Ginola

Well played sir

Nice shirt that like

It's a decent tour around the Nou Camp as well. Did it twice when I was younger when my footy team went to Spain on holiday and for a few matches against Spanish teams.

Isn't he actively being used in Chelsea's squad? Can't see it happening like.

I'm still confused as to why HBA was so set on joining us rather than the other options he had. Since he's joined it's like he's finally got to play for his boyhood heroes as well. Not that I'm complaining, it's one of my favourite things about the signing.

I'm worried that might be the case, yea. The hype surrounding him on here is incredible, sure he did well in the short time he did play for us but his total game time only equated to about 2 matches. I think he will have some matches where he shines a way above everyone else, but I think some people might be expecting these to come too often, and he may go missing in a few games for us, as a lot of players of his style do. Still, I hope I'm wrong.

That's why I thought it'd take a while to implement really, you couldn't just pick teams out of the football league and drop them down a division in order to allow to the reserve teams to take their place, the majority of the reserves in England wouldn't be up to the Championship/League One standard anyway, so you'd have to throw them into one of the lower non-league leagues. They'd then be playing a fair few games against some bruisers which the managers would be quite weary about and might send them out on loan anyway, and of course it would take quite a few years to rise up the divisions.

Totally agree, you shouldn't be allowed to loan to clubs in the same division, possibly also have a loan cap on how many players you can loan out as well as loan in? I love the way that the Spanish B teams can play up to Liga Adelante as well, I think that's much better for the youth players development really. It'd take a while to implement that with the English reserve teams though.

Nothing to do with a recent Asia cup semi final then? Us getting relegated. The worst I've felt about anything to do with football by a distance.

This really. I sit in L7, which is quality, but Gallowgate is good as well. Pretty sure L7 is still members only anyway isn't it?

Nolan is much more effective from CM rather than as a second striker

What wage is he on at the moment? And how long is he expected to be out for?

Dear God

Might lash a cheeky tenner on a Korea/Aus double. The game is live on betfair as well btw, don't know if they have matches on as regularly as Bet365 though, never really checked before.

Good. Who made the apparent bid btw?

Bartons not about pace though, so hopefully, he should be able to carry on playing to a good standard for us

Loan would definitely be the best option if we were to sign him. I'm not sure where he'd play though really, I wouldn't drop Barton, Nolan or Tiote for him and he isn't a LM. Perhaps as a drop off striker but we tend to play better with 2 up top really.

Possibly, but I'm pretty sure every deal we've completed this season we've known about or known of an interest before hand, even if it hasn't been widely broadcast. For this lad, we've heard nothing.

Ridiculous that we didn't try to sign him. How do you know we didn't? I was using the assumption that if we were interested we would've had a bid accepted since he had a release clause of £500k and that would've been heard by someone, but there wasn't as much as a rumour suggesting we were interested in him from what I heard.

So good they named him twice

Exactly, a midfield 3 of Mascherano, Cambiasso and Riquelme, with the former 2 being more disciplined and Riquelme basically just roaming wherever he wants creating chances for a front 3 of Tevez, Messi and Higuain had the potential be increadibly lethal. Their main problem would've just been the CBs for me, I can't really think of any world class Argentina CBs, Gaby Milito would probably have been a better choice then Demichelis though, Burdisso and Otamendi are both fairly hit and miss as well. Full backs of Heinze and Zanetti would've been good enough though. Spud; As far as I'm aware he's still doing a good job for Boca, been hit by injury a bit though. There's no way he could handle the pace of the Premiership if he came over.

Fell out with Maradona though. Yea, well Maradona really messed up Argentinas WC chances with the squad that he picked. I mean, Jonas in at right back instead of Zanetti is just insane. Leaving out Cambiasso was a bit of a mistake as well imo. I'll leave it at that though before I start rambling way off topic

Once we are settled and start to push on, I'd like to think we'd look for a replacement for Nolan because he's the quite sizeable weak link in a midfield four of Barton Nolan Tiote HBA. Agree, he is good enough for the next 18 months though as we build on the more pressing areas. Would love to see a more mobile player eventually. This. We certainly shouldn't be in a hurry to replace him as his leadership and goalscoring qualities and invaluable to us at the moment, when the rest of the squad is looking stronger (probably another CB, LW and ST being the main positions that need addressing), then we should be looking for a younger, more energetic player to fill his role. Hopefully, if we signed those players the CB would have the leadership qualities that would be missed without Nolan in the side.

Argentina would've been a better side had he been in the 2010 WC team.