tajjuk

Because their league is weak and PSG aside most of the clubs are pretty poor, which means there are plenty of opportunities for them to blood youngsters and this is a good route for them to earn money by selling them on to bigger leagues. Of Europe's 'big 5' leagues, the French league is very firmly 5th in that ranking and it's only really there because of PSG. You can see it in European competitions, they have only won the European Cup once, Marseille in 1993 and only had 6 finalists. Both Holland and Portugal have won it a lot more. They also have never won the UEFA Cup/Europa League either, and again just 5 finalists. In the last 25 years they haven't won a single European trophy and only reached the final of either competition 4 times, and that is with PSGs massive spending power of the last 10 years. In terms of quality of league, finances, big clubs, top players Ligue 1 is quite a bit behind Serie A.

Better than what we have got, which he clearly isn’t. Since when are talking Maguire exactly? I said he couldn’t get near the England team and Maguire and Mings are hardly a low bar to clear but Keane is too crap for that and is too crap to even get in an awful Everton team but clowns like you clamour for this experience nonsense apparently contrary to all evidence he’s good now. The nonsense people spout on here. Keane is crap and would be a crap signing.

Since when is he? His last England cap was 2020, this would be England who's centre-back talent pool is so great that Harry Maguire is a nailed on starter despite being in the worst form of his life for the last year pretty much and making horrendous mistakes with regularity. During which period Tyrone Mings, who has struggled to get into poor Villa side has got into the England team ahead of Keane. This is also Keane who can't get into a terrible Everton team this season and was part of that same bad Everton team last year. At his best he was never that good, average at best and that 'best' was like 3-4 years ago. 'Experienced' PL player, AKA, over rated English dross that will be on high wages. He is not better than what we have got, I'd rather have Stephens back to be honest.

I hope not, both would be very poor. Why do we even need more centre-backs when we have Salisu, ABK, Lyanco and Djuleta-Car? Plus we shoved Bednerak and Stephens out on loan?

Yeh there must be reasons why clubs keep buying these players but it’s hard to see it most of the time Morata has had clubs pay a total of 189 million Euros for him but has only managed to hit a 20 goal season twice in his career and he’s 30, and both times it was only just 20 goals in all comps. Yet he’s played for Real, Chelsea, Athletico, and Juve

He probably would if he got sacked at Chelsea, can’t see him getting a bigger job after that. He doesn’t even have the name someone like Lampard can rely on. He would be looking at bottom third PL or top championship imo, which is basically where we will be. He is also a project manager and we are basically set up as project club.

It does seem odd that we are basically trying to copy city’s/pep’s philosophy but more youth development focused (because we don’t have city cash) that we then didn’t appoint a manager who fits this style, you’d think we would have gone for a promising youth coach or former pep coach or Barca coach or something to fit the same style. As others above have said Jones doesn’t fit based on his past experience bar that he speaks Spanish.

On McKennie he seems to be one of those players that moves to or gets linked with big clubs but isn’t that successful or sticks around long for some reason, similar to Rabiot or Morata.

They just made Chelsea look like a non-league team with about 6 main players rested. Best expectation is we put a shift in, don't make any massive howlers and don't get thrashed, maybe a striker gets a confidence boosting goal.

I do not get this fascination with transfer values. West Ham are currently struggling as badly as we are, yet spent £35 million on Scammaca a player many on here said we should be getting, a 'proven' goalscorer but apparently we are 'cheap' so wouldn't sign him. 3 goals in 15 in the league so far. They also got Paqueta for a fee reportedly costing over £50 million, yet he's also struggled and produced 1 goal and 2 assists in the league so far. That is less goals and assists than Perraud has managed for us. Rodrigo was £27 million for a 30 year old and he's managed 16 in 47, and only 6 goals last season in 31. If middling PL clubs are paying £30-40 million plus for players not in the PL and not wanted by one of the big clubs, then based on the amount of transfer flops from other leagues, they are over paying. We were clearly ready to go at this price bracket for someone like Gakpo, who looks pretty special and he ends up going to Liverpool, so that seems more the level of player we should be going for if we are spending £25-30 million plus. I am not saying we shouldn't be paying these levels of fees for the right player but a 20 year old who has only ever played in Argentina and 24 year old striker with a 1 in 3 record in the not very strong French league we shouldn't be paying £25 million for them or anything close. Of course those clubs want those fees, but if it wasn't PL clubs looking at them then I can guarantee the quoted fees would be lower. January is a tricky time to buy and plenty of clubs end up over paying. Plus there are still plenty of undiscovered players out there that represent good value. (Orsic is a good example of one) These players we are looking at are not proven PL players, they are not internationals for top sides or proven themselves in top European competition so they are gambles based on raw talent that we hope will be effective. I think negotiating the right price is sensible for players like this. If a top quality proven player is somehow interested in us then sure go all out, but likely none is. I am surprised they managed to get someone like Orsic to join considering our current state, he's an international with a good international team who has proven his quality in top competitions.

Some of its bad luck, some of it will be likely poor positioning/footwork from the person scoring the own goal and some will be poor defending from others that leaves someone trying to make a last ditch tackle or block that they aren't fully in control of. But yeh basically poor defending, if you are under pressure and relying on lots of blocks, last ditch tackles, not being in control of the game then some of the bounces or deflections are going to be unlucky ones.

I remember Orsic having a lot of pace and being very direct, IIRC he tore Spurs apart and seems to have a good record against teams better than Zagreb, but I am presuming they play a lot on the counter and he's good on the transition.

