Zoo 2.0

On 20/06/2020 at 08:39, Shukes said:

Heading back to us.

Sheffield fans seem gutted he is coming back and want him again.

Besic would have made it here, and would have been a great player. His injury in Wayne Rooney's testimonial was at the worst time, and he never bounced back from it. Koeman had used him quite a lot that summer (and trialled him as an attacking midfielder as opposed to deep) and I'm sure that he would have been part of the first XI throughout that campaign. He would still do very well for a team in the bottom half of the table, an Aston Villa or a West Ham. 

He would provide better cover than Delph IMO, but to be honest I can't speak volumes on Fabien's positives. It was a questionable signing from the start for me and it's little surprise that he's not had the major impact people hoped. I'd sell both Mo and Delph, using the money to bring in a player of substantial quality and improve what is a wafer thin midfield. Only Sigurdsson, Gomes and Davies stay for me (and only André walks into a top club).

1 hour ago, duncanmckenzieismagic said:

Just not feeling this at all, normally I start derby week absolutely dreading us getting humiliated and can’t stop thinking about the game, then the night before tends to be a sleepless night before starting derby day full of hope and being right up for it  only to end up having my dreams and hopes crushed once again

The last bit will probably still happen but just haven’t had that derby feeling all week, even now just hours from kick off

The whole buzz of a derby weekend is that one side (usually Liverpool) will have the bragging rights from what happens. At the moment even if we win, they're about to secure their long awaited title so it's a win/win for them. Add to that the whole 'Project Restart', which I didn't like from the beginning has meant that for me personally, there isn't much buzz around football altogether. My attitude towards these games are that they are glorified friendlies, in an extended pre-season before we can start the real football again for 2020/21. 

As a season ticket holder too, the feeling of watching Everton at home from my own home rather than the stadium is deflating to say the least. Normal for the fans that watch their games through a stream, but a real kick in the teeth for the matchday supporter - the sooner we are allowed back in grounds (safely of course) the better. 

14 minutes ago, StevO said:

Even though he’s not kicked a ball since his operation in February? Have they got money to burn over there?

Yeah, they have. Their owner is an English billionaire who owned INEOS, and their plan is to rival PSG now that the owners of AS Monaco have dramatically reduced their funding. 

To be honest, injuries aside Morgan would be a great player for a Ligue 1 side (outside of Paris) so not a terrible deal considering they'll only really need to pay his wages.

Looks like Morgan's leaving, apparently the fee was rumoured to be around £7m, but has been reduced to £1.8m (plus add ons).

This is a one time in a hundred when you'd be all over a player that's 35. Someone who has captained the likes of Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Kylian Mbappe, David Beckham, Neymar. You just can't put a price on experience like that, especially as he will be for one in a position that we need to strengthen and two alongside Mason Holgate, for whom he would be a fantastic mentor. 

Not to mention that his leadership skills would work wonders for the South Americans in the team (Bernard, Mina, Charlie). He's not exactly a bad player either, won it all domestically for PSG and held his own with a marquee squad around him - we would do a lot worse, and there's plenty of interest.

Apparently he was playing foot-tennis when the injury occured, although it's only what I've seen on Twitter. 

I think the game against Palace (or Watford, can't remember) will be the last we see of him. He was injury prone at Mainz and we took a gamble on him, looks as though it's backfired massively. The worry for me is that he looked completely off the pace in the two games that he did feature in so he will only have gone backward after around 18 months of no football. I just can't see this being the romantic story everyone hopes it'll be - he won't play for us again, and it's £25m down the toilet. Wouldn't be surprised if we mutually agreed to terminate his contract and he goes back to mid-table/second tier German football. 

Can only wish him well, and hope that his mental health doesn't suffer after what has been a horrendous injury period. 

23 minutes ago, Palfy said:

Looks like we are losing the Angry birds logo on the sleeve, all I can think is thank fuck for that I personally hated it. 

I'm in the camp that couldn't care less what the main/sleeve sponsors are, so long as they pay the most amount of money. The reported figure for Angry Birds was £3m, so anything over that would be a step in the right direction. 

For what it's worth, Angry Birds was as purely text generated logo, so much better than some of the more "notable" sponsors out there. 

USM next, please. 

Happy Birthday @StevO

3 hours ago, StevO said:

Im going to have to buy this book. I love reading these bits. He’s fascinating. 

I read it when he was managing Bayern, just because he's a fantastic manager, who has been there and done some of the most magnificent things in football. 

It's a different book in the sense that after each chapter, there are 3-4 pages on Carlo written by a player that he has managed; Zlatan Ibrahimovic, John Terry, Andrea Pirlo. The amount of names that adore and respect him speaks volumes for his presence in the game. 

I can't recommend his book enough, it was a great read when he was managing in Germany and will be even better now he's at Goodison.

