Lotus

We could’ve got any cunt to run and around and press and offer nothing in front of goal or link up play from any number of leagues around the world for considerably less than £25M. You don’t need premier league experience to be shit in the opponents half (when we have the ball, he is good when we don’t).

If this is genuine, why didn’t we bid for him when Etikite went to PSG? if he was a real and pre planned target, why is it taking until now? Theres something seemingly amiss with our strategy regarding the recruitment of forwards. We can all have lots of faith but if I just look at the evidence, we’ve signed Chris Wood (who was a waste of money and I can’t think of it as anything else) and apart from that, nothing. Unlucky with Etikite, Under bid for Maddison (ludicrously so), and now have a bid turned down for this nipper. I can’t make a pattern out of the bids (I’m ignoring the rumours and twitter ‘links’). I would reckon one of Ashworth’s major jobs is to find a good head of recruitment.

Not sure we ever expected to sign him tbh. You certainly don’t go in for a player of that quality with such a low bid. Think we may have been using the process to demonstrate to another team/player that we’re only willing to bid so much and will walk away.

3…at least is imperative? Shush.

If they could finish it would've been.

If we sign ( I know........) a CF, Wilson can play as a RF now and again I reckon.

We've all seen our points can cover bad performances, see Pardew 5th. We're not at a stage of our development where by points are good enough if the occasional performance is sub par. A few games last season we stole a result, that's a fact. So far this season, we've had a jog about against Forest and have been run ragged by a toothless but brilliantly coached Brighton. I certainly have lots of faith, I really do. I want to see some evidence that we've pushed on from last season though. And......there's 10,000s of pro players in the world. It can't be hard to find an upgrade for the money available. Nearly all other teams manage it. We must have set ourselves some ridiculously stringent criteria to not find an upgrade on someone who can't pass or shoot.

What? They played some great balls into our box. Don't think our back 4 was 'rock solid' at all. Pope was excellent and they couldn't finish for shit.

Kept us in it today. Top performance.

Brighton are FAR more than the sum of their parts. What an excellently coached team. If they had a goal scorer they'd be really dangerous.

Why?

Joao Felix.....

From my POV we’ve got f*** all options to pick from apart from Burn or Botman. So, probably unchanged unless we get an injury in training. Fwiw, I think Bruno’s slide rule passes into the channel between the CB and FB suit a right footer so I would’ve given Murphy a go if Maxi HAS to stay on the left.

Was reported his agent was being a dick, so he sacked him.

He’s performed so much better then I expected and so far, way above his price tag. That becomes a burden if the recruitment team expect every player they want to be that much better than the price. You only get THAT lucky now and again.

Gtilitsch on a free fills the Shelvey sized hole in our squad.

Isn’t Florian Grilitsch still unsigned? DM with a good all round game.

From what little I’ve seen of Longstaff in a deeper role, he let players get in behind him too easy.

Really? Like, Sterling knows where the net is….

Being linked with players by ‘journalists’ is worth absolutely nothing. £30M would be ample for a scout worth his badges to find an attacking talent. I bet 80% of the scouts from the top league teams in France, Spain and Germany would kill for that kind of money. As has been said so often, the stats of Miggy, Murphy and Fraser is hardly much to compete with. It’s not a high bar.

Did Ashworth do the scouting at Brighton? I don’t think he did, pretty sure that wasn’t his job. I’ve no reason to think he’s not excellent at his job but let’s not burden him with expectations of roles he’s employed to do.

Aye, crediting Nickson for that is laughable. A £40M forward who can do nothing near the box. Love him as a midfielder though. Really hope he can add to that and provide some assists and goals.

Dunno if we’re making perfect the enemy of good here, but I think it will be a poor window and serious impact to our season if we can’t add an attacking player. Like, a proper misstep. Howe’s clearly a very very good coach. If recruitment is a job too far because he’s got too much on his plate we really should have someone else handling that. Has Nickson demonstrated clear recruitment success at any other club? Serious question…..all I can see is Blackburn Rovers and the youth team at NUFC. Neither leap off the page to me like…. This isn’t bed wetting….Wood was a bad, bad signing. Can’t try and paint that any other way. A forward who doesn’t add goals or assists, not even link up play. We’ve had over 7 months now to scout about. If Etikite was all they could come with they’re not scouting we’ll enough.

I’ve no idea about Pogba’s off-field demeanour. I certainly wouldn’t jump to a conclusion that’ he’s difficult or disruptive. I’ve absolutely no idea so it wouldn’t even cross my mind. What does spring to mind though was his application when France won the WC. He was everywhere. Defending in his box, breaking up play in MF, closing down the opposition, driving the ball forward. He was absolutely great. Then I think about his frankly limp performances for Manu, it’s like 2 completely different players. No idea why, I’m sure Froggy might say he was absolutely fantastic for them, I thought he was a stunning disappointment. I won’t speculate as to what were contributing factors to his vacuous performances for his previous club, but at some level a professional sports person has to be accountable for their substandard play.

I thought Cucatella looked good on the ball but for a player that got forward so much, he didn’t have the recovery pace when a counter attack went down his side. He couldn’t even catch up with a player who was running with the ball ffs.