Full first team seems fairly logical, need to get them match sharp, playing together again and hopefully get a confidence building win.

It's good they have the transfer ban threat in there, a 10k fine to a PL is meaningless, you could see clubs breaking the rules all the time if they just got £10k, £20k fines.

We have never been a club who's transfers particularly involve a lot of rumours, generally we seem to get media noises 2-3 days before the signings actually happen and go about it very quietly before that, I don't think much has changed in that regard with SR. I am very much hoping we are not involved in getting PL rejects like Fraser. I don't see signing players from PL clubs as a sensible route for us because we are not big enough or rich enough to take up and coming players from other clubs (generally the bigger clubs do that to us) so you are talking about players that other middling to lower PL clubs don't want, so why would we want that, the cost of those players and their wages is usually far too much compared to what you get from them. A Romeu or Bertrand style signing might be alright, a good young player not quite getting into a big club, so someone like Gallagher maybe might fit that mould, who isn't getting very regular game time at Chelsea. Cole Palmer at City, van de Beek at Utd, maybe a player like that even then fees and wages are likely to be higher. If we get people in that I reckon they will be either from Europe or Championship, under 24 as well. We were targeting the likes of Gakpo and Ramos, probably both might have moved up to the pecking order for bigger clubs but it'll be the next Gakpo or Ramos or similar player.

Haaland has an 18 year old cousin breaking records in Norway youth football Tjaaland.

Gyokeres is less prolific than Armstrong, so probably more of a gamble. Only thing you can say is physically he's completely different being 6' 2" so offers something we don't really have which is height and strength in the box, so might be more useful in build up play. I mean to be honest you kind of feel Armstrong next to someone like that might be more effective.

I feel like ralph lost confidence in his own patterns of play. Previously when we had bad spells we fought through it with the same style and turned it around, but this last slump he seemed to give up a lot of the principles he'd built the team around and was constantly changing things. Did you see the last chance he fluffed right at the end?

Ok so we are going from one absurd piece of logic to another. How many top flight games did Klopp play? None. How many top flight games did Tuchel play? None. How many top flight games did Mourinho play? None. How many top flight games did Rodgers play? None. Unai Emery, 5 top flight games, never played internationally. Thomas Frank, never played professionally. Graham Potter, 8 Pl games I think, none internationally. Eddie Howe, never played in the top league. Steve Cooper, played in the Welsh League David Moyes, highest level played at was 24 games in the Scottish top league for Celtic and then most of his career in the championship. Teb haag never got out of the Eredivisie, never played internationally. De Zerbi, spent most of his career playing Serie B football or even lower. Marsch, only ever played in the MLS So most of the PL managers didn't have stellar playing careers, some of the best managers around didn't have successful playing careers or barely had one at all. I mean Lampard and Gerrard probably had the best playing careers around of recent PL managers and are probably two of the worst managers around. So yeh great point there........

Lavia, KWP and Tino were all doing training with the team at the training camp, I'm not sure if they were doing full training but looks like they all should be pretty close to being available.

Based on this incredibly dumb logic we should never sign anyone that hasn't already played in the PL, so instead of your Mane's, Van Dijks, Tadics etc. we should be going all out for the likes of Lingaard and Cleverley...... I mean for a start its massively disrespectful to all those hard working professional managers in the championship, acting like it's some sort of amateur mickey mouse league, not one of the toughest leagues in the world (iirc one of the most watched and probably stronger as a 2nd division than many top divisions across Europe). But if we signed one of the best young players who has consistently performed in the championship most people would be excited by the signing, but we get one of the best young managers in the championship, who has consistently made his team overperform with lesser resources and was championship manager season last year and suddenly he is being equated as being a manager of a local convenience store? He's got more managerial experience than Arteta had before he got the Arsenal job, more managerial experience than Gerrard had before the Rangers job and more than Lampard had before getting the Chelsea job. Just overall an absurd take.

Eh? I mean Morocco for a start, but 'least technically gifted' What are you on about? Foden, Grealish, Kane, Bellingham, Saka, Mount, Rashford, we have a forward line that matches anyone left in the competition. I mean everyone is raving about Brazil who have an ex-Leeds player who has been struggling at Barca and a back up Spurs player making up their forward line. Argentina are relying on an aging Messi, plus and France Mbappe aside are relying on a 36 year old Giroud and Greizeman who is a shadow of the player he used to be, along with Dembele who less than a year ago Barca were desperately trying to sell to anyone that would have him. I know England teams tend to get over rated in the past but this one is as easily as good as anyone else left in the competition, especially attacking wise, especially with the depth we have in attack. Defensively there are more issues granted, but none of those other teams are particularly special at the back, 39 year old Pepe as an example or Argentina playing Otamendi as first choice centre-back.

He was a good shout before he scored at the World Cup, banging them in for a newly promoted Werder Bremen side but currently the biggest two teams in Germany lack a no.9. with Bayern playing Choupa-Moting and Dortmund losing Haller to cancer, considering both like to pick the better players up from the Bundesliga wouldn't be surprised if he ends up there.

You can't blame him for the second, way over him and was the full backs man who he just didn't know he was coming in. He was also pretty instrumental in the end game siege to be fair to him, he was the one mainly heading everything away or blocking most things and I think he cleared one of the line as well. Just caught out with a late run for the first goal and good ball.

Jonathan Pearce said there was no doubt Ronaldo touched the ball first but even that I found doubtful, didn't look like a pen at all to me, very very soft.