Clockwork Cheese

Think he's 10 years too late at Spurs - he would have loved playing for Redknapp. "MK Don's, National Team. BANG!" At some point he's taken his foot of the gas, and doesn't have that killing hunger that forced Poch to throw him straight in and saw him through the first few seasons of his career. Towards Pochettino's end he eventually pissed him off, and his form tanked. Mourinho became at his whits end with him, and now it seems Conte has given a limited chance he hasn't taken. Poch, Mourinho, Conte - three managers that all share a core tenant that you need to sweat and eat grass to play for them. I'm in Mourinho's camp on this one....

Have a google, QPR Four Year Plan! Pretty funny stories in part 2 of that podcast about him being in caretaker charge for 1 game whilst it was being filmed, but none of the footage going in to doc.

Doesn't say names, but remember looking around and consensus/rumours were that Cisse didn't want to play because he didn't get shagged, and Diakhate had a spell put on him.

Watch podcast on Marc Birchall who was a coach at QPR at the time. He said that all the players coming in were on massive money, relegation get out clauses the lot - whilst likes of Jamie Mackie, Shaun Derry, Clint Hill were still on relative peanuts. Explained that basically, whilst splitting the dressing room in cliques, it became a situation where the lesser paid players would have rightly had no motivation to give a fuck either - they would have earned more money in Championship than in PL *more games, so more match bonuses* - only their professionalism would have seen them commit, whilst Djbril Cisse refused to play because his bit on the side didn't shag him night before, or the club having to pay off Samba Diakhate's Witch Doctor curse so that he could train pre-season.

I seem him as emblematic of the post-Ferguson era at Manchester United. He's 29, should be in the prime of his career, but he's played about 30mins of football since November and been paid a fortune (£100k+ a week) for years now. For a long time now he's been an established senior player, yet he's never been in any managers best XI, or long term plans - dating back to about 2015 really. Players have been signed ahead of him, shunted him down the pecking order - failed and left; but he's never forced any managers hand that they should be playing him, trusting him to perform. Under SAF players like him were moved on, or wanted to move on. Problem is the size of his wage has priced out the rest of the clubs in the league which could have been viable moves for him. Years ago he could have gone to a West Ham type of club, not just in last summer. But no fucker can afford him. Was a joy to see him play for West Ham last year, put in some truly class performances. Just bugs me thinking he's been happy enough to be a Man United sub the whole of his career, that and the whole JLingz carry on just makes me think he's a bit of a prat.

Oh yeah, agreed - even with differing degrees of reservation on even both signing permanently tomorrow their vast improvements on the shite we're having to play. That being said, we're always going to be second/third choice for these guys - both would rather be playing for West Ham, Everton, or a Villa. This is compounded when you take into account their characters, motivations and career trajectories. We truly lucked out with Trippier - a seemingly leader/model pro that has that has that killer winning mentality still fresh inside him, a player that hasn't been outcast, a player with their career still in an upward trajectory, and someone who made a clear choice to sign and commit to playing for us. End of the day, I just don't want to have to watch another Bentaleb or Danny Rose type play for themselves and use us simply as a venture for a deal somewhere else - especially in the situation we're in now, we will be sold the dream on having a player of their 'calibre/talent' sign. Whilst not ideal, it's testament to how much of a wreckage our squad is that even a 4/10 Alli phoning it in against Watford would still be more productive than Longstaff. Cambridge is the sort of game where Alli would have scored and collected a goal bonus from. We were in a sorry state having to bend over for Danny Rose couple of years ago, frightening how much worse we are now.

Not apposed to him signing here on loan, but would have bigger reservations about him signing onto anything permanent. Doesn't seem that we're in talks with any other options other than him as to forward players, so guess you just have to get on board with it! Whilst we wouldn't be getting the player we all saw last year at West Ham, he'd no doubt improve us going forward. We've nobody that is natural at breaking lines, playing direct and vertically and making defenders worry about space being left open. Would just feel 100x more easy about this if we had the back end of the side secured transfer wise. Adding Lingard into this side at present won't keep us up alone - it runs the risk of leaving us even more exposed the other way if we're still having to play Longstaff/Hayden/Shelvey/Joelinton in front of Lascelles/Clark/Schar/Fed.

Yeah, I'm leaning towards this sort of thinking. Cantwell is a non-starter as far as I'm concerned. Must be a clear reason why nobody has come in for him since Norwich dropping in 19/20, and his stock tanking. From what games I've seen of Norwich this season, can't even think I've seen him kick a ball. Always thought he was all fart-no poo when he was meant to be good a couple of years ago. His mentality and attitude will be totally at other end of spectrum that we've added to the dressing room with Trippier having worked with Simeone. Serial loser with 1 and half relgations to his name now, that is a lightweight playmaker who lets games pass him by at the best of times - no taa. Appreciate we're not in a situation to be too picky, and Lingard and Alli obviously have far superior ability and talent too what dross we're currently fielding, but the the thought of loaning in those sort of signings gives me PTSD from watching Danny Rose play for us. End of the day, their only be out for their own ends - and if they're doing their level best to screw their respective careers and talent away at far bigger clubs than us, I can't have much confidence either are going to be prepared to sweat blood for us in the coming months. Cliche, but moving up too Newcastle isn't attractive to these two I'd imagine - neither will have mates in our dressing room they would know from International duty akin to Lingard buddying up with the West Ham bunch. Lingard clearly wants to move to London, and I'd strongly imagine Alli wouldn't be too motivated to move his life and commit everything to save our arses. All above speak to where Howe is talking about adding the right sort of players against the risk of screwing things up even further.

Bloke is total dog shite. Thought he was a total car crash playing centre back the other night. Had a good laugh when commentator said that Rodgers told him that "he's going to be his Mascherano". Couldn't get any more Brent.

Along with runners and movement around him, especially when countering - Fornals, Bowen, Lanzini, Antonio, Yarmolenko, Benrahma. One of those cases of right club, right time. Easy to see why he had a good run of form there with how Moyes had West Ham playing at the time. He's a step above what we've got at present mind - but it's fanciful to think you can pick up the Jesse Lingard that we saw play in second half of 20/21 and expect anywhere near that for us, adding in he's sat on his arse not playing for 6 months.

Rumours somewhere of Roben Goosens and Hans Hateboer - both of Atalanta - that seem to be built on sand as well.

Yeah, can't see there much in Zapata talk. I'm sure the club has sounded out and made various degrees of contact on many players that we're hearing about. Deals like the Diego Carlos, Botman, and Lingard are the ones that have gone the distance to be taken serious in my opinion - the rest is just fluff and guff from Twitter and the various creatures surrounding the interest of Newcastle United and this transfer window. Just doesn't make sense to me we'd spend £25M on Wood when we're ready to commit to spending £40M on someone levels above in Zapata.

Personally, won't be too worried missing out on Lingard. He only wants to be back with Declan and the boyz at West Ham. Far better than what we've got, no doubt, but we for sure won't be getting the player that finished last season for WHU. Has sat on his arse last months at Man United instead of going elsewhere other than West Ham to play actually play football. Just a bad feeling about him, and us seemingly so desperate in going after him. Seems obvious he doesn't want to come here unless either being paid a fortune; not actually playing at staying at Man United for rest of season seems a more viable option for him. No doubt he's had months to sort a move this month from Man U, so testament to his motivations/viable options available to him that he's still a Man United player - despite playing 31 minutes of football since November.