Nine

How many goals have we given away from our own poor set piece this season? Has to be 3 or 4 already.

Tonali needs to be more aware there

Christ

Pep looks ill

Oh my god City

To put it simply - it’s slightly concerning that we havnt found a way to integrate a player of Tonalis ability into this side yet, especially when Longstaff is getting starts. And that’s not a dig at Longstaff.

First half showed promise with what we had, I said at half time I wouldn’t change much and I’ll stick by that. The changes havnt worked and the second goal was weak and we never recovered. Poor showing post half time all round, onto the next.

Second goal killed us

We’ve had poor moments yes

We havnt played badly, but tonight is more evidence that we lack creativity in midfield. We suffer in games that lack transitions with Longstaff and Willock in there.

Brutal, one of those games unfortunately

Hall is literally twice the player he was a year ago, incredible

We havnt been as bad as people are making out at all, I don’t think we need any changes besides maybe Willock if he’s hurt

429 charges

That is big time hindsight though, as no one on here would have wanted him to move on after that season. In fact I remember plenty of posts on here saying things along the lines of - that patch of form will be sustained and it’s just the player hes become under Howe.

I’m not sure it’s him being defensively lacking, although he’s not as effective as a Joe or Gordon he can still execute that role. I just think it’s that he’s simply suited to games where we see a lot of attacks in transition, most of his goals that come to mind are from that scenario. It’s why he’s a super sub for games like that at the weekend. Hes just very direct and he always wants to cut in and shoot and he’s very good at that, I think he would have been incredibly effective in our 22/23 season for example.

That’s why he’s an important player for us

Wonder if we step off now, playing with fire with their counters

Havnt all of your previous managers been fairly invested in Rashford though? Correct me if I’m wrong, I know he’s a fairly one season on one season off player so I’m not sure if his form has been worse than previous seasons.

He caught that so sweet

Osimhen at Gala is so 2033/34 in FM, love to see it

To be fair I chose this game for Leverkusen and not Liverpool, I’m thoroughly disappointed as I watched probably as many Leverkusen games as NUFC games last season and they were usually great

Liverpool game is utter tosh

Don’t know if it has been posted here but apparently Gerrard is on the brink in Saudi and has been turned on by the Al Ettifaq fanbase, so we’ll probably have to suffer him while he sits in one of those comfy punditry chairs every week soon.

You’ve pretty much nailed it here I think