Riccardo thought that he could take Renault from the midfield and develop them into a top three team all on his own - romantic, but not practically possible. His move to McLaren (the team he turned down when moving from Red Bull) is an interesting one as they'll have Mercedes engines and are surely the front runner to challenge the Red Bull's and Ferrari's. It does feel to me as though he has gone all around the houses to get back to where he was originally, but I understand that a change of scenery mixed with being Max's wingman was what pushed him out of the door. 

Sainz has also been confirmed for Ferrari in the past few minutes, I'm not convinced that he will be the #2 driver as everyone thinks. Charles is the poster boy because of his amazing speed, but Carlos for me is one of the fastest guys out of the main teams, I wouldn't be at all surprised if he was able to equal or better what Leclerc does. 

The final question is who fills the Renault seat for 2021? A romantic return for Fernando Alonso? An all French squad with Pierre Gasly or promote from within and give China it's first F1 driver in Zhou?

8 minutes ago, MikeO said:

I'm glad we're in agreement too but I still don't get how I misunderstood/didn't read the article, can you tell me (for example) the bit where it mentions roll-on/roll-off subs? Or indeed social distancing problems in Stockley Park?

I really can't be arsed to debate with an obnoxious person like yourself, which is why I wasn't going to respond in the first place but saw you'd asked two questions so thought I'd give my thoughts. 

The roll on/roll off substitution statement was an extension of the point I was making about high-risk injuries coming as a result of players going from zero games to a tight schedule in such a short space of time, this has been raised by many players (most recently KDB and is rightfully being brought up in any discussions surrounding 'Project Restart').

The social distancing aspect of the post is all over the internet, in the article and doesn't take a genius to work out. A room filled with multiple people is no different to a pub or restaurant and as it hasn't been part of football since the sport began until 2018/19 it makes sense to temporarily suspend it. 

I hope this answers your questions sufficiently, however note that I'll be leaving this discussion here. It also doesn't take a genius to work out why this forum is so quiet (when others continue to prosper) when you have staff that interact on a daily basis in such a laughable manner to any opinions or post that differ from their own. 

8 minutes ago, MikeO said:

VAR has one official making the decision does it not? If there needs to be a tech guy in the same room (though I don't see why there would need to be) I'm sure they could safely distance themselves from each other.

There's no mention at all of roll on/roll off basketball style subs so don't know how you read that into it and we don't need to "minimise" injuries; if the players are at increased risk from injury and thus potentially needing the NHS the matches should simply not be played.

This is about people dying, fuck football.

Which is exactly what I've said twice on this forum in other threads, I was simply answering the questions that you'd asked earlier after misunderstanding/not reading the article that was posted. 

Glad we are in agreement.

28 minutes ago, MikeO said:

Um.....why? How does this improve player welfare? And what does scrapping VAR achieve? And why the ridiculous sub changes? None of it makes any sense at all; if it's safe to play the games it's safe to play the games, tinkering with the rules is pointless.

I don't know if you've missed the point completely, or just didn't understand what was being reported. 

VAR is potentially scrapped for this season as gathering officials together in a room isn't great for the welfare of those involved, removing the system altogether (when it's not exactly well received at the moment) is a logical thing to do if the game is to resume. 

As for the extra subs, players are going from no football at all to a congested fixture list so allowing more subs (or roll on/roll off) is common sense to allow injuries to be minimised - many players have been calling for this so again, a logical thing to do. 

I think it's too early to say really, if the virus lasts in full force until August/September then I think the best solution would be to void the season and start the new one behind closed doors or with staggered seating in the crowd.

Taking bias out of the equation, every effort should be made to finish the season. If it was the other way around and we were 14,000 points clear you'd be miffed to say the least that the season had been cancelled, when so many options are still available. I'm personally in favour of temporarily restructuring the calendar so that the summer break moves to winter, which would help no end in 2022 when the World Cup starts in Qatar. 

20 hours ago, markjazzbassist said:

it's going to be an interesting window this summer.  i'm reading a lot of clubs are having financial troubles and will be offloading players to try and ease the financial burden.  we seem to (finally) be on firm footing finance wise, so hopefully we can take advantage of this.  Barca in particular has been reported to put everyone except Messi, Ter Stegen, and De Jong, available for sale.  Could be some bargain deals to be had and we know Brands and Bill get along well with the Barca people.

It works both ways though, if everyone is having to sell due to unforseen loss of income then there won't be tons of clubs throwing money around as they can't afford to spend themselves - as exciting as the prospect of cheap transfers is, there's absolutely no way that clubs will sell plays for 50% less than what they are worth when money could be saved in other areas such as staff redundancies, selling property and government grants. 

As you mentioned Barcelona, they will look to swap Greizmann with Neymar as this is a deal that has been in the works for over six months, along with Ivan Rakatic who they've been trying to flog all season. As you rightly pointed out, Ter Stegen, Messi and De Jong will be going nowhere. 

As for the transfer window in general, I don't think there will be much movement at all. Clubs will not have the money to spend that they normally do and will probably focus on the summer after next for any big targets, especially as this is when the European Championships will be starting and some bargains will be found throughout the lesser known nations. 

