Stottie

The final piece in the Arsenal jigsaw. Why spend 600M when you can spend 700M!

Kane may just be prodding Bayern for a last-minute wage hike. A Man U of the past would have got it done, probably years ago for a world record fee, but too much of a shitshow now.

Understat last three seasons. Maddison's are all in the PL. Sofascore (Paqueta in green, Maddison in blue) Unless you see and want Paqueta as more box-to-box, I don't see why you don't buy Maddison for half the money. The only logic to Paqueta is if you see him as a proto Bruno 6-8 to replace Gundogan. You buy him for the feist. KDB is missing more games with injuries, CL final included. If that is the concern, Maddison scores highly as a final ball merchant/assist monster to help replace him.

The Spurs lads reckon Levy will not sell Kane to Man U. Dunno if Kane could force it by rejecting both Bayern and a new contract. That would of course be a massive, burn his bridges with Spurs move. The potential ace up the sleeve here is that Spurs could offer him a huge-money, multiyear deal on the assumption, or possibly even pre-agreement, that he buggers off to Saudi when its no longer value for money for them. If "we can just dump him on Saudi" is an option, a megacontract would not have the normal potential millstone type risk.

It was in a way, them not scoring from corners or free kicks in spite of lots of fine deliveries. Their defending however was top notch.

Toney?

Shame for the lad, who is a real handful and seems to thrive against us. A few players going down already, and that's before we start playing 100 minute plus games. Villa are potential conference league winners, esp. with Emery, so they'll need their full complement. Us too of course, though our European adventures are likely to be harder but shorter. Fingers crossed our lads stay fit.

Has Lavia to Chelsea been facilitated by us buying Livramento? It means money has to pass from Southampton to Chelsea for his sell-on clause, unless a player goes there instead. With taxes, FFP or whatever, it might be easier to send a player. Or easier for Chelsea to outbid Liverpool for a Southampton player, given the credit they have the Southampton bank and what can be submitted to the authorities on paper as the price. fwiw, I think Caicedo is probably overrated. I suspect the safest bet to buy from Brighton would be Mitoma, the player with the highest individual skill that would be replicable in any system. I like Caicedo to Liverpool as a transfer, because its going to be Declan Rice money and all that bollocks about moneyball and "ceilings" goes out the window.

Is Longstaff doubtful? I think he plays if fit/ready. I wouldn't move Burn and play Targett in the same game against a probably very good opponent. Keep Burn LB and bring in Lascelles is one fewer change. Its SJP and I expect a far different game to what happened at Villa Park. We'll still need an emphasis on solidity, so Bruno Joelinton Longstaff midfield (no Anderson) and Almiron Isak and probably Gordon front three. Gordon played at Villa Park but looks a completely different player now. Howe likes Wilson, so he may get the nod. If neither starts, Barnes and Wilson would be the most two-player fret we've had on the bench in donkey's years. Liverpool/Man City level.

7 goals for Maguire in 57 games for England, 6 in competitive matches. Kieran Trippier took about half a season to score more goals for us than he ever did with Spurs. Sometimes you have to blame the environment.

If you're getting JWP anyway, Maguire has to be a good signing. I wish our CBs were as effective on the end of free kicks. West Ham's job this year is to consolidate in midtable, and keeping it simple is one way to do it. Maguire was fine for England at the World Cup, so I don't think he is quite the liability he is made out to be.

He's done a Jericho job, brought the walls down! Since these things are usually for an international audience to get new fans, the shoo-in choice for the US of A would have been Ray Hudson. With subtitles.

I've seen various videos but every pundit just seems to say "NUFC? Won't manage CL and PL commitments. 6th to 8th". It seems like we are not worthy of any other analysis. Nobody bothers to talk about our strengths and weaknesses or how our signings, Gordon included, may change how we play. This week, I've heard more about Poch being nice to club staff like the dinner lady or how Arsenal's new number two keeper might affect their number one. At Chelsea, Havertz scored about 60% of his xG for three straight seasons. That's 40% worse than an average striker, say Danny Ings. For one season, you can dismiss it as luck, but three seasons is a lot of evidence.

Here are last season stats on our exclusively wide players and Diaby. His defensive contribution at Leverkusen was even less than ASM for us(!) https://fbref.com/en/stathead/player_comparison.cgi?request=1&sum=0&dom_lg=1&player_id1=3ea50f67&p1yrfrom=2022-2023&player_id2=862a1c15&p2yrfrom=2022-2023&player_id3=de112b84&p3yrfrom=2022-2023&player_id4=2b16cb1a&p4yrfrom=2022-2023&player_id5=aeed5c06&p5yrfrom=2022-2023 The big thing Diaby brings is assists from crosses, something we don't need on that side with Trippier as the league's top crosser. Statsbomb Kev said he expects Tonali to add quality delivery from the right. https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1672622138329538566.html

If I were Man City, I'd have signed Maddison over Paqueta. I thought Maddison had played his way into City interest last season and that they would rival us for his signature, not Spurs. As for Chelsea and Man U, Captain Hindsight says that if you're going to sign a striker not available at the start of the season, the one to buy was Ivan Toney.

Brighton have a weird way of playing where they cycle the ball and tempt the other team to overpress. They are extremely well-drilled at it and it works most of the time. When it doesn't work, their opposition manages to convert the 40% of possession they get into lots of xG. We do not hog the ball, but concede significantly fewer. The ease with which Brighton can replace players and even the manager suggests what they are achieving is not dependent on Caicedo or any other individual. That Caicedo can do it at such a young age speaks highly of him however.

Raheem Sterling scored a ton of goals like those two for Man City. Basically a back post run. Wilson's not really been much of a provider in his time here, but he did a great job yesterday and now has someone to provide it to. Isak also excels at bringing others into play.

Its from Understat. Miggy's page is here https://understat.com/player/7420 If you have time, try clicking all the buttons. You can do all sorts on that site. In the end, Miggy only outperformed xG by 2 last season, 11 goals from 9 xG. That's not massively unsustainable.

Minus 10 seconds added on according to the new timewasting directive designed to thwart NUFC.

Another fantastic goal from one of our shit right wingers.

Brighton give up a lot of goals and xG for a team with 60% possession. Their xG against was the same as Brentford, who had something like 43% of the ball. Because it's xG against (i.e., chances) as well as goals conceded, you can't simply blame their keepers, who as it happens aren't very good. Maybe there are getting caught in transitions or their renown "entice the other team's press to engage and then bam! out ball to Mitoma" type style of play carries downsides that they accept due to a risk-reward model they have. I dunno. I just wanted to say that they concede a lot for a ball hogging team, and if you want to press the point, a ball hogging team with a DM supposedly worth 100M.

Here's Miggy's shot map for the Premier League goals he's scored. Only one of the five to the left of the penalty spot was Howe era. So him scoring from where he did yesterday struck me as something new and probably coached into him. I thought it was a very intelligent run and a harder finish than he made it look. Forza Miggy!

At Spurs in yes, the same league, Poch averaged just under 1.9 points per game. That might sound good, but for context, its the same as NUFC since Jan 1 2022. Its lower than nine Chelsea managers in the Abramovich and after era. Including ones like Rafa who they hated. https://www.planetfootball.com/quick-reads/comparing-chelsea-managers-pl-records-since-abramovich-takeover/ Poch is a good manager and it sounds like a good bloke, but yeah, he's up against it with this job.

Isak stepping up with the most demanding fan's "I miss Maxi's dribbling" needs. We've got a gem here, lads and lasses!

Can’t say I can ever remember Miggy scoring from a position like that before, in the left side of the pitch. Great goal!