Mole

I thought Arsenal and Forest weren't as awful as the games before tbh. Granted the bar is literally on the floor here, but at least we managed some attempts on goal from them

That says more about the inept decision making around the national team for decades than it does anything about Scholes or Butt for that matter.

I know it's nice to think about, but from what I've seen this season I have an extremely hard time believing he would work with Howe tbh.

I checked it because I didn't recognise the name, but I seem to have touched a nerve.

The 26m part was about Osula iirc and they used Tonali to get people to click. Not that it matters.

New poster who has mostly posted on Sunderland and Bruce threads (at the time I looked) set off my alarm bells ngl. Chose to ignore it afterwards.

Yeah like if the concern is "We don't create enough or the team isn't on the same wavelength when it comes to runs off ball" I would think it's probably too soon but I'd get those concerns. Right now I just want to see the man on the ball more tbh, pretty sure great things will happen as a result of it.

On the contrary, I just have a habit of repeating myself

There's really no point worrying about something (regarding him shooting and finishing) until he gives you a reason to actually worry about it. So far the issue has been on actually creating chances so he actually has the chance to even get a shot of. Hell him just having more of the ball in general would be nice. But I'm sure all of this will come.

From what I saw this summer, the targets they went for and who ever was responsible (I'm sure it's a lot more than just Eddie) seemed very positive. The issue was forcing people into positions they were not really equipped to deal with, hopefully with a new CEO and Sporting Director on board plus Sugs on the data side of things those issues should be a thing of the past.

The edit reasoning is great

It makes us unique so I wouldn't change it. I'm sure Woltemade commented on it recently and I do think it's part of the attraction to the league. I just personally find other aspects much more important when discussing who is better sort of discussions.

Actually the Pedri example is very bad, what Tonali does every week is an extremely positive example but I don’t think many times he’s actually out of position. (His team mates might be though ) That sort of ball winning is extremely positive and should be praised highly, but there’s a lot of players historically who won tackles but weren’t really impacting the game and if anything were detrimental.

More talking about the sort of tackling that is a result of (which to me is very common) of being out of position and forced to rectify that mistake than this. I am not as negative towards this or the pressing example Ian gave, both of those are much more positive examples I probably shouldn’t have been so generic with my initial post as tackling has a wide spectrum and includes a lot of different aspects.

Not at all, I just think there’s way too much stock put towards it compared to other skillsets which are arguably more important when comparing players. I think it’s an exciting part of the game and I wouldn’t personally change it, but I also would place many other things of higher importance. I also think there’s many ways to show bravery on a football pitch other than just the tackling aspect. I want to be clear, obviously winning possession is an important skill to possess but I think there’s a big difference between let’s say what Pedri did against us and the type of tackles that are celebrated in this league usually.

England is the only country where tackling is such a highly prioritised skillset. When the reality is tackling someone only happens because you made a prior mistake.

Shite ginger manc iyam

There's no way that post isn't a and which is why I'm ignoring it.

I feel like this is an unfair interpretation of events. You compared one teams depth at full back to one teams depth at centre back. Pretty much every team in the country with any sense will have more depth at CB than they will at fullback. This is completely natural. A more accurate comparison would be how many injuries would it take for our first choice RB to play CB? and the answer is pretty similar to what Chelsea did with James. I'm sure they have more depth but comparing a teams CB depth to a teams full back depth is always going to look bad for the latter for real obvious reasons.

Yeah not something I really want to think about 6-7 games into his career lol, but I suspect he'll be a professional lad no matter what.

I'll be honest I think it's way too early to assess, he's already done quite well in the games since so who knows what he'll look like in say December.

I agree but I also think that Scholes style of play means that I think he'll always be more appreciated in Europe than he is in his own country IMO. I think if you ask the Spanish, Italian and other big European countries their opinions on him will be higher than our own.

From what I've seen so far this season I don't think so. Liverpool, City and Arsenal sure, but the rest aren't some sort of an inevitably that can't be finished above. Spurs and Chelsea are both doable.

I get very muted during those moments even when I'm alone. But I go back singing along straight afterwards. The bars in Amsterdam playing uncensored version of Shook Ones was an experience in self control.

What choice do we have? Also tbh these things are never like this in reality. The amount of times you hear football fans talk about 1 v 1 duels that never pan out because it's such a tiny part of what happens on the pitch is endless. I wouldn't be surprised if he gets to isolate him less than 4 times over the course of 90 mins.