SuperSig

I wasn't happy with McCarthy & Schneiderlin as DM's, but with Baningme/Gueye I think we can be a lot more effective in attack with Gueye pushing further up the pitch, making runs into the box. Rooney/Davies are too inconsistent for me to play alongside Gueye, seeing as Gueye is also extremely inconsistent. Tosun can make up for Rooney & Davies's absence , similar to how Wilfried Bony played with Sigurdsson. Thus Cenk can make up for our 'lack of creativity' from midfield if Gylfi isn'tttt delivering. If you don't understand what I meant with this, take a look at their highlights together: https://streamable.com/op7an Gylfi/Bony as the striking partnership with Dyer/Routledge/Montero as wingers is some of the best attacking football I've seen from a PL team outside the Top 6. Gylfi/Tosun with Walcott/Bolasie/Lookman/Vlasic can be a lot better. But how can we counter attack efficiently if Rooney/Davies are constantly losing possession? Baningime is a way safer passer, and while he wont provide passes similar to Rooney or Davies, he wont constantly lose possession carelessly either. Gylfi usually only plays with 1 DM for Iceland, and manages to thrive being the only creative outlet in the team. I do think there is a world where Rooney or Davies could fit in that XI, but as of right now from what I've seen from both players.. I think they're both negatively affecting our build ups in attack. I don't want to turn any Rooney or Davies fans sour on me, but Joe Allen on his own was more effective than both of them combined despite the fact that Stoke were playing with 10 men. Baningime has impressed me quite a lot in the few games he has played, and in my opinion he passes more safely than Rooney & Davies, although will rarely attempt passes in the final third. Gylfi did fine without Rooney or Davies at Swansea, as someone who has watched Gylfi play for 6 PL seasons in a row I have no doubt that he would perform better without them. I've watched Gylfi play for: Reading's academy Iceland's u21 Reading in the Championship Iceland in Euro/World Cup qualifiers Hoffenheim Swansea Tottenham Swansea (again) Iceland at the Euro's Everton And Iceland at the World Cup in a few months. Only Spurs & Iceland at the Euro's used him more ineffectively than Everton have this season. Spurs barely played him & when he did he was playing on the wing. Iceland played with a player eerily similar to DCL at the Euro's. Both players are 187cm tall, lanky pacey forward/wingers that have horrendous finishing. Constantly losing the ball. His name is Jon Bodvarsson & has 2 goals in 36 apps for Iceland. We're deploying players that have a negative impact on his performances. Thankfully Coleman/Baines/Walcott/Tosun are absolute class, but without those 4 players for most of the season. Sigurdsson's lack of pace & strength means he needs other players to thrive, while more physically gifted players usually don't possess Gylfi's both footed technique. So yes, it is a little disheartening that a player of his price tag cannot thrive under certain roles or tactics, but you also have to consider what he possesses in comparison to the other Playmakers.

Gylfi created 7 chances in one match alone against Burnley for us this season, 6 were in open play. He apparently only made 25 open play chances last season, which means in one game for us he created 24% of his total open play chances from last season. Sigurdsson managed to ''change the teams whole mentality when theyre in a rough patch'' for Swansea. He also did this several times for Spurs. The Spurs team let him down massively. Adebayor/Soldado/Dempsey/Holtby/Chadli/Townsend were terrible when Gylfi was there. None of those players would get into that Swansea side either. Not then or now. Benoit Assou-Ekotto and Kyle Naughton as fullbacks for Spurs were a lot worse than Neil Taylor & Kyle Naughton for Swansea. Spurs had a lot of potential, similar to the current Everton side. Rose/Walker were world class players that were hated by the fan base at the time, but I always knew they were good. Kane came in and scored brilliantly with his left outside the box while running at full pace, I knew he would be good too yet Spurs fans despised him. Paulinho/Dembele and several other great players were also highly underrated or disliked by their fan base. Eventually all of the players blossomed, just like Gylfi. That Spurs side never played their best team, Rose/Walker/Dembele/Sigurdsson were always on the bench. The few times they all were on the pitch they played brilliantly. It wasn't just the fact that Gylfi was wasted playing LW for Spurs, but most importantly the lack of playtime. Gylfi may have offically played 58 PL matches in 2 seasons for Tottenham, but he only played 2.497 out of 6840 minutes available, which is 36.5%. In those few minutes he played, he scored twice against Chelsea in two draws, assisted Bale in Tottenham's only NLD for over 4 years, scored in a draw against us, scored a brace against Norwich, scored a late winner against Southampton & West Ham. And scored/assisted against Sunderland/Reading/Fulham/Aston Villa. In Europe he scored & assisted 2 goals in one game against Inter, and scored against Basel in the quarter finals. He also scored and assisted against Maribor/Tbilisi/Anzhi & Tromsø. He was far from his best at Spurs, which this picture shows: But he wasn't bad, not at least compared to his team mates. Yet he didn't take penalties, corners, free kicks or any set pieces for Spurs. Apparently he wasn't good enough. His reaction to DCL's miss on a set piece says it all really, it's the last clip in the first video I posted. He definitely has issues with DCL in the same sense he had issues with Bodvarsson for Iceland's national team. Both players are headless chickens on the pitch. Same height, same attributes (tall, lanky, pacey) and suffer from the same problems (weak, poor decision making, bad finishing) I really want to see this XI next season: Replace Bolasie with a new winger like Wilfried Zaha, Baningime with a new DM like N'Zonzi & Keane with a new CB like Alfie Mawson. Along with backups for Baines/RFM/Tosun (preferably a target man) and I think the battle for the Top 6 would be on.

Coutinho in 17/18: 7 goals, 6 assists in 14 apps = £144mil. Sigurdsson: 11/12: 7 goals, 5 assists in 18 apps 14/15: 2 goals, 8 assists in 13 apps 15/16: 9 goals, 4 assists in 14 apps 16/17: 5 goals, 5 assists in 12 apps 16/17: 3 goals, 6 assists in 9 apps If any of you seriously think Gylfi is bad in open play then you should look at his highlights for Swansea. https://streamable.com/m4spq Also, 9 of his 10 assists in 2014/15 were in open play. He also didn't take set pieces in 2014/15 and created 73 chances. This was also coincidentally the last season he played in-behind the striker. In 2015/16 he was a striker, in 2016/17 & 2017/18 he has been a winger. He has been class for us since Walcott/Tosun arrived. DCL/Niasse/Davies/Rooney/Martina/Kenny have held him back all season. Sigurdsson should have 6-8 assists by now and instead only has 3 because DCL cant finish clearcut chances. https://streamable.com/94wkm