Chez

Just got back from playing football. How are we doing?

Time for Orsic to step up and show us what he can do. No excuses against lower league opponents

What a good original question. It's bloody difficult. I want to say 4-3-3, so we can try and get the best out of Sulemana, and that's my line up, but perhaps the 4-4-2 (aka 4-2-2-2) is the formation some of the players actually know how to play. When is comes to the players, I honestly don't know who is the best choice in many positions - and I watch every bloody game. McCarthy, but he's injured, so probably has to be Bazunu, as Cabellero is possibly too slow. I don't know, as not seen him play for yonks. KWP - I am not sure whether to play him at LB and bring Lyanco in at right back, as we had a modicum of success with it, but picking Lyanco ahead of Bree feels wrong. I'll have to stick with KWP at right back, I think. ABK is a no brainer, then after that, probably Salisu, then DCC, then Bednarek, but I'm not convinced Salisu and DCC are that much better than Bednarek. Salisu has had some poor games and DCC has been OK, but lacks pace. I'm tempted to pick Larios ahead of Perraud. He looks a better technically, but although Larios is busy (much like Perraud), he looks too slow to me to play fullback (much like Perraud). Maybe Djenepo gets another go there? No, that's not going to work. Shit. Lavia, JWP. Not really a decision to make here as there is fuck all competition. Alcaraz. Again, seems like the only option to me as Diallo gives the ball away too much. But Alcaraz has a lot to learn, not least where to be defensively. Picking him is easy, but as we saw against Wolves, it doesn't mean our midfield is suddenly great. Salemana on the left wing. He's been unimpressive, but everyone else has had a shed load of chances, so he has to be given a few more. Djenepo after him. On the right wing, I think I'd go AArmstrong, then SArmstrong. But not totally convinced by my own choice. I think we have looked most threatening when AArmstrong was running at Newcastle in the first leg, but I am willing to concede the end product has been missing, so why go back to him again? I guess I thought he might have turned a corner in that game - maybe not in terms of goals, but confidence wise, he seemed to go for it and caused Newcastle genuine problems. Mara gets the nod for me. I think he is the most talented of the three and his performance against Newcastle made me think he could lead the line on his own. Che has had his chances and Onuachu aint my cup of tea. Not much separates them though, so wouldn't criticise anyone's alternative choice. If we go 4-4-2 I'd need a rethink.

Just looking at last two Prem seasons: Stuart Armstrong: 2 goals in 25 Prem games, 1 goal in 20 games Eli: 4 goals in 30 games. 0 goals in 20 games Djenepo: 0 in 12, 0 in 12

Pretty sure that if McCarthy had been fit, Jones would have played him. Not sure how Selles will play it. And perhaps there lies our real problem. Not that Bazunu has not been ready to be first choice Prem keeper, but that our senior keeper is not good enough.

How would you use him? The way I see it is that he's a ball player (the kids would call him a baller...or maybe they would a few years ago), and the kind of guy you want in the opponent's box, with nice twinkle toes and ability to do something. But getting the ball to him in the box relies on us dominating a game and being able to get th eball up the pitch and into the box...something we struggle to do. I guess what he does give you is control of the football. Maybe he comes on when we are chasing a game. If that happens he needs to play in the hole, not out wide. I have to say though that I went to the Bournemouth away game and it shocked me just how little effort he put in. We were under the cosh and he just strolled about. OK, perhaps he is one of those players that just does not and will not do the hard dirty work, but he didn't make any effort when we have the ball either. Honestly, I have seen him sprint once since he got here.

Not sure the point you are making. Mine is that we had the money, we met both the transfer and wage demands, but he didn't want to come. You keep saying if we had £xm more, we could have got him, but that's not true. He wanted to join a bigger club (bigger than us and bigger than Leeds) and when a bigger club came knocking a few months later he joined them. The long and short of it is that the Larios signing (and the £6m spent) didn't stop us signing Gakpo or another striker in the summer. The problem seemed to be more that we just aimed too high and then failed to get any of the deals over the line.

First of all, for context, I like Edozie. I love players that dribble and try and take players on. However, I have to question whether Edozie has shown `a lot more' than Bazunu. To compare the two, Bazunu would in general have to come on with five minutes left in a game and make a flashy save that ultimately goes in. That's pretty much all that Edozie has done. Made a couple of nice dribbles, but then failed to get a cross in or pick a man out for them to shoot/score. Keeper errors and underperformance is for all to see. The underperformance of left wingers is harder to judge. Overall though, Edozie hasn't really set the world on fire. If he can't get a regular place in a side that can't create or score goals how well has he done. That's not to say Bazunu has been good, he hasn't, and I'd of picked McCarthy over him all season, but shouldn't those failing to even make this side actually face more criticism than those in it doing badly? For some stupid reason the song "How shit must you be, if you can't get in this side" comes into my head.

I don't believe it was. Gakpo thought he was going to United. He was linked to them all summer. When little old Saints came in and met PSV's demands and his pay requirements, he mulled it over, but he never said yes. It wasn't down to money, or wanting to stay at PSV, it was simply down to our lack of prestige - hence he joined LFC without thinking just a few months later.

