abdulaziz1

2 hours ago, NeilS said:

I reckon Ireland was a protest vote that year, as we were universally rubbish that season. It was the pain of drawing matches to crawl over the safety line from Relegation at at the end.

I had forgotten Sinclair, yes you are right bar a handful of matches he didn't light things up. But I never expected much from him to be honest, which is probably why I had forgotten about him.

You are right, We were rubbish and heading towards the Championship thanks to Randy and Co. So it probably harsh to say no to any City players, if we were buying someone of top quality from City with a good attitude it would be fine, unfortunately they won't be letting those type of players go to us easily. Dougie they had to let go because of work permit isues, so we were fortunate to get in early with him. With Grealish I fear he will not have the hunger if he were to return here, he has achieved what he wanted to at City and I fear he would be coming back to see out his career here. We need players looking to push on and improve and give their all for the team.

Ireland had couple of good games that season, add to that he came as a part of Milner deal, usually in those kind of deals fail. I’m usually against getting fancy names thats why I was against Coutinho for example. But I think Grealish is still a good player, we had good days with him. Even Young which we had him after more than 10 years helped us qualifying to Europe. A loan for Grealish would be perfect. We’ll need a proper rotation next season anyway. I doubt City would loan to be honest, but I think that would be perfect for all parties.

2 hours ago, NeilS said:

Haha, how did I forget about Dougie sorry about that.

To be honest though, I don't count Doug as a Man City player because he never played for them in a competitive match and spent most of his short time there on loan. I was thinking more along the lines of Richards, Ireland and Lescott via Albion they were all hopeless and a monumental waste of money for us. Dunne and Given were just ok, but not the best.

Ireland somehow was our player of the season on McLeish days. 
Lescott didn’t come directly from Man City from what I remember. Richards was free transfer.

Only Sinclair was who we got from them, he didn’t do much but won us against Tesco Bags in our cup run if I’m not mistaken. Our issue was much bigger than buying from City. 

6 hours ago, ender4 said:

I wonder if we'll sell him this summer if we can get a reasonable fee?  He's 31 years old and unlikely to improve any further.  

Depends who we could get, and how much we could get for him.

35 minutes ago, Jas10 said:

With games running out and our objectives, developing young players is not the high on the list of priorities. We need players who can contribute and make a genuine impact, so much to play for. Plenty of time and opportunity for development including preseason.

Diaby and Zaniolo can make a difference… not Rogers and Duran so much atm, their time will come…

I don’t think Emery’s playing them because they’re young, even without Duran and Rogers he didn’t start Diaby and Zaniolo. All have different attributes, I think he played both because of the physicality of West Ham. Although I don’t agree starting two forwards but I can see where Emery came from. If he starts Rogers, Duran and Tim, it won’t be because he’s developing kids but because he needs them. Somehow those kids adds physicality which senior players lack.

If he got a good offer I’d sell him. He’s been a good signing generally, and we need a squad depth, but he’s better more advanced, so with Buendia back, Rogers, Ramsey and even McGinn I think we have a good depth there. But if we got a more proper CM or DCM, I think it’s what’s we need especially with Kamara not featuring for a while. 
It’s not that we don’t need him, it will be a tough season to maintain what we’ve done this season and most likely play in a tougher European competition wether it was CL or Europa. But if he could generate some amount I won’t be against that. 
For now hopefully he continues helping us on our goals, and then wether he stays or go I think both will be good for the club a way or another.

4 minutes ago, MWARLEY2 said:

He has been valuable for us once Ty was out for the season but if you arent incredible technically in this league then you at least have to be quick and strong and be taller. Not knocking him but theres no qualities that stand out in his play and natural attributes. 

Hopefully him and Zaniolo help us going to the CL, and winning the UECL and they will be remembered like our players in the promotion season. They might not be the level we want but they helped us.

4 hours ago, Pongo Waring said:

Will he start?

I think he should start, I don’t see any other way to go there without starting him. 

3 hours ago, VillaChris said:

Ultimately though if Ollie is fit he starts every single prem game we have left. Maybe he might be on the bench for Europa if we have a 2 or 3 lead but that feels unlikely.

Duran is in the same position he was six months ago which is where the frustration started. He needs to be starting 20 games in a row somewhere sooner or later so the summer will be interesting.

Fulham took Broja on loan from Chelsea so they're clearly in the market for that profile of CF so I'd offer them Duran on season long loan.

He needs to be playing regularly next season and I just don't see how that's going to happen with Ollie still firmly the number one.

The issue is we’re making it tough for ourselves all the time (ofcourse a lot of things included), so every game is becoming more important than the previous one. If we got 4-6 points from our next 2, I’d start Duran against City for example. 

8 hours ago, Callum said:

Rogers and physical do not belong in the same sentence man. He is not ready to start a prem game of this importance, we have to find another way.

So you’d prefer Diaby or Tielemans to be put run by the most physical team? For me Diaby has to be kept to the second half. Rogers to start first half. Tielemans starts as well but with both Tim and Luiz behind him.
Unless if Ramsey was ready (which I won’t risk as he will have more time to get ready during the international break).

If we managed to win UECL and qualified to CL I think we’ll be in a very great position. The squad should be stronger with Buendia and Mings back. Then we have Zaniolo and Lenglet back to their teams which reduce wages. I’m not sure wether Sanson gone already or not yet I remember something like 4m. I think we could offload Dendonker for 5 or around that. Not sure about Coutinho, but if we managed to offload then we’ve had done really well. Chambers contract will run by then or have 6 more months. 
Not sure about Dinge situation, won’t try and sell unless we get someone as Frimpong, but if we still get a decent offer then we shall take it.

