Dr Jinx

Serious question, how often do you watch our games?

What absolute twoddle. If Messi was scoring about 5 goals and getting 5 assists for 2 seasons in a row, but he was regularly having games where he was repeatedly beating 4 and 5 players with the ball before getting dispossessed, every pundit, journalist and supporter would be saying the same thing. 'Totally out of form' Now don't think i'm saying ASM should be getting Messi stats, i'm not. But he should be doing better than he is. He should be aiming for 10-15 assists a season.

I didn't say he had a better season, i said it was a myth that he played better under Bruce. His end product is pretty much exactly the same. And yes, there is a massive difference between Messi (even at the age he is now) and a 25 year old ASM. One has high end product, the other does not. So saying that he's the best forward on the pitch in some games (which you did), doesn't really hold up to scrutiny. He needs to do much much better, he has the ability but the question is does he feel like he needs to improve. If he thinks 5 assists a year is going to get him the Ballon d'Or he'll be left waiting.

Would Messi still have been the world’s best player if he scored 5 goals and provided 5 assists a season?

We’re not just talking about goals through are we. Goals and more importantly, assists. They are too low.

Are you suggesting that judging a forward player on their goals or assists is silly? It’s end product!

Well last season he scored 5 times and 5 assists, the season before 3 and 4. So the better under Bruce thing is somewhat of a myth. Whats consistent is that his end product vastly needs to improve, even for a team that struggled, those are poor numbers for someone with that talent. I don’t think I’m being overly critical with that. There’s plenty of players who can beat a few and then give the ball away. Maxi just does it much much more stylishly so we tend to ignore it more than we should. I think (hope) he can improve but he has to want to work on those other aspects of his game, if he doesn’t want to, nothing will change and things will fizzle out until we get a better replacement. Time will tell, not too far away now either. He’s had a full pre season under Howe so should be fitter and we’ll see if his game has adapted.

I’m warming to him.

He does my head in at times but I wouldn’t ever want to sell him. He’s essentially a wild card, something you can’t plan for, either for the team he plays for or when trying to plan tactics when playing against us. The top 6 teams will all hate playing against him for those reasons, just the pure unpredictability.. which version of him will show up, there’s the one that will repeatedly lose the ball in the middle of the pitch and looking like a sulk is nearby, or there’s the one that’s basically unplayable, beating 3/4 players with ease etc.

You’d be mistaken for thinking this was Bez playing in a charity match.

“Ah yeah fuck it, stick on a relegation clause and we’re on the gravy train” If Steve Bruce was still a footballer.

Oh they’ll try again, more like LIV next time. An offer so good they just do it regardless of what anyone thinks.

I think Ritchie staying is a shocking indictment of what Howe thinks of Lewis as a footballer.

Back to Red Dwarf you go.

What is the fucking point of FFP if clubs are just going to do that? And why are we seemingly the only club with money willing to play by those rules? There has to be a point when a massive heel turn comes along. Or maybe it’s just as simple that we can’t attract those players yet until we reach Europe.

He was heavily linked with us at one point in time iirc?

He will get minutes for sure, but he’s not first choice anymore, he knows it, we know it. It’s about self respect, yes this is probably the biggest club he’ll ever play for but the version of it that he led was a shadow of what it’s quickly becoming. The version he led was no better than Norwich or Forest or Burnley. He’s the one who came on the radio to defend Mike Ashley.. “he’s a good guy”.. remember that? As we grow into what we should have been all along we’re quickly seeing who’s out of their depth. Some players will improve and become more, but it won’t be Lascelles. Can he do a job coming off the bench?, yeah sure.. but he could be captaining and starting for one of those lower down sides. The fact he seems content to settle for a bit part role is an indication that he’s accepted defeat already in terms of his career here.

If he was a few years older I’d get him settling for a bench role but he should be in his prime, he should want a move away for that reason alone.

Christ that’s scary but i suppose in a sense he’s very lucky he’s in the profession he is, they’ll be getting checked like that at least once a year, maybe even twice so hopefully this has been caught really early.

Isn’t that why the selling clubs are fucking about so much. You have to admire how City go about their business. Virtually no public haggling they never lowball with their offers but aside from Grealish, don’t seem to overpay much. I thought Sterling at 50 million all those years ago was mental money but it was astute. They knew it was going that way so they just paid what seemed at the time a massive fee that Liverpool couldn’t turn down, but it was actually buttons on what he’d be worth at the same age now.

They're under pressure financially though? Maybe some loans are being called in etc, info line that doesn’t just come out unless they want it to.

What Maxi showed was fairly standard for him, yes some games he can run the show but not often enough for his ability. We haven’t seen much of Anderson but let’s assume that his level, he can more than stake a claim to be in this side. The team we were playing today finished 8th in the Bundesliga last season, comparable to what we managed. So they were no slouches like.

You think Maxi played better?

Pretty poor stuff overall. We never at any point had our strongest side out but a lot of performances that will (or should) set some minor alarm bells. I think at this point Anderson has shown he’s capable, he looked a level above ASM to be honest? On what we have currently he deserves a start.. ship Maxi over the right. Longstaff wasn’t great, Murphy was shit, Fraser was non existent and Almiron looked incapable of creating anything. I thought we might have enough as back up to Wilson but I was way off, we desperately need some reinforcements. Midfield and up front. We need 3 players.

Be very surprised if we sold Maxi, he’s capable of better and if that happens loads of clubs will be in for him at a much higher price. I don’t think he’d move to any other PL club so it doesn’t leave loads of places he could go to anyway.