the_eristic

He NEVER had any pace though, and was an important part of the pure counter attacking side that found quite a bit of success for us (relatively speaking!). Players with intelligence don't need the pace anywhere near as much, especially in the middle of the park. It's the speed of thought that matters, and Barry is quite good at seeing space and moving the ball smartly.

As long as he doesn't expect us to keep him on City wages, I'd absolutely have him back. His composure and consistency would be a boon to our side.

As good as GG might turn out to be, I don't think he'll ever be a player with the specific type of creative vision someone like Sneijder has. I see him in competition with Delph for, as you say, the box-to-box spot, but with Sylla or Westwood staying back, we're still in need a player to control and move the ball intelligently in attacking positions and pick the locks for the front three, so we aren't stuck with counterattacking so often. It sounds as though Helenius will be tried as a pseudo-trequartista at some point, but I think we'll see a dedicated attacking playmaker brought in before the season starts.

That's an interesting idea. We jumped from around 30th to 8th in the world with the conclusion of the previous season. Perhaps that jump shifts the standard of everything to a bracket with the teams of comparable rep.

What gives? I had "extensive" youth recruitment a couple months ago, went to my facilities page to check on something and noticed recruitment was down to "established", had to go harangue the board to get it back up to merely "well established"! Does youth recruitment downgrade itself over time, did the board do it for some reason without informing me or did something else cause it, like letting a coach or two leave?

Isn't that guy a known BS artist? Regardless, I can't see us selling to another English side for that little.

Aw geez, this thread too?

Laursen for teaching them how to smash the ball away. Mellberg for teaching them how to smash Freddie Ljungberg. Carew for teaching them how to smash strippers and models. Sorted.

I think he's been signed as a utility man, we'll see him tossed in whenever/wherever needed, might nail down a position if he excels in it. If he can become even average by Premier League standards at any of the positions he can play, his value will have tripled at a minimum, and Lambert must see something in him to believe he can make the step up. No risk in this one for me, lots of potential benefit.

Don't think he will get ahead of Johnson though, for some bizarre reason managers are always enamoured by Glen **** Johnson. Its mainly to do with the club he plays for though in fairness to Joihnson he was one of England better players at Euro 2012 Not just England, Johnson has been preferred at club level by 4 consecutive Liverpool managers now. There must be something about him I'm missing... He's the English Cafu! Or, perhaps more accurately, since our very own Alan Hutton is the Scottish Cafu, he's really just the English Hutton?

He's a "resolute" personality, "level-headed" in media handling, and was very happy to have joined, so I don't know where this outburst came from! Ozil, for ~18m. Big wages, but short contract. Shirt sales like mad already. Offers more consistency and physicality than Canales with a mostly similar but better skill set. Wound up spending the bulk of the Ganso/Gotze money on an absolutely incredible 18-year-old newgen central defender at Atalanta, so it worked out well. A few other managers dislike me for "buying success" now, lol!

Yeah, seems like he can place 'em or lace 'em with minimal backlift. We're shaping up to be a real shooting side this year!

Just had a player "concerned" over being subbed. His legs were shot and he wasn't doing much, but now he's properly pissed because I told him I would make changes as necessary and is "considering his options". He's only arrived two weeks ago and has played three games, 90 minutes in two of them, where's he think he's going to go?!

I agree. Well, if by doesn't, you mean does. Often. Splitting hairs, I know.

Well, scratch Ganso, his agent is "unfriendly" towards me for some reason, won't even open talks.

I play a narrow front 3 with two poachers playing off a 6'3"+ target man, with one or two CAMs behind them. If I'm just using one, I'll go for the playmaker; two, one playmaker, one dribbler. Ganso would mainly be in competition with/replacing Sergio Canales, who is a bit of a hybrid of the two styles, but too inconsistent to start every match and is completely lacking in physical presence. As far as I can tell, Ganso has the highest creative/mental skills in the game without being hilariously expensive, on insane wages, or >30 years old. My facilities and physios are world class, don't have too much injury trouble, but you never know. Also, I just want to buy a real-life big name player for once, and CAM is the only spot where there are players I like who represent proper upgrades. The most well-known player I've purchased previously is Lacina Traore; Canales was released from Madrid, got him on a free. Gotze would be best overall (though he seems to be injured fairly often, too), but he'd cost probably my entire budget and would demand over 100k/week wages vs 50m and probably 65k/week for Ganso. Of the other "big" AMs with stats I like, I could get Mesut Ozil for absolute peanuts, but he doesn't look quite as good, or Jovetic for somewhere between Ganso and Gotze, but he's already on 130k/week at Liverpool. Chelsea had Hazard valued at 300m on 176k/week and I don't think Bayern would sell Toni Kroos to me due to our rivalry.

I have 75 million in the bank and absolutely nothing worthwhile left to spend it on. Should I blow it all trying to get Ganso or Gotze just for the hell of it? I'm not one to make marquee signings nor sign older players (they're 27 and 25, respectively) and am not short on good AMs, but both are substantially better than what I have (in terms of their current ability, anyway), we're silly rich from success and selling players to City, Madrid, et cetera for stupid money, and with a few more great seasons should make it #1 in the world. I owe it to myself and our fans to splurge a little, right?

No modern Gibson is worth that kind of money, especially when you can buy one of the banjo world's holy grails for that, an original 1939 Style 12 Mastertone: http://www.gruhn.com/photo/JA6138.jpg The quality just isn't there on their new stuff. Yet another indication of their business model, preferring to be "lifestyle" products over accessible high quality instruments. Honestly, much better off buying a Nechville or Deering.

Amps? I don't know the UK market as well (other than the fact that US stuff tends to be insanely marked up over there), but what's your budget and what do you really need? Since pics are being posted, here's a few of the amps in my general vicinity: The Carr is my go-to for the typical work I do (displacing a Goodsell Super 17, which is still in close competition), but I've always been the type that prefers different tools for different jobs. There's another 9-10 strategically positioned (id est, carried in and set down wherever I could find before dropping dead for the night) around the house.

You know, people on football forums love to accuse other posters of living in Football Manager land, but that is EXACTLY how to become rich and successful quickly in FM. Lambo must've been playing one day when it hit him: "I've gone from the Conference all the way to winning the European Champions' Cup seven years in a row with little more than a hodge-podge 132 African and Eastern European teenagers and Ethan Moore. This... can work."

Have we signed anyone ye... wait, we have? What witchery is this?!

What those videos show me is that we should be signing Montpellier's left side to come with him!

We've supposedly been interested in him since Lambert took the reins. Wonder if it's just lazy journalism, if we're actually still interested, or if the price will have shot up too much due to his excellent season.

Maybe he thinks it'll come with some of that Chinese baby milk. It comes in powdered form, right?