Gallowgate Toon

Selling him now with our current FFP situation for decent coin would be objectively decent financial business but I'd be fucking gutted. He's such an important influence on many levels at the club as well as still being a very good player. He & Bruno are the soul of the current group.

Isn't he good mates with Kane? He probs just wants another pal there for when Dier's craic gets boring.

Pretty low, iirc. Joelinton and Bruno's defensive numbers were massively ahead of everyone else last season, from memory.

Don't think he's going anywhere quite yet but the day he does I'll be really gutted. Watching him for any other PL club would be tragic too.

He doesn't need to do the Shearer or Wilson-type battling, tbf. He can work towards channels more though - when we were penned in on Satuday, we were playing long balls down the line to get some relief but Isak was staying central. It was probably just fitness related, like, but I'd expect him at 100% to be doing that running in that scenario. Helps to split defenders too so if they win the initial knockdown then he has a better chance of collecting and making something happen.

Totally agree. If one of Bruno/Longstaff had dropped back for KdB, he'd still have an awful lot of room to run into, a quick knock past one of them and he's in a similar position with acres. They either all need to drop, defence push up, or a CB takes responsibility to fill the gap.

Two of their goals didn't come from this problem though and they don't play with a dedicated AM much, they're exceptionally fluid positionally and basically have multiple AMs at any one time. Case in point, KdB is in a completely different position for the winner. I actually thought one of our CBs could've done better for the second, they both chose to track the run instead of one making the decision to close space.

Is there any meaningful proposed reform for FFP? We seemingly get daft rule change suggestions every month now for on-field matters.

City managed the first 15/20 of the half perfectly - constant possession. They could've easily ramped it up a few times in that period imo but strangled us and kept their FBs a little more restrained to help win the second balls. They knew if they stopped the counters then we didn't have much left once Isak and Gordon gassed.

His talent on the ball is unquestionable. 10 years ago, he would've been a languid AM, maybe like Gourcuff or someone. Lots to improve physically and off the ball, as you'd expect. Think in today's game he's potentially going to get moulded into a deeper playmaker, unless he can develop a better engine.

Always comes across so well in interviews - evidently a very switched on lad. Interesting comments around mental fatigue.

Nobody will care about finishing 7th once we lift the FA Cup!

You sure this is true? To my knowledge, only one of our sports scientists has ever worked with Howe before. We've got a few that were hired before he arrived, iirc.

Wouldn't be surprised at all to find out he's still playing through something.

Positive that he's graduated to first sub

I do seem to be getting more irrationality angry at the injured players, after each defeat

Thought he was great, his energy was so impressive. Seems to be using his right a lot more now, after that comment about a coach punching the stand

It was a massively overcooked problem until the injury crisis, as our defensive record proved at the time. Teams who attack leave gaps. City are a fantastic side and it's happened to them plenty.

For any folk going on about the gap between defence and midfield today, they very often tucked Foden and Doku well in to massively overload the middle while massively stretching their FBs out. One 'DM' isn't doing much against that. Unless our FBs man marked them across the pitch, there's very little we could do about it other than sit even deeper & narrower as a team. We took some chances for better counter options until we couldn't any longer.

City played that second half perfectly. Set up to dominate possession expertly and wait for our counter options to tire out after 20 minutes. It's so fucking tediously boring to watch though.

It's tricky with Longstaff because we do seem to have played our best stuff with him in the side. Joelinton and Bruno were by far our most prolific midfielders last season for defensive work, iirc, they got through more tackles, interceptions, clearances than anyone else in that area and they cover distance as well. I'd say Joelinton isn't positionally sound though, his great defensive work seems to be winning duels in central and wide areas but good teams have found him wanting when his back is turned and he's not sure what's behind him - bit of a hallmark of him not traditionally being a mid perhaps. Bruno is great defensively, imo, apart from when covering breaks. Longstaff seems to do the better positional covering than Joelinton and has a bit more athleticism than Bruno, but he's obviously a lot weaker on the ball (does have his moments, tbf).

I still think he's going to finish this season strongly, or at least much better than we've seen to date. Howe has mentioned a few times that we've simply not had training time as a squad - that isn't conducive to a good environment for a young player learning a new position/system and fully explains the lack of trust, so far.

Teams didn't have it that figured out before the injury crisis. We had a mini wobble for a few games after Villa and then we were one of the most in-form teams until December iirc. Any type of football requires the necessary energy at this level, regardless of tactics. Rafa nailed it with the short blanket expression.

A very sobering day for them - the clubs are currently oceans apart in every way.