c1982

I think being part of a group could be the best move for us as we ‘navigate’ FFP and future trading. They’ve got Genoa C.F.C. in Italy, Standard Liège in Belgium, Red Star F.C. in France, CR Vasco da Gama in Brazil and Hertha BSC in Germany. I can see it as a way of not making the Gbamin, Tosun type mistakes e.g they’d always be a ‘buyer’ - it wouldn’t surprise me if there’s a lot of trading between the groups and I’d imagine it’d be to our benefit as the highest valued £££ club  in the group. It will help with ‘unknown’ talent with work permit issues too. I, for one, am all for the ‘partner’ clubs idea.

Standard Liege - who Price is supposedly joining - are part of the 777 group - who are supposedly buying Moshiri’s majority stake in our club.

Interesting… or maybe not.

10 minutes ago, Romey 1878 said:

Genuinely could have voted for any of the 11 (even Mina ), but I went with Pickford.

This - I can’t remember the last time when that was the case but that performance made me proud again! Unbelievable performance and an incredible result - just WOW!

I’m in the minority but just feel that we’re much better with him (and Tarkowski) in the team. Proper leader - proper shithouse - liability fitness wise but if can help get us over the line we can all move on happily.

2 minutes ago, Romey 1878 said:

That was more like it from him tonight.

Yes, he's not in his favoured position but we still need him to perform and he did that impeccably against Brighton.

That 1st half vs Leicester was a wake-up call - excellent tonight.

Some good news at last…

He’s in the match day squad today - doesn’t mean he’ll be on the bench necessarily but he’s travelled down with the first team.

11 minutes ago, Gwlad all over said:

I understood he and his wife didn't have children. 

They’d just had their first child months before said incident involving the unnamed Premier League football player that may or may not be Gylfi Sigurdsson.

Fulham - we should be winning with or without Dom so hopefully we can manage his minutes initially because Palace, Newcastle, Wolves, Leicester - these are the games where I see Calvert-Lewin making the biggest difference.

Ireland have, all of a sudden, got themselves potentially 2 quality strikers for the next decade (at least) with the emergence of Ferguson and Cannon.

Michael Vincent Keane 

5 hours ago, Goodison Glory said:

He's on fire. Different level of course but a good platform for him to kick on from next year. 

Either kick on here or make sure we sell for a decent fee with clauses to suit us. With made the wrong choice on far too many of our youngster and they’ve just walked for free - look at Bowler, Kenny, Dowell, even Ledson and Lundstrum - all should have brought more money in. We need to get it right with Cannon, Simms and Dobbin (probably needs a Championship loan) as all are worth a decent fee potentially- Brewster for £23.5m shows what a purple patch can do - I’m not saying we’re getting this kind of money for any of them but if they’re not going to be first team options here, we need to sell while their profile is high.

15 hours ago, Palfy said:

 he has 159 motm votes this season with the next highest on the 80, surely that should tell any doubters of his value to the team

He’s got so many because Lampard built his whole set-up around Iwobi - and while Iwobi looked incredible at the start of the season, the results didn’t follow. Under Dyche, Iwobi looks less effective from the the right but the whole team looks a much stronger unit - I still believe Iwobi is a more than useful component but not irreplaceable. The role Lampard played him in was a luxury are team couldn’t ‘carry’ - he could definitely play the role at a top European club though - I personally think he’d flourish in Italy.

3 hours ago, dunlopp9987 said:

Bet they throw out their U-21's against Gent to try and get eliminated from that tournament

They should be trying to win that competition and I’m sure they will go to win it - it’d be ridiculous of them to not go all out to win it at this stage.

39 minutes ago, Romey 1878 said:

Iwobi was fucking awful tonight. Played a massive role in their second goal as well.

Yep - wouldn’t say he was awful but gave the ball away for their 2nd.

On 12/03/2023 at 21:16, StevO said:

My problem with that is how often Iwobi gives the ball away. When he’s out wide we can get away with it a bit more, but in the middle we get punished. He’s more of an attacking threat, absolutely, but he’s equally a bit of a liability in there too. 

Sorry to go off topic again but I was discussing this the other day. Lampard was obsessed on building around Iwobi in the ‘10’ and yes he looked our best player but he lost the ball so many times and we got punished so many times. Maybe if Lampard hadn’t alienated Doucoure and played Iwobi in a wide position he’d still be our manager. Iwobi is still a key player but having Doucoure in the the 3 has made us so much better - it’s not as if Dyche has discovered some miracle remedy; Ancelotti, the best manager in world football, played Doucoure on a weekly basis and had reservations over Iwobi centrally.

*disclaimer - I’m not bitching about Lampard (I’ll forever be thankful and supportive) and am certainly not knocking Iwobi’s talents.

5 minutes ago, Palfy said:

Expensive thinking  

Incredibly bargain thinking if Dyche could get him ‘back on it’ as StevO said - Alli ‘back on it’ is world class - won’t happen but as @StevO  said, “Wishful thinking.”

I went with Doucoure but would fully endorse the Simms vote

1 hour ago, duncanmckenzieismagic said:

 

Amazing kid - helps to put things into perspective when you watch things like this.

This made me laugh…

Off to Dortmund in the summer on a free.

They had Gakpo, Nunez and Salah with Jota and Firminho in reserve and were missing Diaz.

We had McNeil, Iwobi and Simms with Maupay and Gray in reserve and were missing Calvert-Lewin and Townsend.

A disappointing performance but not surprising result - Leeds and Villa are games we need to throw everything at - 6 points and things will look a lot less depressing.