Dr Jinx

5 hours ago, madras said:

So, Botman dragged on, Ekitike also and Bruno took over a week to sort out ?

What’s your point? You think the club are indecisive? Don’t act quickly?

19 minutes ago, madras said:

Some have dragged on like, Botman did, so did Ekitike, even Bruno.

 

 

 

Botman was a late January move that the club wouldn’t accept a bid for.. I think it was nailed on he’d come here unless Milan could match our bid. They didn’t and he wanted to come here anyway so..

Ekitike again, similar but that’s firmly on an asshole agent thinking he was being a smart arse. We agreed the fee with his club fairly quickly.

Bruno, first any of us heard about it was when news broke that a bid was accepted. Transfer took a bit to conclude because he was away on international duty.. I think all of that was fairly decisive.

I think if the club had really wanted this player it would have been wrapped up before the euros.

It’s not their style to mess about with rejected bids and back and forth shite.. when they want to sign a player they have been decisive.

I think we’re still in for the Georgian guy and that will play out when we have the July budget, not saying that Trafford isn’t a viable option, I just think if they wanted him the window was there before the competition started.

23 minutes ago, Optimistic Nut said:

40m euros seems a helluva lot of money.

Big P’s

Lyon apparently willing to meet the 40m asking price.

Something about this just doesn’t feel right, like we’re being done here..

Surely there’s someone else we can move on before end of June that will solve PSR issues.. this lad needs a chance here.

Witness protection?

40m would be a great price for him seeming as he’s never kicked a ball for us. But you would have to ask why clubs would be prepared to pay that amount for someone with so little experience.. his potential is quite possibly far beyond that price.

A buy back option would have to be included surely.

So say Wilson moves to West Ham, DCL is just a replacement then.

We’ll still most likely go big on a right winger/forward in July or August.

Would really rather we took a look at Minteh for pre season but just doesn’t seem to be on the cards at this time. 
 

Can’t see Targett staying when we have Hall and Kelly.. so I’d expect him to be moved on too.

Kilman could fill the gap of both Lascelles and Botman who will both realistically not be ready until Feb/March

So that would leave:

RB: Trippier, Tino

CB: Krafth, Schär, Burn, Kilman

LB: Kelly, Hall

And then Alex Murphy will get a few minutes am sure.

Midfield we should hopefully have:

Bruno, Tonali, Willock, Joelinton, Miley, Longstaff, Anderson

Forwards:

Gordon, Isak, DCL, Murphy, Barnes, (new right forward)

Now questions arise.. does this squad look better than previous seasons? Does it look like top 4 contenders?

Injury free, see no reason why not but if Willock misses most of the season we may well have a midfield that suffers the same issues as last season. Still lacks a bit of pace.. and teams who decide to play straight through them will still cause issues.

I’d still like to see us go and get a proper holding midfielder that allows Bruno to push up.

3 minutes ago, The Butcher said:

Chris Wood was shocking for us. One of the worst I've seen for us given his fee.

That miss in the FA cup was really quite something.

Hes a good lad though, have no animosity toward him, even for the goals he scored against us last season.

8 minutes ago, McDog said:

Irish lads on here, I have a question. My observations from very far away is that the sport popularity in the country is as follows:

Hurling

Gaelic Football 

Football

Rugby

Is this way off?

It depends on who you talk to. More people play GAA games here than football as the whole organisation is amazing for grassroots. 

I have my 5 year old training every Saturday and although he hasn’t a clue yet he loves it.

Now for going and watching those games.. the average league matches would have a fairly low turnout.. it’s only really when it gets to the All Ireland stages where the crowds turn up in massive numbers.

Local League of Ireland football has had something of a resurgence in the last 10/15 years.. crowds are up for most clubs and a few teams have done a little better in the European competitions. Still very difficult to hold onto the best prospects though when they’re being pushed toward English clubs, even league 2 is still a good bit ahead so there’s no real reason for them to stay.

