Mikky

Could do with a couple of midfield loans on the basis that neither Willock or Anderson are going to be back anytime soon me thinks

As close to a Rodri clone there is (in terms of style - Rodri is world class)

Gambia are hopeless

Tonali had the best seasons of his career alongside Kessie - Fofana is sort of similar A flat 3 no longer works in the long term(we can still use it) - need to (or Howe needs to) evolve

What was that from Evans?

I think he’d work really well in a double pivot with Tonali - the ideal profile is actually Phillips/Neves - his style is perfect for us - can be quite flexible with our players then in terms of the front 4 in a 4231 - would mean we could offload Longstaff to help with FFP

Said it before, we need to play with a double pivot

The solution is players coming back which means we are able to rotate during the game with fresh legs

Tonali - Willock - Anderson - Barnes - Murphy All more or less been absent for circa 70% of the season - killed us

Barnes if they operated would have been back by now Bloody amateurs

Might as well rule Barnes and Willock for the season Anderson probably looking at March now?

Spurs lost Kane but benefitted massively from his sale with FFP

He’s a cross between Rice and Joachim Anderson in his playing style - typical rugged Italian defender - comfortable on the ball - bit dirty - can dribble and play out - got a decent turn of pace - pace wise similar to Lascelles? He is my number 1 choice

Or Scalvini - Scalvini plays all 4 positions at the back and at 6

Shame no links to Yousuf Fofana - him and Big Joe in one midfield would have been insane

The number 6 doesn’t need to press in a 4-1–4-1 set up which is essentially a refined 4-3-3 formation - like Busquets at Barca - the number 6 plugs any gaps left by the pressing 4 ahead of him so we are not always left open to counters - it’s why you see Pep playing with 3 then Riodri and Stones ahead - you are controlling the centre of the pitch

Plus doesn’t help when you play Europa too - it takes its toll - definitely a shock to many foreign players - takes a good year to get used to the PL - plus in the case of most of these there’s no winter break in Dec, it’s relentless stuff

There are some new foreign players who struggle for a few months around Nov/Dec time when the intensity of the league catches up a bit - once he gets used to this he will be fine - probably see really kick on in the next few months

That team photo with the scarves is epic tbh

Players just need to relax here - needlessly open

Don’t think either PSG nor R Madrid would buy him - both are stacked in those positions

Its a system we should adopt away from home tbh - and should work well with Tonali - we’ve been too soft recently

Yeah this isn’t the Celta of yesteryear sadly - barely have any money - really tough job

Yep spot on - so quite an unusual injury for a footballer to get - sadly one of those you have to get right before making a comeback

It’s quite a bad injury - need to get the rehab spot on