Viana

A truly horrific situation that has been handled incredibly poorly by Manchester United. They've failed Greenwood, they've failed his partner, and they've failed the players of Manchester United women.

I can appreciate the general sense of frustration attached to lots of strains, but his injury today looked brutal.

I'm very high on his potential. That got me too excited and I compared him to Raheem Sterling. I think he has a bright future.

The market for proper defensive midfielders this summer has been outrageous. I don't blame us for holding off until things settle down. I wouldn't have wanted 50m on Lavia or double that on Caicedo.

Scottish football is hilarious, and I won't hear an argument otherwise.

The thing with him is, he's hard to get past, and when he starts running he can build up a canny bit of speed. You fold those qualities into last night and it potentially gives Walker more problems. I don't blame Eddie because you don't want to change a winning team, and throwing Longstaff in from the start would have been suicide. If Trent plays next week it might be one for then.

Enzo misses a pen, Caicedo concedes one, Murdryk looks crap. That's what, £300m spent?

Caicedo praying on the pitch. Bit late for that.

Whether through luck or judgement Chelsea's signings should work well with Pochettino. I think his style meshes better with players that are on the come up over players that have already had success.

Jesus Christ if that goal doesn't scream relegation I don't know what does. Everton have circled the plug hole for a few years but this is probably the year they finally go. It's still early days, but their start to the season has stunk of Sunderland under Moyes. A battling British manager, no money to spend, mediocre players unable to summon anything. If it wasn't for the blue shirts you could have convinced me the loss to Fulham was at the Stadium of Light.

I think Villa's first two games are a good indication of how the season may go for them. You can get away with Diaby in a free role against Everton, but when you're playing a team also pushing for top 6 you need everyone to work off the ball. It's why he wouldn't have been much use to us last night against Man City. I think Villa will be hard to beat at home and will likely grab a good amount of points from teams in the bottom half, but they'll struggle against the top teams.

As someone that saw a lot of Ziyech, he's a very good player, but I think he's like a few of that Ajax team in the sense he was made to look great by the system. . There was a few in that group on the younger side that secured moves but didn't manage to kick on (Donny van De Beek, David Neres, Nicolas Tagliafico). Onana and Matthijs de Ligt are two that may escape that accusation, but de Ligt certainly wasn't great for Juventus. My belief is strengthened by how good Dusan Tadic and Lasse Schone looked that season, and it's why I'm surprised that Erik ten Hag has Man Utd looking so average even with the ball.

If you assume Trippier ages out in 2-3 years then Ashby will likely battle Tino for that role. If that's not the case, it wouldn't surprise me if Dan Ashworth/the club saw Ashby as someone we could sign for a few hundred thousand, develop via loans, and then flog for 5-10m depending on how he gets on. The early reports indicate he's comfortable at Championship level.

Recorded his first assist for Swansea today.

Late night thought that should not be forgotten; Schar fucking hated Bruce. A big plus for me.

Love him, but tonight was not it. I sometimes wonder if his role for big games is LW where he’s just shuttling up and down.

I thought he offered a lot. I still think his only issue is what position he slots in. I don’t think he’s shown enough previously at CM to start, while Almiron’s pace and Gordon’s price make them more of a lock on the wings.

Passers need runners. Miggy is the only one that consistently does that for him. It’s also two games into the season meaning we have nothing to really take from his performances. Give it 10 games. @Yorkie great post. I also think we have to factor in game state. He’s gone from facing teams where we were underdogs to now supreme favorites.

Bloke is aging like a fine wine. I also think he brings the best out of Botman. Sven is lovely, but he’s a big rampaging bloke that is physical and aggresssive. Schar is more of a pickpocket. It works so well and is why I think Haaland didn’t score tonight.

He had one golden chance the whole game and lacked conviction to just hit it. That is the margin at the top level. We basically played what could be a Champions League knockout game tonight. I think against lesser opposition he’ll be decisive in games.

Botman is basically what people think Van Dijk is.

I know everyone adores James Richardson, but I feel like I've noticed a more pronounced snideness to him lately. It sounded like he wanted nothing to do with the women's World Cup chat, and was constantly interrupting while also making a passive aggressive remark about Duncan Alexander's jokes. I know to a degree that's his style, but I do wonder if he's just bored of the whole carry on. I think I need to refresh my football podcasts tbh. Even the tactics one with Michael Cox feels like eavesdropping a group of lads from Oxbridge discuss football.

Miggy's consistency rests in his industry and hustle. His inconsistency in output is what stops him being truly elite.

I'm choosing to hold onto the positives here. We bloodied their nose, caused them problems, we just didn't have the quality or composure in the moments that mattered. If that's how close we can run the treble winners then we're doing something right. I think the team still picks itself largely, but yeah, I'm not going to cry over a narrow loss to Man City. They're the bar, we'll get there. I liked what most of the subs brought. The only one I couldn't quite see a positive with was Longstaff. I worry the lack of regular football may harm him and exacerbate his shortcomings on the ball.

It's just a quality issue today. We've been more than good enough for a point. Lots of positives to take from the fact we've pushed the treble winners this close.