og1874

CM is the key, and like I say I don't see too much changing in terms of who we would be likely, or able, to sign there regardless of the manager. I think most managers like a bit of width from their full backs, the main difference would be whether or not wingers are used up top. We'll be unlikely to be able to sell all our wingers this summer, so I'm not sure there'd be much of a difference there either, if a new man came in and inherited the squad in October or whenever.

We need a new central midfield and go from there. The right players in there and the mistakes drop off drastically, we're not as easy to play through, and there's a better balance in attacking play.

Here's my 2c if anyone cares, which I'm sure they don't... Gerrard has come in and inherited a squad with major balance issues - issues that, as we all know, have existed for a while. It's also a squad that lost its main focal point last summer, and replaced it with players who further unbalanced the squad (made worse by injuries to said players prior to Gerrard's tenure, affecting season prep). Before Gerrard, it was abundantly clear that there were major, major issues in the squad, despite it being, man for man, our best squad in over a decade (at least). More than the balance issues, we also have a squad that is far too capable of individual errors costing goals at literally any point in the game. We have very few players who can be relied upon NOT to make a mistake in the 90 minutes. This is why those players are at Aston Villa and not Man City. It's fine margins at the top of any sport, and a player who is reliable 95% of the time, still has that 5% in him to give away a goal at any point. Worse than that, errors breed errors. Players get in their own heads when they're the ones making errors, and they also start to anticipate their teammates making errors, learning to them not being able to completely focus on their game, leading to them making mistakes, leading to them getting into their own heads, leading to their teammates worrying about them making mistakes. It's an insipid cycle, and difficult to break without a complete overhaul. This too was present before Gerrard. None of these are excuses, they are all facts which I'm sure very few people on here will disagree with. So enter Gerrard. He's inherited the same unbalanced, error-prone set of players we had before him, and added Coutinho, Digne, Chambers, and Olsen. Digne has clearly divided people, that's fine (however I do wonder of the logic of the whole "oh typical, we get rid of Targett for Digne and then Digne gets injured and we have no cover... we have the exact same cover we would've had for the position if we hadn't brought Digne in and kept Targett - that particular stick used to beat Gerrard makes no sense). Coutinho, I'm sure we'll all agree is a talent none of us would have passed up. Chambers was a bargain, and has been reasonably successful, and Olsen is a sub keeper we hope never has to play. All in all, not really a squad changing improvement in terms of personnel brought in, but hard to argue that there wasn't an improvement through Coutinho alone. The main issue is that the manager has a style he wants to play, and we don't have the personnel to play it. So there are two options - you implement the style for the benefit of those who will be staying and playing it next year, or you put that implementation off and just figure out what works with the players available. Given that the team is highly unlikely to get relegated (despite what some seem to think), there are pros for the first approach. I would personally have preferred a hybrid if I'm being honest, where the approach is "start with what we have the personnel for on day one, and gradually shift things towards what the desired long-term style", for me that makes more sense, and is more likely to keep players confident rather than amplify the individual errors (which we're seeing). I question the logic of not looking back to what worked last season (with basically the same set of players, but Coutinho instead of Grealish, and some major upgrades on fringe players). Why was it not a case of playing the same system with Coutinho stepping in for Grealish, and using the abundance of wingers at the club, rather than wasting their abilities? For me, that should've been the base to build from, and that is the major criticism I have of Gerrard - BUT like I said above, I can understand why the idea of implementing the long-term desired style at the potential risk of short-term under-performance was chosen. I don't believe Gerrard has done anything to show that he can't be trusted with money. I also don't think he's done anything to show that his system won't work with the right players. Everyone can see central midfield is killing us at the moment, and we basically need 2 new starters there in the summer. If we get the right players there, or close to the right players, we will be a completely different team - just with those players alone. There'll be less mistakes, people will have more clarity of their roles, and things should, in generally, see a massive upturn. That is true whether Gerrard is the manager or not. If we sack him, we still need the same 2 central midfielders we need if we don't sack him - the only real difference would be whether we sell or keep the wingers we have (as another guy may not opt for same approach as Gerrard - or, I should say, almost definitely won't). I would also imagine that the players brought in, or attainable to be brought in, wouldn't vary too much regardless of whether it's Gerrard or another manager bringing them in. Ultimately, for me, I'm still of the opinion to let the current manager get those players, and see if the improvement comes (which I'm pretty sure it would). Bottom line is that, like I said above, I'm pretty sure any replacement manager would be shopping from the exact same pool of players, with the exact same resources, and would likely bring in the same guys, so either way I think the personnel we have in September would be pretty similar with or without Gerrard, and I don't think there would be another mass rebuild or exodus if Gerrard was moved on at any point next season. The issues are so glaring, and the pool of players realistically attainable by us so similar regardless of the manager in charge, that you have to imagine most managers would be addressing the same things in much the same way. For that reason, let's just see how August-October fares on the pitch.

