Keener window-cleaner

Nyland with his other gloves on.

I wonder if Bacuna will play for them or if they by now have found out how crap he is.

Who is right about what?

Long injury, no pre season games(?), high wages, I hope the gamble will be worth it if he signs! At the moment I'd rather spunk the wages on a striker and a cb. Jimmy can take Bolasie's place as wide forward.

Everytime he is heard of makes it more of a farce, best to quickly and silently cut the ties.

I was very pleased to see that he made a couple of top class saves. Despite the second goal being a mistake of his in my eyes, some of the other saves were better than I ever saw Sam Johnstone do last season. I was worried that Nyland would turn out to be a disaster for us, so it was very good, a relief, to see that he has this potential. Now he has to work on being more commanding and to come out more decisive on crosses and corners. He should watch videos of Brad Friedel and how he shouted "AWAY" every time a ball came into the penalty area. Nyland gets bullied at corners which isn't acceptable, he is big and strong enough not to let that happen. He looked almost terrified when he went out on the pitch yesterday, and looked nervous during the game. He needs to beef up his confidence quickly. I want to see him shout more and be more angry (towards the opponents) to give a more confident impression. Regarding his kicking I remember one clearence in the first half that was a bit short, and one in the second that went way too far directly to their keeper. Otherwise I thought it was very good, nothing at all to complain about (and compare that kicking to Guzan that we had in the PL). He was also quick out to start attacks. All in all he showed that he has potential, be more commanding and he can come good for us.

I agree 100%. I think McGinn has contributed to this, at least yesterday Bruce trusted him and Whelan in midfield and could give Jack a more free role. It makes much of a difference to have the third midfielder in front of the mid two, instead of having a holding midfielder behind the mid two. Except Jedi in defence, the only real issue I had with yesterday's set up was that Elmo played as the wide forward. I think the wingers/wide forwards in this formation must be attacking players/goal scorers, otherwise too much relies on the sole forward. Hopefully Bolasie or El Gahzi will fill that role.

I agree. It's the trade off any team has to make, you can't be 100% solid at the back and play expansive attacking football at the same time. I prefer playing good attacking football and then loose or draw the odd game because of mistakes at the back, compared to the way we have played focusing on defence and nick a goal. With that tactic we nevertheless loose the odd games, but in a turgid depressing manner. There is also much improvement to be made in our defence, bring in a solid cb next to Chester, hopefully Nyland will improve and after a while a new back four will hopefully become more solid. So we have the potential to play good football and still be fairly solid at the back.

Solid performance, but he isn't a cb. You could see at their first goal that he didn't spot the danger and then stood still, Chester on the other hand reacted an threw his body towards the player despite being further away than Jedi, who just stood still and watched. He has good delivery when he is heading the ball, but when he has it at his feet it makes me nervous. Don't know how many times it wnet over the line to the left today.

Wow the first 60 mins was the best I have seen us play in a long while, totally outplayed them. Passing, attacking and creative stuff!

Yes! We could line up with: Nyland --- --- --- --- Whelan, Jedinak, Doyle-Hayes --- Lansbury, Lyden, McGinn --- Bjarnason, Hourihane, Grealish Kodjia With Tshibola on the bench.

And how about Tony?

Abraham please please please!! He can play as a lone striker and hold up the line, would be a perfect fit! And could play Kodjia as a wide forward where he has played really well for us before. Make it happen! And then a new CB and I will be over the moon!

On the youtube videos it looks like he is more playing as a wide forward than a normal winger, that's promising! No more RB as our most forward player on the wing but a proper wide forward. Looks like he can play on both sides as well. Seems to have great technique and takes free kicks as well, reminds me a little of Ronaldo the way he plays. Very excited about this one, get it done!!

He is 1,89m/6ft 2in! I like it!

If he is back to full fitness this is a super signing. I saw that he played 16 times last year, but only 3 full games. It's a bit of a worry what shape he is in. It seems a bit odd that Everton would spunk out nearly £30M on a player and then loan him out if he is back to full fitness. It's a bit of a gamble, for me it's 50/50 if he will be a hit or if he will be injured/out of form and be a new Micah Richards. In that case we will have wasted much in wages. I do think it's worth the risk though, not at least because he is such an exciting player to watch, he makes things happen. And I trust the ppl at the club making the judgement that he is in good shape. I thought Everton massively overspent on him, but he is still a very good player. I also think he fits in to our style of play. Although I would rather have seen a player who is a good passer and good at keeping possession, the direct style of play we have probably suits Bolasie very well, kick it towards his side and let him run with it and see what happens. All in all, incredible if we manage to loan a £30M player!!! Who would have thought that a month ago. Now I'm just waiting for Tony to announce it with a cryptic tweet!

Yes! Then we could field a midfield of the new Gazza, El Gazza and McGazza.

I'd be happy for them to pay his wages while he is injured, which he probably will be most part of the season.

He didn't have much to do, but he was solid today. I wonder if playing him as cb contributed to us playing so many long balls, I didn't see us play it out from the back a lot. Could be because we don't trust Jedi with the ball in the build up. A shame if so.

He looked good the first minutes as a wide right forward, had two threatening runs. Disappeared after he was switched to central striker. Can't understand why we changed his position while it looked like working.

The picture quality was good and worked without disruptions for me. But still, it's so amature. Several times the ball goes out of picture, strange zooming, camera focus on the corner flag/linesman. Also had to watch the whole game without sound as the commentary was ahead of the picture. And no replays!

Man of the match for me, excellent performance! How much energy does he have? Around the 85th minuted he made a long run tracking back and made a last ditch tackle. A couple of minutes later he burst forward past a couple of players and nearly scored. I love him already!

I am at the moment not for sacking Bruce (as I wrote in my previous post) so I guess that makes me a "Bruce inner" . I certainly do not look through this thread in dispair shaking my head. I think it is really interesting to share views on Bruce's tactics for example, especially after a showing like today's. I hope others do as well and are not disencouraged to post about it, critical or not of Bruce.

I think we had a plan B, the way we played after the substitutions. The problem for me is that plan B should have been our plan A. I'm confident we should have won the game if our players had 90 mins to play, not just the last 25.

Did he get criticised for not coming out on crosses last game? Perhaps he had learned and tried to much to come out this time, and did it one time too much. It was a mistake, but not a disaster. Can't remember him having anything else to do, so difficult to judge him yet. I thought his kicking was really good, and he tried to start attacs quickly a couple of times as well which was good to see. For me the jury is still out on him.