janpawel

Man u always are there or thereabouts, even if they are playing terrible, I always feel when we go on a losing streak the table massively swings against us ?

Totally agree! Though I do think Willock has such a high ceiling and unique skillset, if he could do the great work he does on the left chanel also in the middle of the pitch, we'd have our own Bellingham

I know what you mean, and whilst Gordon pretty 2 footed, his right is definitely stronger, and livramento/tripper both like to put a cross in so I can't imagine this being best for Gordon Not saying it might not be the plan, otherwise Barnes and Gordon is means a pretty strong LW spot with 2 40m singing there ?

Surely we can raise this as collusion of some sort? Even if the 3 things put in place in spite of us have a reasonable argument, it just seems extremely targeted?

I agree

I kind of feel they beat us the way we beat arsenal, player for player arsenal are clearly superior, but we nullified them and played to our strengths, won it physically etc Feel the reverse is true for dortmund

Dortmund aren't near the best team we've played the last year, but we seem to struggle against them the most.... Sure Howe will get lots out of this no matter how the tie goes F'ing hope we do something this half mind

So excited for this, it's one of those games where a draw massively suits them as it gives them the advantage h2h, essentially giving them a 1 point advantage I'd certainly go all out as we don't want to be in a position where we rely on them to drop points over the last 2 games, or us to win in Paris etc

For those who think we will definitely make signings, do you think it will be stop gap singing (which we don't appear to do) Or the 'bringing forward' of long term targets. Like we did with Gordon, who was apparently supposed to be a summer singing

Yeah has a bit of the van dijk aura from a few year ago about him, strong, fast, always making the right decision and calm as out Thought he handled Wilson easily, other than when they had the tussle from on the half way line and Wilson took him out the game, think it ass the chance that gordon could have taken after Miggy played him through

Still don't understand how the tackle on Longstaff wasn't even reviewed on VAR? Like I thought it checks everything where there is even a remote chance of a different decision?

Whilst I think he is brilliant and has a unique role in our team, I certainly think his ceiling is lower than the likes of Willock, Tonali (presumably) and Bruno. I loved the big Joe / little Joe rotation we had last season, but the fact we now have Gordon and Barnes for the LW suggests this won't be the plan going forwards

Good point! I made a post about us having him, him him etc in midfield that you refer to, my line of thinking is that it is our strongest area (providing they are fit and not suspended) with RW, Keeper, CB and probably another striker a more urgent priority next window But it is an interesting question, which midfielder or midfielders are we most likely to sell in future so we can make such progress?

Do you really think we'd sign a Neves or other 40/50m midfielder, with tonali coming back in summer? That'd give us Bruno, Tonali, Neves(eg), Joelinton, Willock, Longstaff, Anderson, and Miley coming through Seems overkill to me imo, I could see us doing a loan for him or someone else which enables us to stick to the 'plan' that the club clearly has

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Yeah he seemed much more relaxed on the left hand side, not sure whether it was because dalot was terrible, and Willock was excellent in supporting Looked a lot more free whereas on the right side, he seems intensively focussed and almost restricted to the patterns of play we clearly practice

Took more notice of Bellingham lately for obvious reasons... Willock shares some elements of his game with him imo, big, strong, fast feet, elegant for their sizes, good runners with the ball etc That LCM is going to have some stern competition soon between Joelinton and Willock!

2 left backs and 2 right backs in defence, with 1 game between them in about 15 months. No striker That was half our C team never mind B team ?

Which is an exciting prospect thinking about next summer.... I've no idea who we could be scouting!

Injuries are always terrible, but it's such a shame this season as I was so excited for us to give everything our very best go with our A/B teams It's clear that we had 2 different sets of 3 up front for the league and the cup competitions, (isak/gordon/Miggy, wilson/barnes/Murphy etc) and likely the same for the midfield 3 in that we had 6 players who could slot in We know he doesn't like to rotate the defence, but if the defence was fully fit and with Lascelles showing how good Eddie can make people behind the scenes, I'd have confidence in us making 1/2 changes as and when in order to rest our best back 4 and we'd still perform well Now our hand is forced and we're praying for no more injuries, nightmare

Yeah seeing everyone else's point swings would be interesting, especially in comparison to ours, I'm suprised at villa only being 2 better off as they have started exceptionally, though if they won these fixtures last year the fair enough. Tottenham, Villa and Liverpool you'd think will score more points or potentially could do , man u, Brighton and Chelsea perhaps around a similar level

Yeah our only away win so far is against Sheffield, we definitely do need to make sure we are getting wins away from home against the bottom half teams

I've wondered this too once Hall is in the first 11, though looking at our current midfield options of Bruno, Tonali, Joelinton, Willock, Longstaff, and Anderson / Miley....surely one of them would need to make way if we planned on purchasing another midfielder

Almiron for who?

I really hope they can negotiate him to train with us during the ban, maybe on the grounds that he is a foreigner, doesn't speak the language etc which will only support him during his time off, unlike Toney who won't have such issues Would massively help him to get 10 months of English lessons and Howe's training under his belt