If we won the Conference and went to the CL, it will get more attraction to our non wanted players. So hopefully it will help that as well. 

Crucial times for him, Tim and Rogers. Especially the first two. They’re needed in a very crucial time, it’s not about them needing time to improve but we’ll demand a lot from them.

I think he will help us a lot in the coming games. Tough game Sunday, hopefully we can win that.

1 hour ago, jackbauer24 said:

Thinking out loud rather than having a strong conviction in this thought... Could he play deep midfield while no McGinn/Kamara? Play Konsa and Lenglet in Central Defence, Cash and Moreno (or Digne) and then Pau, Tielemans and Luiz with width supplied by Bailey and Diaby to (hopefully) Watkins.

Just feel his calm composure, passing and ability to slot in as a back five when needed, could really work. Or is it to defensive? Don't think Ramsey (injuries) Rogers or Iroegbunam (readiness) are going to help us in McGinn's absence.

 

For me, I’d start Tim and Rogers. With Tielemans as well. The physical presence of the two would help minimizing McGinn absence damage. 

Tim has to start all 3 games, then for the other two positions it will depend if Ramsey was back or not. 
 

If Tim succeeded, I think he’ll continue playing beside Luiz even if McGinn was back for most games. Hopefully he success sooner than later.

Tough draws, I think there is other way to think of it. Italy will have one team out, with hopefully another if Liverpool made it. So hopefully they will only have two. If Leverkusen won which is likely so they will play Italian team. One of them will go out. Fiorentina draw seems easy but if they went out somehow that would be great for us in the UECL if we made the final and in terms of points. 
Hopefully Dortmund goes out as well which will help as well. 
Lot of stress to be honest, that’s without considering the stress of our League and UECL games! Spurs and Utd games as well.

I remember doing these things on Swansea, Wigan, QPR, Sunderland…etc fixtures. Then Derby, Boro….etc

We’ve made a long way, to start considering big English teams and some relevant European giants!

It might not really worked for him mainly because of injuries, but if we made it to the CL and won the UECL, I think we’d give credit to each point helped us in the process. We’ve won some important points with Carlos starting. 
He even scored at UECL, all these small details will be remembered if we achieve our goals. It will be a good memory despite not having what was originally expected from some individuals, but on total it will be different. Like when we look at Hause or Targett,Trez…etc had their involvements on our journey.

Even Dendonker helped us win some critical points last season, which helped us going to Europe. We can’t just go and say we didn’t benefit out of him. 
 

Especially now with this critical part of the season, we’ll whoever is around to be fit, it will be a challenging journey.

4 hours ago, Lerner's Driver said:

We aren't out of it, if our very own Justin Fashanu picks up the baton from Olly and 'sends it home'.

We don’t have the squad for the next couple of games, but if we won our next two, then again Man City and Arsenal games will be interesting. Not at home, without Kamara, but who knows how Tim will step up? No McGinn for City as well. 
The difference between getting excited of winning next ten, while failing to win another 2-3 is really small.

So another two wins will help lifting some pressure out of us (with hopefully some losses for Utd more importantly and also Spurs). Even if we do we’ll have tough time to deal with UECL, but it is what it is and let’s take it game at a time and see where it takes us. 

A win against West Ham at these circumstances will mean a lot to us, will put us in a really decent position before the next derby game. 
Big game for Duran and Tim, they need to step up, and make the manager think again how to go for the next couple of games. It’s their chance. If we won our games, McGinn red card could be good for our next couple of games, he gets rest, Tim gets more confidence. But ofcourse so far it will big a very big miss by the look of it. Up to Tim to show us different outcome. 

I’d start him at West Ham, it’s going to be a tough game anyway. He have strength so no real worry about that aspect, it will help him short and long term. More importantly no need to rush Watkins, possibly keep him on bench. You’d like him to have some rest rather than going for international games in this stage. 

So with how tough we’re making it, we still have some things to follow. Three draws on Friday, Fulham and Spurs Saturday. 
Fulham has been great to us, hopefully they continue their favors.

I think he’s done really well, as usual not helped by a yellow card, but I think he’ll be helpful in the coming run.

Is it confirmed that he won’t feature at all this season?

Hopefully he’ll have something to apologize the fans tonight, a good win against Ajax will help him forget what happened against Spurs and will help his teammates to believe in themselves again going into some tough fixtures.

Last couple of appearances he showed more encouraging performances. I think against Spurs him and Zaniolo showed a lot of fight as the game was gone and you could see the confidence factor wasn’t really in the equation so it was only fight. 
One of our best performances last season was without McGinn nor Kamara, actually without even Emery. We had some good wins as well with Dendonker on the side (I don’t think it’s a huge ask, as Tim is more athlete and more easier to play for our tactics. 
I’m not sure but I’d start him against Ajax as well. I’m really stressed about this game hopefully we can win it easily. 
Not having McGinn after that would be tough, but we were joke defensively lately, hopefully we’ll find that he was our answer. 
I think he realize the chance, with how he battled against Spurs, I think many will be surprised. 

43 minutes ago, Vive_La_Villa said:

It seems odd you can pick up more points for extra games based on the fact you couldn’t win your group. Typical UEFA.

Hopefully 3 English teams go through tomorrow. 

Hope so, even a Brighton win without going through would help as well.

Game at a time, now let’s focus on Ajax. I think Emery would start Lenglet, but who’ll start with him? Konsa or Torres? 
Then for midfield it would be a headache but I think we’d go:

Luiz, Tim, Tielemans

Diaby, Duran, Rogers

Not sure if we’ll start Dinge or Moreno.