KaKa

Mentioned Trincao in the summer and was told he wasn't a Prem player because of his stint at Wolves on loan. I beg to differ.

Will never understand how this West Ham team beat us at home. Lopetegui is awful.

Don't want to see these Man City lot smiling and picking up any kind of confidence.

Probably played the better football on the whole, but so poor at key moments in the final third.

Too little too late now. Think if Leicester had drawn level, the crowd would have really got going and Man City would have been rattled.

Foden would have looked up, seen he couldn't shoot from there and then passed it backwards.

So annoying man. Leicester just not good enough taking their chances.

Bit harsh but really want Man City to stay behind us.

Vardy is a clown. Piss off man.

That was so poor from Vardy.

Been surprised at how good he's looked.

Winks gets so much shit, but he's a tidy footballer. Knitting together so much of their build up play.

Only just turned 22 this year too, but you know these type of wingers always get disparaged. Until they really hit the heights numbers wise, as was the case with Mbeumo. But hey ... at least our club didn't sell him for £15 million only to then replace him with a £90 million Antony

No, the 2019-20 season at Brescia was in Serie A. After he had got them promoted starting as an 18 year old in Series B the previous year.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2024/12/28/newcastle-value-alexander-isak-at-more-than-150m/

If anything Tonali playing at the base of midfield and initiating play appears to be a return to his roots. That's the role he played at Brescia. As both you and Ikon have said he is quite aggressive with his passing from that position though, and similarly I too prefer that, as we have speedy forward players that can exploit spaces when they get the ball quicker.

Tonali came through at Brescia playing at the base of midfield as the lone 6. https://breakingthelines.com/scouting-report/scouting-report-sandro-tonali/

Ironically PSR is now working in our favour regarding our best players. Clubs are not willing or able to put up the money it would take to sign them. Looking at other top teams in the league currently, we are also not a million miles away talent wise, when it comes to our first 11 at least. We just need to manage our PSR situation a bit better so we can pay our top players well going forward now, and really push for Europe and ideally the Champions League. If Mitchell can then add a right winger and centre back for good value and flesh out the squad a bit with some good prospects we are laughing.

Yeah, it's interesting. I agree on the quality of both Barnes and Bowen when striking the ball. However, I'm just not sure how good they'd be manipulating the tight spaces to get those off. It's the biggest issue when playing in those slower possession heavy sides that look to find gaps against low blocks.

Yup. Saka and Mahrez are top tier and are the sort that work best for Arteta and Pep. They are great in tight spaces and are precision finishers and passes/crossers. Sterling was also great at Man City due to his movement off the ball. I think it's quite difficult finding players that will perform in that setup. Salah and Palmer would. Not sure if Mbeumo and Bowen would though. Equally the guys struggling for them at the moment, Martinelli, Doku and Savio would likely look very good playing out wide at Newcastle.

The slow build up and progression forward that then allows for defences to settle into low blocks causes wingers that aren't top notch to really suffer. The likes of Martinelli, Doku and Savio are all struggling due to the attacking approach at Arsenal and Man City. Stick any of those in our side and they would all look very different. Even the likes of Murphy and Almiron have had their moments in our setup.

God forbid Isak ever end up in this dull tedious Arsenal side man.

Kalvin Philipps is passing backwards with seconds left and a goal down.

They are infuriating.

Ipswich trying to outdo Arsenal with the pointless passing side to side when a goal down.