The9

World Cup squad: Jagielka, Cahill, then erm, Phil Jones and Smalling as cover, was it? Ferdinand and Terry long out of the equation, Stones with only a few games under his belt too, it doesn't need Chambers to be involved to show England's area of weakness - it's the same story just in front of them too.

Currently he's a "not-getting-into lower mid-table Prem side" level player, so I'm not sure what that's based on? If we continue to perform around 15th-ish I'm sure he'll get the chance to prove why he should be starting every match - which to be fair to him he pretty much did when given the opportunity last season. It is symptomatic of the kind of "he runs around therefore he is amazing" thought process I see on here a lot, though.

Interesting perspective on the salary cap, I didn't know about the baseball method - that would be a much more palatable option for the big clubs if there was a desire to do it (keep big players, pay a tax, benefit the wider community directly) - but then despite the Premier League clubs being able to vote things through on a majority, the top sides would still never agree to it and would probably rather leave the league altogether.

That's ridiculous, for a start it rules out any player that plays for a side with any kind of squad depth at all, especially those playing in 3 or 4 competitons. It could prevent younger non-established players getting opportunities if players actually do insist on playing, and it hamstrings a manager's selection AND potentially impacts his opportunity to leave out established players from the squad he does have. It also guarantees weakening the England squad which is looking pretty rank anyway, and if you genuinely think any of them rate playing for their country ahead of being able to maximise their income then you are astonishingly deluded. Getting the players to choose contract or country would absolutely decimate the national side, when at the moment it isn't a choice they have to make and nor should they have to. Not to mention that the last people who should actually be involved in decisions about their selection (if fit) are the players themselves.

Strange that people also don't appear to be able to fathom that the first side after a World Cup is likely to be a lot more "looking to the future" than the World Cup squad itself is. The World Cup signifies the end of a cycle, there are 2 years to get the side right for the next major championships - aside from the fact that it was England's worst ever performance in a World Cup Finals itself and there's obviously a need to refresh some of the squad with younger options even before you consider the various international retirements. England have a pile of injuries to recent/regular starters too, Shaw and Lallana's replacements are new caps, and even looking at the previously capped players God only knows how Townsend and Lambert have made the squad on the past 6 months' form. Plus Chambers is not being considered as a right back, right back is the one area where there aren't any injuries (in fact Stones played there for Everton first game of the season so there's one more candidate ahead of Clyne than there was before) and England were desperately short of centre-back options at the World Cup. Also, Hodgson has said "With 10 injuries and six of them in the defensive part of the field, I didn't have the luxury of saying he could start in the Under-21s. We've had to jump him up and he's come in straight away."

Really? Jack Cork? This isn't the Championship you know. I don't want us to sell him, but some of the Cork-love on here is bizarre. He's a solid mid-table Premier League player who is very good at what he does, but he has some glaring weaknesses in his game and he's at best our 3rd best central midfielder - that doesn't say "great" to me.

He had a pretty impressive cameo in the Leverkusen match. If he was playing anywhere else on the park he'd be a starter, but we have 5 or 6 players all worth a place ahead of him who've had the chance to show their worth in competitive matches at this level already, so he's still a bit of a gamble.

At the moment I'd say that compared to last season's players the first three are at best a draw and the last one is risible when Gardos appears to be fit enough for the bench. On the bright side, if Lallana, Lambert, Shaw and Lovren had started this season as poorly here as they have elsewhere, we'd probably have lost to West Brom too.

Lallana last season, when, let's not forget, he was far and away our Player of the Season and would be expected to be playing as much if not more than anyone considering his apparent value to the side: http://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/adam-lallana/leistungsdaten/spieler/43530/saison/2013

It's not that extraordinary when 3 players usually get replaced every match and attacking players are much more likely to get subbed than defenders or the goalkeeper to begin with, it gives him about a 50/50 chance of going off in any one match, all other things being equal. Add to that the likelihood that sides will have more midfield options than anywhere else on the pitch as they're most likely to get suspended, and they also spend more time involved in the play than those at the extremes of the pitch, and it's probably a LOT more likely than not that a midfielder will get subbed at least once in 4 consecutive matches. The Lallana comparison is fair, I think. He played 3 or more successive 90 minutes on 3 occasions last season, the most he managed was 5 matches in a row.

Third most expensive signing in Arsenal's history, our back up right back.

