KaKa

2 minutes ago, Alberto2005 said:

People need to chill, he's a great talent but he's been here 5 years now and never had one consistent season. I'm honestly more bothered about his injuries, that is only going to get worse IMO and we can't afford for our key players to be injured for so long.

 

Is Barnes better? Not really but he'll be fit more often and I've no doubt he'll suit Howe's style of play.

 

Most importantly, we can now go and get 2/3 more players before the end of the window.

 

If we sign Tonali, Barnes + 2 more and lose ASM in the process I'd say our squad is a lot stronger.

 

 

 

Yeah, the fitness problems are the real issue for me. We cannot continue to carry a player whose availability is so unreliable. The squad is nowhere near good enough for that.

As for Barnes not being better, I don't know about all that. Stylistically not as exciting, but he is rapid and direct, and he will rack up the goals and assists, and there is still room there for even more growth coming into a better team. Think he's being underated on here.

6 minutes ago, nufc123 said:

Thats my sticking point with him. Its always chaotic and frantic. His finishes is quite poor really.

Yeah, never had the curled finish with the instep. Always thrashes at the ball when he goes to shoot.

The ASM complaints are truly perplexing.

He's a wonderful talent that I believe would have grown under Howe and adapted to his style as we were seeing signs of it already.

However, the man's body seemingly can't handle the intensity and for the most part he is either injured or not quite up to speed form wise because he can't get a run of games together.

On top of that there has been talk of him wanting a new contract, and although his ability probably warrants it, his availability and consistency does not.

This is a very straight forward and simple decision to allow him to move on and get better wages while we get some money in and improve our FFP situation.

Just not fit often enough and I don't see that changing.

Due to that he's a luxury we can't afford to just keep around for when he's available as the squad needs more people as it is, especially considering what we could potentially get for him and the impact it would have on our ability to get more players in.

Wouldn't be surprised if something has been lost in translation somewhere and it's actually some Saudi club trying to sign Kvaratskhelia.

3 minutes ago, Whitley mag said:

Sounds like Titus Bramble for 85 minutes until he had a meltdown moment.

Bramble was immense outside of those terrible meltdown moments, so not a bad comparison if he doesn't have those same errors in him.

13 minutes ago, Toon88 said:

That’s what YouTube videos are designed to do. They don’t show the bad bits. 

Yeah, I think we all know that by now. There's levels though, and his good bits look very very impressive. Be interesting to see where he ends up and how he gets on.

2 hours ago, Matt1892 said:

Worth a watch.

Man ... he looks incredibly impressive in these clips. Freakishly athletic, tough uncompromising defending and really comfortable on the ball.

54 minutes ago, AyeDubbleYoo said:

Perfect time is an interesting concept though. Aye, he’s 32 but he’s also probably playing the best football of his career.

 

Obvs it doesn’t matter to City since they’ll just buy another world class player whatever. 

The fact he's still playing so well is why it's good timing, because I imagine they'd get a decent fee for him still, which is great for their FFP. Another year or two and his value plummets.

Move him now and they can then just go and get a younger prospect that will be with them more long term.

2 hours ago, Lish007 said:

Surprised at that.. fooking hell. Mahrez is pretty much in his prime. It just feels like such a waste.

 

There again I suppose if the Saudi league eventually becomes competitive with good players, it'll be the new PL. 

Mahrez is 32 years old.

It's perfect timing by Man City to let him go now.

I love ASM but he's not going to be available consistently, playing in the current high intensity setup, and he is not going to get the new contract with us that he wants because of it.

He's a very entertaining player and has quite a high profile because of it and so we will probably get £50 million from him from a Saudi club. 

It's a no brainer sale in my opinion.

I kind of want the Saudi move for Maxi.

I think it's more suited to the kind of showman player he is, and earnings wise it will be a massive opportunity for him, because he has never really earned big money.

Ben Arfa should be trying to get a deal over there and all.

2 hours ago, brummie said:

Anyone seen that Arsenal fan tv Rice Rice Baby video?

 

So cringey it made my testicles retract so far into my body, one popped out of each nostril. 

I loved it.

Love the fact they can still have so much fun and not take themselves too seriously despite the constant criticism of them for simply being over enthusiastic football fans like we all are.

1 hour ago, Likelylad said:

I've just heard someone say on TS that Henderson could be an agent for change by going to Saudi. 

