I agree about the AM part...why is Gaston still here and eating up wages? He clearly has no future with us so just ditch him asap so we can get someone else. However the Toby thing looked to be just unfortunate. We believed him when he said he wanted to join us and thought we had dibs on signing him..in the end toby changed his mind and Madrid were happy to go along and **** us over for a few million..not much we could do there. We were perhaps a little gullible but im not going to blame the club for toby/madrids ****ing about. In my opinion the key is putting this **** behind us no matter who is to blame. I dont care if our new players are complete unknowns that cost 2 buttons and a half yard of wool, whats important is that they fit into the attacking, passing team we had last season. I'm sure we could've bid for shaqiri and co but if they're unlikely to want/able to fit into our system of play then we shouldn't buy them. We've been playing ultra defensive football of late and i think its due to limited player availability so i believe we should be buying the necessary cogs to make us tick rather than high profile names. TLDR Ron needs our players gelling and to ditch the dead weight so we can put this defensive hoofball garbage behind us and start netting the ball and playing proper football.
In all honesty (and I've said this before too) I'd really only take Ayew and Wijnaldum in the "players I wish we'd got" category. Thauvin, we'll see. Payet has a ridiculous wage/pay for games deal, Shaquiri has failed at his last two clubs - so let's wait and see.
Koeman is playing very safe with a new team and new players by playing 5 at the back. He is a manager that is desperately trying to get results with a side that hasn't really played together before. The issue is he obviously doesn't trust his defenders, which is a big worry. If he doesn't have confidence in them, how can they have confidence in themselves!? I honestly don't know what the answer is, other than being patient with the team. I would add to Croatia's post Gueye, Amavi, Adama traore for villa, Rondon for Wba, Andre Ayew for Swansea. All immediate improvements. Our window still means we have to play Yoshida every game, who has gone from fourth choice to first team regular. We need to go back to four at the back, and get our passing swagger and pressing game back ASAP.
Right you are..my bad, we really need more abbreviations in football, its becoming awfully crowded I stand by my point about Gaston though.
Decided not to post last night and read through everything on here before doing so. I'm absolutely gutted, mainly about the result but the performance across 2 legs was awful, very much shades of Brammall Lane for me. Was disappointed that Ron said we we're unlucky and that we created chances (did we???) We weren't unlucky we didn't turn up for either game really, we didn't look like scoring in 180 minutes of football and the goal we did score was a pen. Think Ron got it wrong in both legs to an extent, last night we should of been straight at them, there never seemed to be any urgency, almost an arrogance that we would score eventually, though it was patently obvious we wouldn't from around the 40th minute onwards. I think he took too long to make the changes as well. Martina got forward alot but his crossing was poor. We needed the goal, we should of been making them worry about us not us worrying about their threat. We should improve but the combination of dodgy at the back n a bit toothless up front is a dangerous one to have, can't wait till Ryan is back and I'm hoping that Clasie will be the link between midfield and attack that we so desperately crave. Would still love another striker/AM before window shuts but don't think we will see one. Back to 4-3-3 on Sunday please and less of the hoofball, Tadic to start and let's get back to the style that worked for us so well last year. I wouldn't be against Juanmi starting as we haven't seen enough to see what he can do and it would be good to see how he does starting a PL game. Norwich will be extremely tough though as under Alex Neil they're a better away team so will probably play similarly to the Danes, we will have to be patient. Overall absolutely gutted, have to focus on the League Cup now for me as it's the best chance we have of a trophy. Let's just hope it's not another 12 years before we qualify for Europe again.
Agree with that. Which is why we need to be patient and get our actual first team out and playing. Then we'll see what the *real* plan is.
I still believe we're trying to do it right. I don't know all the wages so maybe we could nudge up abit, but fundamentally were doing it right.
If Koeman is worried about our defence, he has to act....he can't just pretend all is well just to keep the teams spirits up (as proposed by Osvaldorama). He was pleased with our shutout at Watford...obviously would have liked us to score at the other end, but you have to start with the defence. In the Europa Cup, the opposition scored in both games with virtually their only chance....that's what we should be looking to do next.
We have to create some clear cut chances first though. Ignoring shots statistics I'd say over the 2 legs they had better chances than us.
I'm not sure about that; they cleared balls off the line in both legs and we missed very good opportunities to hit the target in both games. We also hit the post at home.
Fair point about the balls of the line n I forgot about Yoshis header in 1st leg, but I honestly don't remember these 'very good opportunities' I remember a few half chances here n there which we should of done better with but nothign clear cut, paticuarly from last night.
And we were denied one of the most blatant penalties of all time as "Duncan" punched the free kick away...
I refuse to use that as an excuse though. If we played very and were unlucky then I'd be more annoyed about it. As it was though we were very very poor n didn't look like we would score in a brothel. I actually thought the ref was atrocious for both teams.
I was just pointing out that on another day things might have worked out (despite our inept display) and we'd have gone through. As I said earlier in the thread, Midgetland are a disgraceful team full of cheats and time-wasters. Every time one of our players leapt for a header they backed in and won the free kick. Every time we had a decent bit of pressure in the box, someone fell over holding his face. A player who wasn't touched dropped to the floor and rolled around in his own penalty area to get Pelle sent off (failed, thankfully). The weather was ****. The opposition were pricks. Our team was dreadful. Jeez. It was bad.
I wish! I would have got comp then. I am a Gym Instructor, but taking exams to become a personal trainer. I was doing a exercise when my thumb bent right under me snapping.