Nine

Has started what? The last 12 or so games in a row? And is making the difference using his physical attributes still, you can question him technically but for as long as he is able to stay this fit and put in shifts like he does we won’t sell. Hes this seasons most under appreciated player so far.

Sunderland were absolutely awful, a total mismatch in style. They had to try and play out because a small team of youngsters isn’t equipped for good old long ball, they just couldn’t cope with the press from a side that is physically and technically levels above.

Routine

They are still trying to play it out..

Taken off right after 2-0, precautionary I reckon.

He’s farming impressions by being controversial, but at the same time saying things that a minority will agree with. Hes essentially attempting to be a Z list version of Andrew Tate.. if you don’t like what he’s doing the best way to is to block/ignore/hide him and never mention or repost his stuff again.

And his fitness record, a few games of Howe ball would have his legs fall off.

I wouldn’t call it an assumption, we don’t even know if Bruno will be sold yet My point is if Bruno is sold it could be an opportunity to shift our midfield away from a technical 6 like Bruno, and signing a ready made plug and play replacement for him just isn’t realistic.

Why does any club buy any player?

Selling him could be seen as an opportunity to transition our midfield and/or formation towards an out and out DM at 6 rather than try and replace Bruno’s attributes like for like. I’d expect that would be the route we’d go down if he was sold, we’d reinvest heavily across the midfield.

He is the most indispensable out of him, Botman or Isak but more to the point he’d also bring in the biggest fee. We will have to trade some of our more valuable assets to navigate FFP and reinvest for the mid-long term or until we are an established CL club, it’s just the way it has to go. Most fans will hate it if we sell him, but if the trend continues in terms of how well we’ve spent money so far it will be exciting to see how £100m of FFP freedom is reinvested.

The reason I replied is because I have done the same about a player like him for a while, a younger Firmino type of our own would be absolutely perfect providing we don’t look to keep Isak in the middle of the three.

Firmino would have been perfect for us 5 seasons ago, but hes played 300+ games for Liverpool while pressing like a maniac and is 32 now.. half a season strolling around in the Saudi league won’t have helped either. His fitness record is decent though.

Do you think management are unable to pick up on this themselves? Or do you think it’s a matter of having limited personnel to pick from? You can argue we change the formation, but changing formation mid season during a massive injury crisis/bad form could easily leave us far worse off.

Just let the emotional children out themselves, although the amount of it around football is scary. Rational, level headed football fans are few and far between unfortunately.

I’m not going to disagree, at some point the quality has to match the industrious nature of our system. The type of players that possess both are not easy to come by however, that’s my only point.

Ironically, the same preference for intense pressing is what got us into the CL in the first place.

The trend is and has been that we are consistently signing system players, players that slot in and out of the high press seamlessly. Physical attributes are valuable above all else, and I can’t see it changing anytime soon. It’s why we went for Tonali over Maddison for example.

I’d agree to that to a point, that it’s also just as important to have the attacking quality ahead of a DM so your attacking phases don’t suffer for not having a Bruno at 6. Or you change the formation, but that’s a different story entirely.

De Gea must be asking for the same insane sort of money he was on at Man United to be a FA for this long, money he’s probably offered from certain Saudi sides but won’t get in the leagues he’d prefer to play in.

The trend so far defo seems to favour signing a high ratio of British players each window, usually with one big signing from the foreign leagues. I wonder if we start to adapt that slightly going forward as we have built up a core of brits now.

Todibo would be the pick of that list but he will have more appealing options on the table than we can offer for now.

100%. I’ve seen people on here asking questions about how Trippier and Burn can start being consistently rinsed by quick wingers all of a sudden, long story short is the protection they had in front of them just isn’t there at the moment because everyone is gassed. Now I could pivot this post into making a point of how under valued Miggy especially is on that side, as the protection he provides when he’s fully fit is a massive piece of our defensive (and attacking) structure on the right.. and it baffles me how some fans still go on about how ASM would have made the difference in this game or that game A player like that is the furthest thing from the type of player we need to use out wide, the physical attributes of Gordon and Miggy are the bread and butter of our wide play and the next winger we sign will be of the same mould but with more technical quality and end product.

If we sign a DM it’ll be with a view to start with or switch to a 4-2-3-1 when deemed necessary with Bruno as one half of a double pivot, we won’t play Bruno further forward anymore. Bruno needs to play as a 6 in whatever formation we use.