Rugby has always and will continue to be a sport enjoyed by the middle to upper class which is reflected in the private schools most of the players come from.

I’ll always be surprised even with the huge success the Irish team has had, that a certain section of society doesn’t give a fuck about it. (But for what it’s worth I think that also stays true for how Rugby is viewed in the UK as well?)

Am starting to think the England job is tailor made for him.

The man-bun would have to go.. 

How long do we give him though? Like he’s basically missed all of last season.

I’m going to put that more on our much maligned medical team who seem to have made poor judgement calls with pretty much every player with a long term injury.. those changes in personnel are something I wanna see as much as new signings to be honest.

But with the time he’s had off, we’re expecting him to be back now.. if he misses most of this season again then I’m afraid that’s probably it for him.

A loan abroad would probably do him good, slower league etc where he can build himself back up.

If he’s starting from zero trying to get up to Howe’s expected fitness levels, something is gonna give.

I’m not against the idea of Kilman, seems to be a decent player and reads the game well.

Just don’t wanna be losing our youth team prospects, unless we have a buy back clause included.

Again, such a dumb piece of business if the story is true.

Anderson didn’t have a great season but was injured for a lot of it. Terrible time to sell a player when the value would be lower than it should.

When he returned at end of season he had a couple of decent games.. he adds something different in the midfield so I’d rather be keeping him to be honest.

Sign him permanently? Minteh I mean? Fuck that.. a loan absolutely for 1 season but that whole deal sounds like an absolute robbery. DCL may be over his injury issues but he’s bang out of form.

What is Howe thinking 

So hypothetically, if City win this case, does that rule get thrown out immediately?

Refers to the Premier League as the Premiership about 6 times.

After watching a good chunk of that interview, I feel confident that in the league at least, that Man Utd will flounder for many more years. He’s an absolute dinosaur this chap.

Going in and stating the obvious (Real Madrid have had better management at their club than Man Utd) isn’t a pearl of wisdom because it’s coming from a billionaire, it’s whether he has a clue on how to fix it.. and sticking all your hopes on a poisonous garden gnome is a risky game given the lack of loyalty said gnome has shown.

14 minutes ago, Ronaldo said:

Had great servant become code for mediocre at best footballer who hung around for years because no one else would pay his wages?

That’s not an inaccurate statement.

Between City and Chelsea, they have both made absolute clangers in the younger players they’ve released or sold on for relatively small fees.

Olise in particular, he rebuilt his career (after City released him) but it was still a relatively small punt by Palace to get him from Reading.. less than 10m. That’s the market we should be in right now, there’s absolute value there.

The way Chelsea mishandle players, I’d be very tempted to look again at Broja.. available for between 20-30m

5 minutes ago, Jack27 said:

fuck them

🙂

Feel a bit for Palace, they were just getting a really good side together.

MGW would be a very expensive acquisition, probably having to pay over the odds. Just can’t see it while Willock is still part of the squad.

41 minutes ago, jack j said:

A sweeper keeper predominantly comes out to smash the ball away before the attacker gets there

They haven't got time to get it on the deck and fanny on with it most of the time.

If you're talking about him playing out from the back then that's a total different thing to a sweeper keeper

 

 

 

I’m talking about a keeper who will play at edge of box when we’re in possession, freeing up other defenders to push on.. who can play short, medium and long passes as is required.

Being in that position means a keeper will get there before an attacker most of the time.

Pope can play from the back if he’s rolling it to Schär or Botman.. but everything else comes at a risk of losing the ball.

It’s unfortunate because he’s a top keeper otherwise.

50 minutes ago, Rod said:

Pope is arguably the best English goalkeeper at this moment.  Why do you think we need an improvement?

He can’t kick a ball properly. If he was England’s best goalie he’d be at the tournament.

Hes good and he’s a lot better than Dubravka but the sole issue of his poor kicking leads to a lot of turnover of possession.

If we’re having a keeper playing in that sweeper role, they need to be able to pass properly.