KaKa

Hell of header from Mitro. Wish he hadn’t been so incompatible with Rafa, would have him back in an instant.

Mitro is the man. Had a fair few on here calling him shite though.

We never had any pace out wide or decent delivery into the box during his time here and so it just didn't work.

It's a big shame because he's a great character and talisman.

Pretty confident both of these teams, as well as West Brom are going to give us problems.

Oh my God ... what a game man. Mitro with a monster header.

Good goal Fulham! Anguissa has been quality. Lovely ball from him.

This defending is criminal man

However, have to give Leeds credit ... they are playing some stuff.

Lovely ball through to Bamford, who again has shown some great movement. Good goal. This Fulham defence is bad though. Yikes.

Well just so you know you are going to be tortured by these kind of conundrums every single week. Enjoy

Ah, I see. Depends if you want to use any extra to try and update other parts of your team I guess.

I ran away from everything Tottenham after last week. Not sure Mourinho ball will produce enough attacking stats for how much their players cost.

I brought in James for Dele. James is a great price too.

Both teams have dodgy defences, but I'm really impressed by their build up play. Like both midfields.

What a strike Helder Costa. Goal Leeds.

Yes, because he hasn't done any of those things at all since he joined. Of course

Obviously delighted with the start to the season - I can't not be - but it'll be easy to forget we were absolute shite for 30 minutes today which isn't great against a newly promoted team at home.

 

James makes such a fucking massive difference, completely glues the attack together. Allan was great again too. Doucoure was rats. DCL starting to look a proper striker.

 

Point is though these are the sort of home games we made a total mess of and scrambled a 1-1 draw last year. Plus these are really early days, a lot of players getting used to playing with each other still.

Your biggest issue right now is Yerry Mina. That guy is a very bad defender.

I think the early struggles today had to do with the 3-4-2-1 setup West Brom had, as it made it difficult for your lot to find those spaces between the lines initially, when West Brom dropped back.

West Brom are pretty decent, I've watched both their games and they are going to be a nasty surprise for the more run of the mill teams, if they just stick with things.

Starting the season with Leicester, Everton and Chelsea is very unfortunate for them.

Good post, and I agree. Think he has to be found another club pronto, because under Bruce it's looking like things are going to get only worse for him.

He's just going to get put upfront alone in weakened teams in the cup games, and that is not going to do anything to improve his situation at all.

Your statement regarding Rafa saying he wasn't worth £20 million is wrong by the way. Rafa thought a fee of £20 million was his value rather than £40 million.

Ashley revealed: ‘We delivered Rafa’s number one target in January, Miguel Almiron, but Hoffenheim wouldn’t sell Joelinton. Then in February they said we could get him early, but it would cost £40m. He was a name we had discussed with Rafa, and our recruitment people had him top of their list. I thought it was one of those that would keep drifting away, but no, we had it done.

 

‘I was so excited to tell Rafa we’ve got another one coming, but when Lee Charnley, our managing director, had the conversation, his view was that he didn’t want to commit to the transfer until he knew what his position was with the club next season. And I didn’t get that. Is this the bloke who had given it to me for the last 12 months?

 

‘Proper given me bucketfuls – which I may or may not deserve, but I don’t deserve it on this one, because I’ve done it. I’ve got his first choice, Almiron, and this other player who was so exciting we thought he’d be out of our range. When we first sat down with Rafa, we didn’t think we would pay this much for a player. We’d never done that before.

 

‘From there, the relationship deteriorated very quickly. I was personally very disappointed, and that’s putting it politely. I was freaked out. I’m thinking, “I clearly don’t understand anything about football” because I’m all for celebrating and going mad and suddenly it’s, “No – you’ve got to sort my deal out first.” So we had another few weeks of correspondence and then it wasn’t just his deal, it was that he thought the £40m for Joelinton wasn’t worth it. It’s too much and the club shouldn’t spend it.

 

‘And very occasionally, I get to be me in this world. So here’s the deal. I’ll pay £20m of it personally. Nothing to do with the club. Above and beyond the budget. Rafa valued him at £20m. So that’s what would come out of the club budget. The rest, £23m – I’ll pay. And he still didn’t sign it off. Looking back, I think he knew for a long time he was going to China because it was like we couldn’t do anything. Joelinton was the test.

 

‘Why on earth would you not want that? As a football manager, with all the things you have said, why wouldn’t you want Joelinton? It wasn’t even as if it was him or Salomon Rondon. And we told him that. We just wanted Joelinton secured.’

DLC seems to have developed a bit of a poacher's instinct. Wonder if he can get to 20 PL goals with Rodriguez and Richarlison feeding him

There are so many avenues of quality service in that team now, and he's got such great size and athleticism and constantly improving instincts like you say.

He's going to have a very good season if that team stays relatively healthy.

Just send WBA back down now. Pointless club, offer nowt.

You clearly didn't watch the game.

Make sure you tune in when they face us. Might be some humble pie being served then.

Another filthy ball in from James.

Yerry Mina not jumping and closing his eyes in fear on that free kick is so ridiculous man

The state of Pickford man

Good move in my opinion.

I would change that red card rule personally, sending off a player for that little push is way too soft.

 

You mean too harsh? If so, I entirely disagree. Players should keep there hands to themselves.

 

James has done the South American double there, a goal and then winding someone up so that they get sent off. Just needs to dive for a pen for the hat trick.

Gibbs is pathetic. It was hardly a wind up even. Just a slight bump after his attempted tackle.

At the most just push him away. Why he's put his hands to his face I'll never know.

I would change that red card rule personally, sending off a player for that little push is way too soft.

It's because he pushed his face I presume. Was such an idiotic thing to do man. Feel bad for Bilic and West Brom. They were playing well.

Added him this week too. Didn't captain him though.

Gets into some really good positions to unleash that left peg coming off that right side.

Hate to see it but Everton have a really nice playing style this season. I’d love us to be so comfortable on the ball.

We should probably aim to match West Brom first