Fabrice29

His role was to create space for others. Which he did quite well. I'm not sure why we would use our last pre season friendly to change our whole game plan for 12 months now to get the best out of someones attributes who we are actively trying to sell, but he did the role we asked of him well and I suspect at some point next week we'll be using the same tactics to get behind Newcastle (whether we use him or not is another matter).

He wasn't. He also wasn't asked to do anything Che Adams wasn't asked to do last season.

Oh jesus, there's more than one I wonder what Martin was thinking as we dragged their defence up field and allowed our two quicker players either side of Onuachu to exploit the space.

Does this bloke still do a podcast? If so has anyone tried to explain to him one of the more simple concepts of our tactics?

Is that because you watched him or because he signed for Stoke a few weeks back?

Yes, if you like. It’s almost as if just saying ‘pissing around at the back’ as a thing that makes or breaks success is daft.

We pissed around at the back to score the goal that got us promoted btw.

Exactly this. Started weeks ago with the ‘personal terms will be tough’ stuff. Hopefully it works out but it’s good PR management if it doesn’t. Also enjoyed the ‘be careful of club briefings’ whilst simultaneously doing a club briefing.

Might end up promoted much to the annoyance of you.

There’s probably truth in it but I’m with you, the Celtic must get on with it line was funny especially when it was followed up by being annoyed that unless buying clubs got real then Onuachu was staying.

I see we’re briefing local journalists how nothing is our fault and people are lapping it up again. Easy work.

Oh 100% and the longer that at least two teams are interested or can convince everyone there's two teams interested then the longer can they wait. The briefing that came out from Atalanta's side yesterday felt ominous to me. Combined with our weird briefings I'm still not convinced this is happening for us.

I think we're better organised than we were last time we were in this league. It just feels less so because we do it differently and our defensive organisation is focused with the ball. Anyway, either way, we have just come up via the play offs. We will 100% get pumped at times this season, like every team does at some stage. It won't be a crisis or a reflection of tactics unless it happens repeatedly and consistently.

I'm not sure they have any European games before September do they?

Alright, suppose we do this, and we splash out £30million or whatever it takes on Riley (who I assume you are referring to)... and then that's us done... Which of our academy youngsters resolve this issue? Which one addresses the keeper situation you want us to address? Which wide player can we reliably expect goals from? Which academy striker backs up our current strikers? Try answering this and you might just find the answer as to why just splashing all our cash on one player feels a bit riskier than not.

I genuinely don't know or remember this but how many times did this happen with McCarthy last time we were in this league? Come back to me on that and I'll let you know how concerned I am

They played as part of, at least, a midfield 4. But it's not really about midfield 3's or 4's is it. We don't play symmetrically and haven't done so for a while now. Players interchange to fill in certain positions on the pitch. Both Aribo and Smallbone are asked to move wide and interchange with the right sided wing back and our left winger. Stephens and Downes are asked to anchor the centre and disrupt play when there's a turn over. The idea of us playing a midfield 3 or left wing backs bombing up the line just isn't something we've done for a while.

We literally played today and at no point did we have this midfield 3.

No worries mate, glad I could help. All I said was I was enjoying peoples set ups that haven't resembled how we've played for quite a while now.

Oh right.

Enjoying everyones use of classic formations like 433 and 352 when we haven't played anything as static as that for quite a while now.

Champions - Man City Saints 15th Relegated - Bournemouth, Everton, Leicester

In the last few weeks we've briefed Alfie House specifically that if we don't get Matt O'Riley it will be because of personal terms and then not because of personal terms. Refreshing.

No.

Playing someone we’ve already replaced seems like bigger self harm in the long run.