Now the others have their heads in the Saudi trough. The whole conversations changes. 

Finding this whole thing so pitiful man.

Fans all now celebrating Saudi clubs buying their past it players so they can go and buy new ones.

As always suspected, everyone's so called morals are all empty gestures.

Where are the protests against accepting these bids and dealing with Saudi clubs? Or the protests against their former players accepting offers to play in Saudi?

So humiliating man.

6 minutes ago, Pata said:

”They can offer a very high salary…” 

 

Do some fucking research, it’s your job ffs.

 

 

 

It's not completely incorrect.

AC Milan's top players aren't on massive salaries. 

Tolani got a wage hike joining us and Hernandez is on around £85,000 a week, which we could increase a fair bit if we make him one of the top earners , which he would be.

38 minutes ago, The Prophet said:

 

Aye, but I already spend way too much leisure time catching up with the Bundesliga and Serie A

 

Maybe I'll drop one for Ligue 1.

I hear you man. I'm right there with you 

I usually just pick based on whose playing. BTs coverage of the Portuguese league is decent and all.

1 hour ago, The Prophet said:

Really need to start watching more Ligue 1 with the amount of players we target from over there.

They show at least 4 games every weekend on BT sport, so very easy to follow.

1 hour ago, StevenSeagull said:

Brighton fan here. 

 

A huge part of that U21 success is down to the work Dan Ashworth did when he was at the FA. I don't know if you think he's making a difference right now at your club but it'll be crystal clear in 5 to 10 years and for a long time after he's left.  He's the best at what he does. There's not a sporting director at any club, anywhere in the world that comes close.  I'm so glad that we had him at Brighton even for a short time. 

Great name by the way 

33 minutes ago, mighty__mag said:

 

If you've watched it, the bit I don't like the most is the behind closed doors approach, with our Arbitration we all tuned in, it was transparent,  with City's appeal it was a court behind closed doors? Absolute shite.

Yeah, I watched it. 

It's absolutely disgraceful, honestly. 

All their achievements have been built on the back of this nonsense.

Either everyone sticks to the rules or just remove them altogether. It's all so impossibly dumb.

1 hour ago, mighty__mag said:

 

 

Interesting, I hope we don't go down this route.

This is honestly so pathetic.

I don't understand what satisfaction is gained by 'winning' this way.

Really hope they figure out a way to properly put a stop to all of this.

1 minute ago, Matt1892 said:

Here is a good video of how the team set up, they play such a fluid system that it was really difficult to stop.

 

 

Fantastic. Will check this out. Cheers 

8 minutes ago, The Prophet said:

I wonder if we signed him after this tournament if a few would feel differently about his fee?

I imagine we wouldn't even be able to get him for the fee we did in January.

3 minutes ago, Zero said:

 

He is everywhere the whole tournament.    As crazy as it sounds he was the core player for the team, among the likes of ESR, Palmer, Gibbs-White etc. he deserves the award

Man, that is really good to hear. Very promising indeed.

Great achievement.

Only followed this tournament from a bit later on.

Did he play as a striker all tournament? Really liked what I saw of him there, dropping in to link up play and then getting into goal scoring positions.

Maybe a longer term rotational piece with Isak at striker perhaps?

3 minutes ago, gbandit said:

As it stands, in terms of creativity we have ASM who is an outstanding dribbler if not an outstanding passer / chance creator. We have Bruno who is an elite passer, especially along the ground with through balls. Trippier and Tonali are both excellent at crossing and lofted balls. I’d say if we were to lose ASM then we’d be sorely a dribbler in the side. Willock is an amazing ball carrier but not dribbler. Gordon isn’t a dribbler so we do need either ASM or someone with that quality as we can’t just rely on Isak to do it as we need him scoring goals 

I really wish we would play ASM on the right as he is just as devastating on that side, and his career numbers show he is actually more productive there.

I think it is probably because on the left he looks to cut in and shoot more and his shooting is quite erratic. Playing him on the right forces him to be more of a creator as he looks to cross the ball more on his stronger right foot, and his crossing is pretty decent from that position.

The only issue is that we can't really play him on the right with Trippier, as Trippier needs more protection from the wide man ahead of him, but maybe in such scenarios we can play Joelinton as the right sided 8 and have him cover Trippier instead.