For us, Brands has always said that he wants to get to a point where we bring in 1-2 players a window as signing 11 and 12 players is just insane. I think we will probably add a center back (Gabriel?) and a right-back to replace Sidibe and compete with Coleman/Kenny. A number 10 is needed too, but after that I think the line will be drawn, 3 players in maximum with the option to then add a further one or two in January. 

He's a decent option for Porto, but given his age would only really give a maximum of three years until heading into the twilight stage of his career, I don't think he is a big enough name to command such a late transfer - there's countless players half his age that would do a similar job or better, not to mention that it's not an area of the pitch that we desperately need to strengthen. 

Liga NOS (Portugal), like the Eridivisie (Holland) is at the top of the "B" tier for me and unfortunately players can look a lot better than they are due to the standard of opposition. For every João Felix you'll find a Renato Sanches, with no guarantee of what is being purchased. It's a big step up to play in England and not one that every export can deal with. 

It's just too much of a gamble for me, Porto and Benfica are renowned for being tough negotiators, simply because they have to be in order to compete in Europe so we would not be signing Corona on the cheap, he'd be a considerable transfer. 

It's a no from me, although I don't believe we're in for him. He seems to go against the foundations that Brands' has been building and for what we would spend, money could be put to better use (i.e - off the top of my head, Grealish).

With the European Championships on the horizon he won't risk going off the grid with a spell in the Championship with Villa, regardless of where they finish this season he will be off I think. A new challenge has been long overdue for Jack and it's only been so long coming due to his unwavering loyalty towards his boyhood club - something that really should be applauded. 

I don't think we will sign him, simply because Manchester United have been all over him for years now and regardless of recent struggles they are still one of the biggest clubs in the world - there's an argument to suggest that they are starting to take shape under Ole too, with the good times not too far in the distant future. He will be seen as a cheaper alternative to Jason Sancho, who will most likely demand a nine figure sum to move from Dortmund. 

He would improve us no doubt though, lovely amount of flair and a hard shell, pretty much everything that you'd want in a creative midfielder. Anyone saying that we shouldn't go for him, or that he wouldn't come because he's too good for us isn't thinking big enough, the great sides didn't become great sides by being modest, you have to sign to improve - not stay sitting down. 

On 03/04/2020 at 13:28, MikeO said:

 

Hard to argue against FC Barcelona's 2010/11 side which revolutionised tiki-taka and took the national team to back to back European Championships and a World Cup win, all in dominant fashion. To not only be great yourselves, but lay down the foundations for others to dominate too is the sign of true masterclass - similar to how the Ajax side of the early 1970's should be praised for their revolutionary Total Football, something that Pep Guardiola would build on 40 years later. 

Barcelona themselves were from another planet that year, winning the Champions League and romping La Liga receiving praise from Sir Alex Ferguson in the process as he dubbed them the "greatest side he had ever faced". 

Lionel Messi started to hit his peak form too with over 50 goals in a single season, backed up by one of the best midfield trios that football has ever seen; Xavi, Iniesta and Busquets. 

On another note, praise must go to Jose Mourinho for what he has done in the game, it's fashionable to point out his weaknesses now, perhaps he has been in the game too long but you cannot question that in his peak he was the best manager on the planet. Taking the reigns of FC Porto and taking them all the way to Champions League with a strong emphasis on organisation and professional fouls. Landing in England and taking Chelsea to their first Premier League title in dominant fashion before winding up at Italy and giving Internazionale a Champions League title. Never has a statement been so bold and accurate, he is not one from the bottle, a true special one. 

Gareth Bale signed a record breaking £1,000,000 p/w deal to move to China, it was only Florentino Perez (Real Madrid's President) blocking the deal at the eleventh hour which stopped it going through. There's absolutely no way that he would leave for less than half of that, especially when he has all but confirmed he has little interest in football and prefers to play golf. He has stated numerous times that he is settled in Madrid and regardless of not playing will see out his contract. He won't be moving to anyone any time soon, let alone us. 

Aaron Ramsey was always criminally underrated IMO, it's only that Juventus have the most depth out of anyone in Europe that he isn't getting a game each week - the wages that he would demand would be phenomenal though (he's on around £400,000 p/w) at the moment so is a non starter for me.

On 08/03/2020 at 16:00, TallPaul1878 said:

Why do so many plagues seem to originate in China? Even the Black Death originated in China and, ironically, swung into Europe via Italy.

They still have regular outbreaks of plague in China to this day.

It's a country with an insanely crammed population who in some cases are forced to live in appalling conditions. Despite being a rich economy and advanced in many ways, the level of hygiene is not something that you would find relatable in the UK or US. 

A lot of communities still deal with sickness with more traditional methods too as opposed to turning to medicine, so diseases can last for longer untreated and manifest into the likes of SARS, bird flu and coronavirus. 

Where you have an overcrowding population, you'll always have rampant disease as a side effect.