There is a salary cap, the problem is it is set unevenly to begin with and allows teams with CL income (and various other revenue generating schemes, which they are better placed to implement than other sides with less existing success) to spend a lot more than everyone else, perpetuating the problem. The other suggestion, of the "draft" type situation, highlights the other problem, that the Premier League is a collection of individuals all attempting to maximise revenue independently, rather than an organisation of all members which is run for the League's benefit as a whole and not the individual clubs'. The only ways the Prem will be competitive for all teams again are if the top clubs leave, or if the top clubs agree to a form of governance which massively reduces their chances of both winning things in England AND of competing in Europe. There's no way they'll agree to the former because they're making too much money and have stacked the odds in their favour, and there's no way they'll agree to an "equality based" salary cap because it will prevent them from making more money with European success compared to other UEFA-based teams which DON'T have salary-capping. Comparatively, Real Madrid and Barcelona are hoovering up the cash in Spain more than the top sides in the Prem because they negotiate their own tv deals - for some reason the top sides in England have agreed that that's not how they want to go - not sure why exactly, but Man U were completely against arranging their own deal the last time it was mooted - maybe the cost of setting that stuff up is more hassle than it's worth compared to letting the Prem do it. Also, even in MLS, where the league owns the rights to distribute franchises and the clubs pretty much adhere to the "collective good", there are uneven salary caps and rules allowing different numbers of salary cap breakers in different places, and there's a skew in the numbers of people watching on tv in LA and NY compared to the likes of Salt Lake and Columbus, but that's accepted for the "greater good" of the league anyway. After all, successful teams in bigger markets = more money for all. To make English football "even" again, you'd need a viable salary cap without exceptions, regulation on squad sizes and stockpiling of the much cheaper youth players, a communal pot of cash with the League determining the equal re-distribution of funds, all the teams would need to accept that there's propbably not that much chance they'd do well in Europe (and decide if and how any prize money should be reinvested evenly), all merchandise sales into a central pot, collective tv deal negotiation, and for the bigger teams to be happy that their profits would be reinvested to the benefit of the other clubs rather than just them. Then there's the tranche of regulations that would be wanted to ensure youth development for the national side, and the relationship with the finances and structure of the Football League too... Ain't gonna happen.

And either stupid or criminally unfunny.

Not sure how I feel about this, Gastón has always been about potential, but he's come a long way short of even middling expectations so far. We may have to deal with the unfortunate coincidence of Alpine being nearly right about something. That hasn't happened since we started a season with Makin and Bennett at centre back.

Heh, it's the sideways kicking that's where the money is.

Can he kick a ball whilst looking in the other direction though?

He was running and did it with his standing foot when in full flow with a rolling ball, it was bloody awesome. Even Henry's one was a slow moving ball with him basically just standing there. I've done the Emerson standing leg free-kick dummy and that's hard enough with the thing stationary and me standing over it during a stoppage in play! EDIT: Which btw is the same thing as Long's, except you're standing still, you swing your leg first to dummy taking the free kick, then pivot on your toes on your other foot to pass it with the heel of your standing foot whilst everyone is switched off after the dummy. Doing that whilst running takes incredible skill. Even thinking about doing it whilst in possession of the ball in a competitive match puts you on a different level to most.

Footballers falling over whilst attempting skills which do not work: David Dunn: C Ronaldo: Bale: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvkvjY_y6sw Players Not Falling Over whilst doing the exact same thing as Shane Long last night, 10 years ago: Thierry Henry:

Long's already retweeted it, which he wouldn't have if he'd been embarrassed by it. The "the after swing" "making it look unintentional" is exactly the reason it was obviously deliberate, the ball was SO far on its way already that there was no possible way he could have been trying to pass it with his right foot. I've seen people accidentally poke the ball with the wrong foot, it never goes perfectly to an overlapping teammate and they are ALWAYS put off balance by the adjustment they try to make to kick the ball from its new position after they've already accidentally moved it. Long's action was one movement and smooth, he knew exactly where the ball was going and didn't try to adjust to kick it with his right (because it was about two yards to his right by then), and you could also tell it was deliberate as he wasn't even looking in the direction a right footed kick would have gone, he just looked (and swung his leg) to distract from the initial pass.

There are enough people on here who think it was an accident that you didn't get the benefit of the doubt.

Quite, my favourite bit about it was the jeering from the turds in the Millwall crowd who thought it was a miskick, for the exact reason that you have to be some kind of moron to not realise he meant it. Apart from anything, he was grinning like anything immediately afterwards. Also, we've already had this discussion once.

You have to be a complete imbecile to even consider that it was an accident.

Ronaldinho's the only one I've seen doing it more than a handful of times and there are different variations of no-look pass. Hell, even Ben Reeves set up a goal with one last night, it still wasn't on a par with Long's one. Long was in full flight with a rolling ball - most of them which are performed with a stationary or slow-moving ball and standing player.

He was grinning all over his face in that "heh, managed to sneak one into an actual match" kinda way.

Personally I thought Long looked good in both halves, first half his support for Pelle was exactly what was needed but our tempo was still pants, second half he did a good job out wide (though some of his crossing was dodgy). Our personnel is screaming out for us to go back to 4-2-3-1 though, 4 midfielders plus Long with them breaking in support of Pelle like they did last season. And can we please start building from the back again too? I don't mind us going direct a bit more often, but based on a passing game so it's actually a surprise when we go direct instead of expected (as with Millwall's enormous hoof upfield which shockingly caught Yoshida misjudging the flight of the ball in the air and getting under it before turning and chasing a lost cause, again).