Ronaldo

Will Burn ever score for us?

I really don’t mind Moyes but he’s in big trouble now.

City is pushing it. It’s a patchwork of backward mining villages, fish harbour and utterly wretched town centre.

Fair play to him. He’s reliable from the spot and does his best but I just don’t rate him at all. He’s yesterday type of striker and his strengths aren’t particularly strong.

2nd in the league. Absolutely unbelievable. Had some doubts at first but the job he’s done is incredible.

Yeah he’s a class act. Definitely the boss back there. If his legs hold up our central defence is sorted for next 3 seasons.

Yeah this shit can’t go on, mind. Richest club in the world with a Championship level striker starting again. Has to be remedied this window.

Yeah who cares about Dele Alli? There’s no rule saying you have to want to excel at your job. Just be happy the days of us signing and persisting with players like that are long gone.

We finished 3rd season before. Played mostly great stuff. Crazy looking back that Andy O’Brien was a fixture.

Think it was 2 away wins, Boro and Fulham. Shearer didn’t score an away goal after November. Was rather bizarre how passive we were that season.

Good post. I know it’s en vogue to laud the Bundesliga and it’s cheap tickets but the PL is blatantly the strongest league by some distance now and the fact CIty, Chelsea, Spurs and Liverpool have all reached CL finals in the last 3 years says quite a lot. I do agree the emphasis on tactical understanding is waaay behind in England - starting at grass roots level - and it’s the biggest reason we don’t produce managers and end up with a likeable wimp like Southgate in charge. I always think it is a staggering (but thoroughly unsurprising) fact that 4 Italian managers have won the PL but an English manager hasn’t even come close since we finished second under Keegan in ‘96. In terms of punditry, Souness is widely regarded as a decent / watchable pundit but I don’t think I’ve ever heard him provide any genuine tactical insight. Shearer and Wright are entertaining but I don’t think they could spell the word. Carragher and Neville at least try, but as has been said the average fan in this country would rather hear 5 minutes of analysis on a petulant glance towards the bench than an explanation of how attacker Z was nullified effectively by defenders X and Y.

Still a place for ASM but it’s not as a guaranteed starter in this side. We simply play too high up to pitch to get the best out of him, and that’s not even taking into account his fitness unreliability. Not that I could care less in truth because we’re a far better side now.

Has there even been a player who genuinely never dropped below a world class level for 15+ years? That’s what probably separates Messi from the best of the rest.

It didn’t really work having a foreign manager in charge, to be fair. The media disconnect translated to negativity which permeated the squad and performances. Didn’t help that Capello’s English was shit. Not an exclusive thing to England, either. A British coach would never be accepted as manager of Spain, Italy or Germany.

Get in! Will be able to watch this in Vegas now.

He’s very slow now. He’s a brilliant striker but his lack of pace is an issue in this England team. It just makes us too predictable at times.

Incredibly thick is not hiring security when everyone knows you’re in Qatar. Saka played his best game for England tonight. He was absolutely terrorising them and deserved far better then getting taken off for Raheem Sterling.

Aside from the fact a grown man and multimillionaire didn’t have the foresight to hire security for a few grand when every criminal in Britain knew he was 2 continents away, what the fuck did he go home for? To rebuild his barber shop or check his Rolexes were still there or what? Likely his last WC and the manager has shown more faith in him than anyone in his career. It’s baffling.

Nothing inexplicable about leaving the squad to fly home 4000 miles and back?

Sterling has been out of form for a while, not to mention the fact he inexplicably went home this week and there were ‘doubts’ about him coming back with his country in a World Cup QF.

Saka off for Sterling is lunacy. Sterling shouldn’t be anywhere near, let alone replacing our best player on the night.

Those subs. As much as we’ve improved under Southgate we’re missing something when it matters and his decisions are unfortunately a big part of that.

Hopefully that’s Kane never going to be the same again. Top 4 is ours.

What an absurd comparison.

Would’ve been an outrage if Argentina didn’t go through there. By far the better side throughout.