Tommy not even on the bench either.
Tommy not even on the bench either.
Wait.. I saw Saka got a 3? Which game were we all watching? Easily our best attacking player on the pitch.
Arsene Wenger, the only football manager that got paid 8 million quid to do nothing but sit on his arse..
Glad to get that one out of the way on game one. And on a Friday night, too! I can enjoy my weekend now without that knot of anxiety. Not sparkling, but a good, professional win against a tricky opponent - Palace away is going to be a tough game for a lot of clubs this year, including the top sides.
Really pleased with how Bill and Ben are gelling - could have been a bit of animosity there, given how Saliba was loaned out and replaced with White last season, and how White has now been pushed out to RB so Saliba can take his place at CB, but I thought the two of them shielded and covered each other really well and really shut down Palace’s strongest avenue of attack. Again, professional - I like it.
We started really well and looked like we meant business, we faded after Martinelli's goal and for periods were under the cosh. I liked how we defended though and Ramsdale was in good form too.
It's a really good 3 points, it's a difficult place to come to so I think it's a really good start.
I'll stick by my prediction, if we add a Central Midfielder to the squad (Tielemans) then I think we have the quality and potential to potentially finish 3rd. I like the look of this team now and the squad is starting to take shape too. We have a lot of really good young players here now, some really special ones in the case of Saka and Saliba.
I’d be happy with either an extra left or right forward because I suspect Martinelli could also do a really good job down the right if needed, but yeah we definitely need an extra option to compete with those two - another wide sprinter who leans more towards being a forward than a midfielder (and ideally someone who could play through the middle too).
What I love about those two [Saka and Martinelli] is even when they’re not at their sparkling best they never hide - as a minimum, you’ll always get a hard-working 6-7/10 from them, where they press and track back and work their arses off, and generally allow us to maintain the structure of our play. Pepe may have a high ceiling when he’s on it, but his floor is just too low for me to want to rely on him - when he’s not on it (which is more often than not) we’re basically playing with 10 men.
Last edited by I am invisible; 06-08-2022 at 10:45 AM.
We’re looking at a potential fee of £70-80m for Fofana - no way Saliba goes for less, even once he’s down to his final year. He’ll have A LOT of very wealthy suitors after him.
Obviously I hope we sign him up to a new deal and he stays for a lot of years, but this is one of those situations where I don’t think we have much to worry about - we’ll either retain a generational talent or come out of it with enough money to buy a world-class replacement.