either a younger fb than Enrique to back him up, or an older experienced in the Prem player who's willing to rotate with Enrique. I'd hate for us to sign some world-class LB. I know that sounds daft but wait for my reasoning before jumping all over my back. There's no need for a world-class LB because the marginal benefit of doing so on the pitch wouldn't be that much (because Enrique is good) but the fee that this new LB would command would obviously be huge. Thus, it'd be better off spending the bulk of our budget on players who play in impact positions (CB, CM and CF) because we're not really strong in those positions. Even though the fee would be massive, it'd be justified by the marginal benefit of having these new players in these impact positions on the pitch.

Do they usually play 4-4-2? Who's up front? Ashton and Sears?

No shit. I am making a judgment on his signing. My judgment is we threw away a lot of money and he hasn't been worth the £16m we paid for him. I am also of the opinion that his finishing isn't 'world-class' and that he's no longer deserving of the 'world-class' label that so many seem quite happy to refer to him as. Comprende? In retrospect yes but not at the time. Huge and significant difference in evaluating the 'decision' to buy him, rather than the evaluation of the purchase in hindsight. I hate going over covered ground already (especially since other people have done so) but we overpaid for him if you consider how desperate he was to leave, how Real were willing to let him leave, his performances in the 2 or so seasons prior to that summer and the other teams in direct competition with us for his signing. This isn't hindsight - at least the judgment on his fee isn't. I was excited to have him in the team but we overpaid. Either you're getting really confused, or I am. You claimed that we wouldn't have been in the situation where Owen needed to score at Birmingham if we hadn't signed him. Now you're saying it's simply about the fee? Did spending £16m on Owen stop us signing other players in the future? I personally don't think so. We should have paid the £11m for Anelka, but not instead of signing Owen, but as well as. Between the breaks I've taken to get some reading done, I think I'm really confused But, anyway, I disagree with that last statement. If we had signed Anelka, I think Luque would have proved to be more effective because Souness wanted to play 4-3-3. The real waste is the £10m that was spent on Luque.

I think it's clear you're not a fan of Owen. Still, looking forward to the West Ham match? Actually, I like Owen a lot but I hate to see people exaggerating how good he is because they then underestimate how further we have to go and thus, expectations climb too quickly. I'd rather see Owen being labeled a 'pretty good' striker so that when he misses chances, no one will jump on his back. In a round-about way, I'm just pre-emptively defending him Back to the WH match. Any news on Zoggy and Milner? I hope they both get a place on the bench this time.

No shit. I am making a judgment on his signing. My judgment is we threw away a lot of money and he hasn't been worth the £16m we paid for him. I am also of the opinion that his finishing isn't 'world-class' and that he's no longer deserving of the 'world-class' label that so many seem quite happy to refer to him as. Comprende? In retrospect yes but not at the time. Huge and significant difference in evaluating the 'decision' to buy him, rather than the evaluation of the purchase in hindsight. I hate going over covered ground already (especially since other people have done so) but we overpaid for him if you consider how desperate he was to leave, how Real were willing to let him leave, his performances in the 2 or so seasons prior to that summer and the other teams in direct competition with us for his signing. This isn't hindsight - at least the judgment on his fee isn't. I was excited to have him in the team but we overpaid.

How many fucking sitters will Owen have to miss this season before people realize that he isn't a world-class finisher anymore? The difference between Torres and a pure 'finisher' like RvN, like Baggio has said, is that Torres is a world-class striker who's all-round game makes him world class. To be a world-class finisher, you simply have to finish the easy chances consistently (which Torres doesn't do enough of). This distinction also applies to Owen in that even though he gets brownie points for being in the right position, if he doesn't finish the chances off consistently, he isn't a world-class finisher. It ain't rocket-science man. Just semantics.

What the fuck? No shit. I am making a judgment on his signing. My judgment is we threw away a lot of money and he hasn't been worth the £16m we paid for him. I am also of the opinion that his finishing isn't 'world-class' and that he's no longer deserving of the 'world-class' label that so many seem quite happy to refer to him as. Comprende?

How much money have we lost because he's not been on the pitch though? How much more revenue could we have accumulated over the past 3 years if we instead spent £5m less on someone like Anelka? Anelka had every chance of picking up exactly the same injuries as Owen. Owen's injuries had nothing to do with his past niggles. Where have I said his injuries had something to do with his past niggles? I'm in agreement as well that Owen's goal against Birmingham started the turnaround but you also have to consider the fact that we would probably not have been in that position in the first place if we signed someone else other than Owen. I'm making the point that signing Anelka instead of Owen wasn't a guaranteed way of more success. It's all about "ifs" and "buts". EDIT: Your last line is nonsense by the way. I could quite easily say that we wouldn't have been in that position if we'd signed Cristiano Ronaldo, but we didn't. The Ronaldo thing is bs. The Anelka thing is relevant because he was there for the taking (and was apparently wanted by our manager as well). That's why I've mentioned him and not picked some random bugger. Of course it's all ifs and buts but my point is that the Owen signing hasn't turned out well.

How much money have we lost because he's not been on the pitch though? How much more revenue could we have accumulated over the past 3 years if we instead spent £5m less on someone like Anelka? I'm looking at the facts, not the counter-factual I think his injuries are irrelevant in analysing the decision-making too. Alright then. Fact - Owen has played in 40 out of a possible 106 (35+38+34 so far) league games that he could have played for us. That's 38%.