tajjuk

I think that is some home reffing right there. The pen is not clear cut imo, I mean it cleary hits his leg first and goes up onto his hand, so seems a bit harsh to me, feel like he's not giving that the other end.

You are talking nonsense about something you clearly don't really understand. As said above shots on target is irrelevant, one team could have 10 30 yard shots straight at the keeper and the other team has two tap in chances. It's about the quality of chances and how likely on average those chances should be scored.

It's not a pointless stat at all, its about judging the quality of chances created, if your XG is generally high it means you are generally doing well and creating good chances. It's a stat that shows what anyone saw today, we were the better team and Newcastle were clearly lucky.

Saint-Maximin is Adama Troare Mk 2, looks very good and dangerous, often little end product. He just seems to do well against us. 3 goals and 4 assists last year and exactly the same the year before. Redmond has 6 goals and 7 assists in the same period........

Armstrong a bit over awed maybe on his return to St James park, trying a bit too hard to prove himself? Other Armstrong is also a miss, by far the best finisher out of the 'no.10s'.

How were we lucky? by far the better team, double their shots, way more possession, actually tried to win rather than camping at the back at home. They won't be that flukey against other teams. Considering we have started with two away trips where we for some reason have terrible records, and have also played Man Utd, its an ok start to the season and performances have been decent aside a poor second half against Everton. Think this team will get better, Armstrong to come back in, Lyanco to maybe go in there as well.

Newcastle are the baffling most lucky team in the league, they have played like relegation contenders for about 3 years, park the bus even at home and seem to somehow fluke results from a handful of shots at best.

He doesn't press at all, Tifo looked at him as to whether he would fit into City and basically said he'd have to be carried in that regard. He is basically going to to sit in the box and walk around until there is a chance for him. He can still run though, saw that in the Euros when he cleared from his own box and was up the other end of the pitch in no time tapping it in. He just saves his energy for basically scoring goals. Utd not a huge pressing team anyway though, and with Rashford and Sancho he's got two fast hard working people who will just work of him, with him being a pivot in the middle. He'll still bang goals in imo and lift that team because he is relentless, he's a perfectionist and will expect that from his teammates, he'll probably send a rocket up Pogba if he has some of those games Pogba tends to have where he just switches off. That dynamic will be interesting. What is hilarious IMO is ol' slabhead Maguire is now Captain to Ronaldo, Pogba and Varane.

The buy back is there and of course is something that could happen, but I think often they are not exercised, Chelsea need to have the £40 million available at the right time, the space in the squad, the need in the position, the player has to want to return etc. Who knows if he is this good he could be wanting to follow his idol Ronaldo to Real Madrid

I think Walcott was a fairly low risk comfort blanket signing. He did ok for us last year, he clearly is respected and works hard in training so can help the younger players a bit and seems from the videos and stuff to be well respected by his teammates. We didn't know how the window would go, we probably had targets but pretty much all of them Armstrong, Lyanco, Tino, Small, etc. have had other clubs as strong suitors and we didn't know what would happen with Ings and Vestergaard. But we clearly knew we needed bodies and more squad depth, so being able to get him to sign back in June or whatever was a safe move. Yeh sure with hindsight and how the window has gone, with potentially more opportunities opening up for a late deal by the looks of things, his signing looks a little unneeded, but back in May/June I think it makes sense.

A Korean international 20 year old who has been highly rated and has top flight experience in La Ligs, ON A FREE, seems a no-brainer to me, come on Saints do it, sell the stepping stone young players etc. etc. line.

He should be extra motivated to be fair.

Maybe, maybe not, but it definitely has more options and depth, and it was that that caused more problems last year than the quality of the first team. The fit and in form first team got to the top of the league. The injuries and the lack of depth caused the terrible run and lack of holding onto leads, more depth should mean injuries to the first eleven impact performance less and the more options of the bench should help us hold onto leads or change more games.

Considering Armstrong is injured and Walcott has been poor, and Redmond is well Redmond, I'd put him in line to start.

I thought you meant he only got a 6 out of 10. I suppose if Armstrong can play in the two centre-mids then its not absurd for Mo to be able to do it as well, if someone a little more defensive is with him.

To be fair to the guy he can't really do much more, he goes out on loan and does very well, he comes back and gets a chance (albeit against lower opposition) and does very well. If he is also training well then he deserves a chance imo. Whether he will be good enough we don't really know, but the guy has actually only had 8 PL starts and less than 800minutes of PL football, in a team that was very poor at the time, who's manager then got sacked, whilst he was in his first season in a new league after moving from a different country. Also as that Lille performance (two great goals btw) and iirc he was man of match against Man City in the CL, shows he has played well against good opposition. The guy probably has more Champions League and Europa League appearances than our whole squad put together.

I mean Newcastle suck but we never seem to do well in this fixture, even when they had 9 men. I also presume they will now have Willock available to start which will give them a boost. I doubt he'll drop McCarthy with that new contract seems pretty obvious he is the no.1 for this season at least. Interesting to see if Ralph does anything tactically against Saint-Maximin, as he is basically their main threat. A Tino/KWP right side could help with that as I he likes operate from the left quite a lot. Newcastle also playing wingbacks I think at the moment, so he might do a Southgate and match them up.

Smallbone is a centre-mid and Armstrong is a centre-mid. Supposedly also Lyanco has played DM.

If he's another Osvaldo at least it'll be interesting!

So both strikers, both centre-mids and both full backs. Notice the glaring hole there, shouldn't at least one of the No.10s be in there? Like I said on the other thread, he's not super clinical (but may improve) but as we can see his speed is another level above Ings and his work rate is also clearly excellent, if he is less injury prone as well then I can see those attributes contributing to compensate for the lack of super clinical finishing (and I still think based on his first goal and his championship goals he is a decent finisher, the shot against Utd, which was on his weak foot was really not that bad, it was a decent save from De Gea). I just feel he is going to get more chances than Ings because he's quick and probably that, together with likely to be fitter more often, will end up with a decent goal tally at the end of the year.

I think Armstrong will match or exceed Ings last year if he doesn't get a major injury and I think Adams will exceed what he did last year, I think we will end up with two double figures strikers. Armstrong is not the level of clinical finisher of Ings, may never be, (but hopefully will improve with training and experience in the league) but I think his speed and hopefully his fitness will give him more chances to score goals over the course of the season. I also think the Adams/Armstrong partnership already looks good and is likely to only get better and they seem to compliment each other more than Ins/Adams did. I think the two of them will be greater than the sum of their parts basically.

Probably another club we can start stealing youngsters from, their squad is always going to be clogged up with signings. Have Real Madrid robbed a bank? Aren't they massively in debt and still have big earners like Bale on the books. Also 160 million for a guy with 1 year left on his contract is bonkers.

Well we have been linked to Christie whos contract expires in 6 months so we might do a deal there to get him in early and are seemingly linked with the young centre-back from Dundee Utd as well. Also didn't the club say something like they had their targets but would also be holding some back to see what could be done nearer the end of the window because the thought with the way the market was their could be some bargains. Maybe that is what we are seeing but maybe also why there is £10 million or so from the sales, because we might be able to pick someone up usually out of our price range. Would love a keeper though, but doubt its happening.

Have to laugh at Chelsea going in for him, he's leaving for a better route to the first team and half their U23s have left this summer for that very reason.

Yeh if he'd had a different career path he might not have become the same player or as good.