Could be because Barca seemed to have cooled their interest in him. None of the prospective Presidents seem to be keen on signing him and would rather keep spending their wage bill on Messi
Sad - but oh so true Didn't hear the commentary but does not surprise me My mate was raging Think he broke loads of rules sending me the clip and his rant lmao
That was a very solid performance and highly satisfactory, not amazing but the win and the clean sheet are the main things. Ok it's 'only' Sheff Utd but the attitude and application looked decent and god knows we need to start trying to be a bit more positive, probably both fans and the squad. We looked good for a lot of the match I thought, just lacking finesse in the first half when we should really have scored at least one, and slightly inert you would probably say throughout, but that's not surprising (not making excuses here) and hopefully we can continue to improve now and get an important win against Chelsea. I ended up watching a lot of the 'punditry' on Sky today which I'd normally avoid and I've just got to say that Roy Keane is just the rudest ****ing guy. Souness made a fair and decent comment about Chelsea being a tougher ask and Keane just says 'Yeah obvious point'. The man lacks any kind of basic manners. I don't know how he keeps being employed, it's actually offensive watching him on tv. And that's not even from a Utd rivalry standpoint. It's just such low standards.
so: a) yes a little bit of attitude for sure. There was a change in jones for sure. whether klopp's tactical work freed him up or whether he had a word with the lad; or just the lad snapped himself out of the playing safe it worked. Milner came on and chased about setting a good tone. Naby didn't I felt salah came ot work hard and he set a better tone than mane and firmino. b) tactics changes, It seems roberton was pushed right on and mane vacated the wing to let him do so. Trent seemed to be held back first half c) Phillips and Kabak? accident waiting to happen. both going for same ball, phillips is dead dead slow and kabak a ball watch who got caught several times. willig to be now this won't be the partnership when fabinho returns fully. d) misses - they were atrocious last night, absolutely atrocious. we should have had 5 first half that if they fell to kane or son theres no question they get sent. e) sky: are we shcoked by sky now? From neville's constant use of the word scabby to roy keanes nastiness. Keane seems the next big ron atkinson to me. he will eventaully say something seriously offensive and sky will have to sack him.
You must know that Sky employs Keane BECAUSE he shouts his mouth off right? It attracts more viewers and gets more clicks and subscribers on their YouTube channel. Players, managers clubs referees pundits are all fair game. He’ll be dismissed if he says anything sexist or racist or could be interpreted as such. But he’s too savvy to ape Ron Atkinson. In the meantime Sky will welcome outrage such as yours.
We actually played pretty well last night and would have been far more comfortable had we been more clinical. But the good news is that Klopp did change things and we looked better as a result. We ditched the horrible 433 and went more attacking - I think it was a 4222 with Gini and Thiago as the double pivot with Jones playing in a more advanced role which was perfect for him. As many goals as Salah and Mane have scored over the years, they rely on volume i.e. the more chances and more shots, the more we score. Whilst we have created some very good chances over the past month (during our horrible run of form), we've literally been having 1 good chance a game. It's incredibly difficult to win games by converting 100% of big chances in a game, especially when you only have 1. Yesterday, we created a high volume of good chances and we scored twice. The concerns are and will continue to be our defence and it's something we have to deal with until we get VVD, Matip and Gomez back. We have to accept that our defence will be leaky but as long as we keep creating chances, we should be able to overpower teams. It was just so refreshing to see us play some proper football for a sustained period of time. Shout outs to Jones and Trent - best players by far.
a) I agree about Mane, Firmino I thought played pretty well. b) Robbo was more in the centre of the pitch yes, we were almost playing 3 5 2 or 3 4 3 with Trent like a more mobile CB/FB combo, it was good to see all this really as we can't just leave the formation as it has been, it's needed to be tweaked for ages, it worked when we had the whole first team but it can't be expected to work with 50% different personnel. Good that we can be more fluid c) Phillips seems like what he is, a bang average English CB. Kabak, unfortunately, currently looks like a disaster waiting to happen, he did a couple of good things but he shipped one himself and always seems two steps behind, in thinking and in the legs. No judgement yet, he may get better in time. d) True, but we scored two and won fairly comfortably e) Not shocked, I just find it disgusting and it reminded me why I don't bother. Pandering to the lowest common denominator and they're part of the problem why certain parts of the culture of football in this country can't and won't change