Even if we managed to do some kind of swap for Ings re Bissouma, I'd also look to get Ollie sold, too tbh

Stick a tenner on it, you'll be a millionaire if it happens

I think he might well end up being part of any offer to Brighton for bissouma. They need a forward who can score, we need a central midfielder

That would bean we’d need to lose a total of 11 in a row - which we’ve done once, the season we went down. The chances of any premier league team losing that many games in succession is very slim. obviously it has happened to us before, and sunderland managed even more once (15 in a row one season, followed by their next 5 after their next promotion), but it’s very, very rare

I've honestly raised this idea in the past

I’d have bottom third as “one of the worst” We DO miss most of our clear cut, high xG chances. The goals we score tend not to be the clear cut chances. We score efforts that aren’t expected to result in goals, and we typically miss those that ARE expects to be goals. We overperform xG not because we convert our good chances, but because we convert our unlikely chances

Was expecting a hiding and a poor performance Got a hiding but actually showed some very encouraging signs imo

Norwich can’t mathematically be relegated the day we play them - they’ll have 18pts to play for and be a maximum of 16 from safety

That’d equal the total games they’ve won in the entire season so far

I’d have him over Kane every day of the week tbh

Have to feel sorry for him really. At this stage it feels like prime scholes would be left on the bench for us

Oh I've got no doubt, but even with that there's such an infinitesimal chance of us going down it's as close to impossible as you can get

We would literally need to lose every single game we have left (which would make it 11 defeats in a row), and STILL need Burnley or Everton to turn in a miraculous change in form

So they're basically Russia then Too soon?

I fear it's inevitable unless he ups his turkey game. No good doing it on the pitch if you can't dress up in a silly costume over the Christmas.

If we don't start well and score a couple before the 35th minute I can't see anything other than a comfortable Spurs win. Even if we do score 2 before the 35th minute I wouldn't necessarily rule out us getting nothing from it either. Holding out hope that this is one of the times we transform into prime Barca out of nowhere

The last defender is the keeper, and he's ahead of the keeper. There needs to be 2 defenders between the player and the goal line. Where Cucurella is doesn't matter based on the fact that Martinelli is the most advanced player on the pitch

Only 6-0 Chelsea at full time. Absolutely slackers

Or people should just be a bit more sensible when reading into it. It was basically him saying they're not getting him on loan next year, and they can't afford to convince him to sell him to them. It's the Purslow Bissouma comment all over again.

Burnely currently on 24, so factor in the minimum 4 we'll gift them, plus a win tomorrow, and they'll likely need 4 points from any of their remaining 6 to stay up

They're as good as gone now, so at least we won't have to worry about them for another year at least

Not sure how or why it took that long TBH, it's clearly offside and should've been obvious quite quickly. I genuinely think they actually forgot the rules that it has to be 2 members of the defending team between the goal line and attacker, and were just looking at the last man