Palfy

Alonso had a huge say in the outcome of the race near the end, Hamilton must have thought noooo not Alonso again, he’s still a legend.

When successive managers haven’t picked him, the next incumbent ( Benitez ) probably don’t give them a serious look.

Jeez that’s a blast from the past mate, the first time I had what the Americans would call a proper waffle was in Canada with bacon and maple syrup

brilliant

I would no HR in my work place

After 8 pints or was it 12

No one is going to take him off our hands who wants that in there squad, best thing we can do is pay him up otherwise he’s stinking the place out for another year

Great little story, do any of you American guys no of this France and his work I like him a lot very engaging. Go USA

40 sadly moved on.

Fair play to him I hope he becomes an absolute legend, then we can buy him back in 2 years for 30 million

Is that all.

Most definitely Bill, if they have the green light from the European court and Uefa’s hands have been tied what’s to stop them.

Morecambe and Wise comes to mind, now I’ve got this image of Shukes being short fat with hairy legs and a stirrup

The player I was talking about was Stefan de Vrij

I’m sure I read this morning that Rafa was unsure and hadn’t given it his blessing he had someone else he favoured more, I’ll see if I can dig out the name.

I did mention it and also said if he’s as good as some say there will be a few who come in for him we shouldn’t have to much of a problem getting 30-40 million for him.

It’s not defending within or around our 18 yard box it’s closing down trying to but a genuine tackle in when the balls broke down in their half or tracking a man who’s moving into space or doubling up on one of his teammates, he waits around for the ball and when he gets it either one or two things happen he uses it or loses it, sometimes with great ability and awareness that you just have to look and say fuck me, but it doesn’t happen near enough to allow for the fact that when he loses it he adds nothing until someone finds him again. You may say that makes you a dickhead but in the early 80s mate that’s how the passion in the game came out we were even allowed to make tackles then as well, it still goes off in dressing rooms and training grounds now and so it should it sets boundaries of what’s acceptable and what’s expected, we’ve needed a Keane type for years to get rid of our soft centre, because we just let people walk through us in midfield and no one seems to give a fuck.

I agree his best position is playing in the middle let’s call it a false 10, but he would still need to work off the ball. For some unknown reason working off the ball has been labelled as just defending, let’s turn the tables here why do you consider it acceptable for a player not to work when they haven’t got the ball, because that is what 100% of his critics aren’t happy about on this forum. I played semi professional for a few years and if I got in the dressing room at half time or full time and we were losing or lost, and one of the lads had not been giving it ago, I’d grab him buy throat and smash him into the wall whilst whispering in his ear that I wasn’t very impressed with him, it is usually accepted and gets the desired results, Roy Keane was doing that for years at United and they probably had the best team in the world and they all worked hard.

There shouldn’t be a manager in any league who would condone picking someone who doesn’t work off the ball. So at points in his career he must have had a good work ethic in his game to rise to level he did, why that seems to have changed only he knows Frustrating but only he can change it because Benitez won’t accept it, his International manager isn’t happy Ancelotti was visible embarrassed by some of the questions he had to address over his lack of work, I remember when wearing the badge Nil Satis Nisi Optimum actually meant something and if players didn’t live up to the badge they were wearing they were rounded on by tens of thousands in unison.

And me why is sport so addictive time for bedtime.

Possibly none but we have seen teams concentrate more men and attacks on his side of the field and take advantage of the the fact he won’t track back to help his RB out, and goals have been conceded in those scenarios, it doesn’t take long for other managers to work out a team’s weakness and exploit it, he did do some decent stuff but he has had no consistency to his game bar not helping out with any form of defence he was very consistent in that approach, I honestly don’t think there’s a team in this league who would take him, I could be wrong and Villa or Wolves may give him a go. I remember many years ago when I was a regular at home games the supporters would turn on players that didn’t work for every ball available, now some seem to be advocating it, strange how times change.

Well the majority on here are getting quite used to the minority always being right so there’s no change there.

Mike with respect mate for people of our age the game as changed since we were watching Greavesie, I wish it bloody hadn’t but the reality is it has, not losing is more focused on than winning for a majority of teams.

Didn’t Zadane dislike him.