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Good player, just what we need in midfield.

 

Does that mean he can run box to box and pass the ball accurately?

 

 

 

Not one to get too carried away with youtube clips, but that looks very much the case watching his Shalke highlights.

 

Looks a really good move. Especially as he originally came from the premier league and is still just 25.

 

 

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Gonna be interesting how Bruce fits Shelvey, Hayden, two Longstaffs and Bentaleb into his matchday squad when we only play with 2 centre mids

 

Unless he plans to send Matty out on loan which would be daft

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Gonna be interesting how Bruce fits Shelvey, Hayden, two Longstaffs and Bentaleb into his matchday squad when we only play with 2 centre mids

 

Unless he plans to send Matty out on loan which would be daft

 

Really? Nice new contract and a loan to a promotion chasing Championship club would be brilliant for him.

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He's been better than Sean this season. I'd be reluctant to send him out currently when Sean is playing poorly, Shelvey looks whacked, Bentaleb is a bit of an unknown and Hayden is being asked to fill in in defence

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This is a club with no intention of pushing for Europe and likely to stay up. Bentaleb and one of the other three (with Ki in an emergency) will help secure that coverted 16th place. Might as well send him to someone like Forest or Sheff Wed for regular football which he’s never had.

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Good player, just what we need in midfield.

 

Does that mean he can run box to box and pass the ball accurately?

 

 

 

Not one to get too carried away with youtube clips, but that looks very much the case watching his Shalke highlights.

 

Looks a really good move. Especially as he originally came from the premier league and is still just 25.

 

 

 

Yeah I saw the Schalke clip, he looks a very good player on that, but also a bit of a potential headcase which could be interesting with Bruce in charge.

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to be fair Bruce is handling ASM well if he really does have an attitude problem. Classic case of player on cheap cos managers don't like it but to be fair to Bruce (Shudder) one thing is clear is players do like him. We clearly do need midfielders since ours can't keep ball or are really to young to be relied upon game in game out. Ki deserves more time mind but doubt we'll see him

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One of the reasons possession is shit is because we can’t keep the ball. Apart from Hayden there’s little real mobility in there with positional sense. Midfield is a big weakness imo.

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One of the reasons possession is shit is because we can’t keep the ball. Apart from Hayden there’s little real mobility in there with positional sense. Midfield is a big weakness imo.

 

Aye, we have a midfield that struggled to boss games in the Championship.

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He's the type of player you get in January when you're not prepared to pay the odds (let alone 'over the odds'). Players that are out of favour and/or unproven and/or damaged goods and/or unfit. Maybe there's a market out there, from time to time, which represents opportunity and value, like the cases of MLS/Miggy and France/Sissoko et al, but you tend to need good connections and good scouts for that.

 

Bentaleb's clearly in the mould of agents chucking their unwanted players to the four winds in the hope that someone is desperate enough to take a punt; see Doumbia. He won't have been scouted, how could he have been? He hasn't been playing.

 

Meh. Maybe he'll do alright. But I'm absolutely certain that, if Rafa had been given a competitive budget, a properly identified, transformative CM would have been very close to the top of his list. Diame rightly not retained, Shelvey unreliable, Hayden getting better but still could've been improved upon, Ki a stopgap and Longstaff with potential but unproven. It's a massively influential position and it can make or break a team. Rafa will have known that and I'm sure he'll have had ideas about what to do with it.

 

But then, maybe avoiding proper summer investment and scrabbling around in the January market - picking up unwanted lads who can't get a game for a sub-elite Bundesliga sides - is the key to taking us forward, which is of course absolutely what we're trying to do.

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