SpartyBlue

Yea he jumped off the page. Also pinged a 50 yard ball on the button

Great debut. That is all.

Early days on Patterson but it does seem like we have the future in both sides.

Saw one replay right after. Looked like a break to me. Frustrating because that ball was 2 feet out of play but what can ya do. Feel for Ben. Had to be really ready to prove himself.

He knows just when to step up. Love it. Aside from the injuries, I’m strangely encouraged. If we defend that solidly I think we will, at least, avoid a relegation battle.

Holgate performed well at the end of last season as well. Hopefully turned the corner. We will need him

Iwobi very solid, Tark was excellent but I voted for Patterson. In his first real debut against a top 4 type side I was really impressed. Got done by Sterling once but so do most and it’s his first real action. His desire to get up the pitch and contribute was obvious but that isn’t the thing that caught my eye the most. He is an aggressive defender in the best sense. A couple of times a ball went out wide and he hounded their player without fouling. Never let them turn to face him and it resulted in a turnover. Love that. He also has some fire to him. I don’t know how good he will be but he isn’t scared to play and that’s a really good sign.

Yep. This is a gamble. Extremely high upside but for the price, considerable downside. I think if he just OK he’s Doucoure. If he really develops, he’s at Real Madrid

Point taken but they also aren’t so tall. He can get away with some tackles others can’t. I agree with the above that bringing Gana in to bridge the gap and help teach this kid is very clever. Between him and Frank he should get quite the education.

I wouldn’t want to train it out of him completely. He needs to exercise judgement but that length is an attribute in his tackling

Tough one then to just wait and hope Chelsea won’t need him. If we had DCL it wouldn’t matter

Do we know Broja is even available?

Credit where it’s due, the cheaper signings and commercial deals have helped putting in a legitimate bid on someone. Also, Frank. This one is all about wanting to work with Frank

Is there a link? Can’t find an update

Apply it as you like.

This kid is so damn long. Looks like he has the potential to be a wrecking machine as a tackler but can still dribble and pass a bit.

And more to come off the books. I suppose if a deal is structured over 3/4 years the transfer doesn’t cost that much against us this season. Perhaps someone who knows about these things can weigh in. If we do make a signing like this you’d have to give credit to the behind the scenes group. Getting guys like Tarkowski for free and others for small fees the last couple windows would have given us room for this sort of bid. Fair play if it comes off.

Yea I saw that. We’ve just been operating under the assumption that a signing like this is a bridge too far this window. I’m curious what has changed. Perhaps we had more room than we thought or the deal is structured in a way we can afford.

I guess it’s hard to know how much we do have available and over how many years the money will have to be paid but this is certainly surprising if it’s true we’ve made an offer (and it seems to be). Makes more sense if we had moved Gomes, Gbamin, Mina and had that 300k in wages plus some transfer money

I’m curious why it looks like a goer if the price is understood to be too high

Deal paid over the next decade?

I hear you, if it’s all the same as far as FFP goes then it’s a different conversation. I would still expect that in most release clause situations you can’t pay a small fraction over many years. I suppose we just can’t know until this deal is done, or not.

The reality of sport. Less chance of pulling something while you’re having a pint. I’ve hurt myself a couple times working out which, theoretically, I do for my health.

If it’s true it’s probably just because being less athletic puts you less at risk. Dom can jump so likely more risk of an injury.

There is a baseball adage I quite like. “You can’t pull fat”. It’s probably not true but it does SEEM like the heftier players in that sport get injured less than the ones with 5% body fat. I’d be curious to know how that correlation works out across different sports.