Sure, but we only had one left back at the club. We needed another, be it an 18 year old understudy or a 30 year old journeyman. If we had brought the right guy in, who had a similar impact as Livramento, you wouldn't be saying "why the fuck did we spent £6m on a left back? We needed that money to get a striker." Besides, buying a left back didn't actually prevent us from spending £18m on a striker. We could have used the DCC, Aribo or Edozie money or the money we just spent on Onuachu, Orisic, Alcaraz and Salemana.

If he was as good as Lavia I wouldn't have cared. He ain't.

We did need a left back.

not sure I understand the math of those three figures -11.1, 41 and 25.9. Should that not be 29.9?

I guess what I was trying to say was Tadic didn't dribble or power past anyone, he just didn't have that in his locker. Ely also can't dribble or power past anyone. Sadly, Ely doesn't have other qualities to make up for that. He's a drinks carrier. He plays like a central midfielder, get it and move on to someone else, but that's all he has.

I knew I should have phrased it better: Just like Tadic, Ely has no pace, but there ends the similarities.

there have a been one or two decent crosses where he has been nowhere to be seen. Not many mind. In general our crossing is terrible. It's not just poor delivery, it's having limited players that are unable to even create half a yard in order to allow them to get a cross in that isn't blocked.

I didn't say they should be required to do so, I was suggesting that if we were not going have fullbacks bombing on and creating overloads etc, then there is the onus on attackers to create something themselves, and as yet they haven't been able to do that. I think the idea of our defenders actually being in position to defend, instead of 50 yards up the pitch and leaving us exposed, is something many have called for. You say strikers, but I am referring more to our attackers, so striker(s) and attacking midfielders. It's up to Sulemana, Armstrong and Ely or whoever to make things happen and create and score goals. But they just don't seem to have the quality, skill or attributes to unlock a defence.

Djenepo has been largely crap for us, and it concerns me that we are discussing him as our best left midfield option, but he does have a trick and the pace to beat a man from time to time. He at least makes the fullback work sometimes. His workrate has been good and positional sense improved from a low base. Obviously he treads on the ball, miscontrolls and generally looks like a fish out of water at times, but his unpredictability is a weapon a non-scoring team needs right now. He's like the opposite of Ely, who is neat and tidy but ultimately just a bit too lightweight to make a difference. Ely is a bit like Tadic, in that he doesn't have enough pace and strength to ever beat a man, but he doesn't have the same qualities Tadic had to made up for it - touch, vision and quality of pass/cross. Never has that been more obvious than at Leeds on Saturday when we had a break and it was down to him to pick that right pass to take advantage and he just couldn't do it. That happens too often. Right idea (not always), but poor execution.

My memory might not be great, but his saves/blocks with his feet, to shots that were close to him, possibly in the second season, seemed to be the thing that impressed most and really got fans on his side. Bazunu perhaps needs to watch some videos of De Gea and emulate that technique.

Forster was excellent at saving stuff close to him. He got in the right position, made himself big and did what needed to be done to keep the ball out. Bazunu doesn't stop nearly enough of shots that are close to him. He tries to `save' them rather than block them, if that makes sense. Unlike Forster, he seems to get smaller not bigger. He makes the goal look massive. I'm not sure he (Bazunu) really makes up for the failure to save stuff close to him in terms of agility and saving stuff outside of his arc, low and in the corner, which was Forster nemesis. Forster saves that Leeds shot. I am trying to think of the saves Bazunu has made that Forster wouldn't have made. There are probably quite a few, his speed off his line is bound to have got us out of jail several times, but he has to stop more shots that are close to him. Probably a good thread for one of those XG or XS stats.

This is the issue and has been for a while. If we want to prevent goals, our full backs need to sit in and as a side we need to be more compact and less adventurous. That has perhaps happened in recent times and lead to less goals being conceded. To then score goals, you are reliant on having genuine quality up front that can create and score goals out of nothing. We don't seem to have that individual quality. Or at least it's not showing itself at the moment - and I am looking at Sulemana here. So we must then return to being a bit more gung ho, with fullbacks pushed high and try to create overloads out wide, but doing so will leave us open to the counter - and we are terrible defensively when running back towards our own goal. Finding the balance between attack and defence is critical. I don't see an easy solution here.

Do we? Talk me through this talent pool we are overlooking?

good post. We were fucking shit defensively before Bednarek was recalled. It pains me to say it, but maybe the other options are no better. DCC is slow, Lyanco poor and Salisu has been all over the place. Bednarek is just a easy target, but maybe we should be blaming the guy who should have been marking the goalscorer? Diallo was faced with a two on one because Walcott goes towards the ball near the corner flag rather than inside with Firpo. That's why we conceded, not because Bednarek failed to block the shot. You are always going to concede goals in the Prem, so we have to be creating chances and scoring some goals to give ourselves a chance of winning games. Since Onuachu and Sulemana have got here, we have scored 2 goals in four games. One of those was a JWP freekick. Has Sulemana created a chance yet? There are flashes of skill and pace, but his inconsistency perhaps explains why he only played 356 total minutes in the entire first half of the season at Rennes. Onuachu certainly hasn't made us more of a threat either. His fitness levels are embarrassing. He led the line well last week, but in terms of a goal threat, he basically is only useful if someone puts a great cross in and that happens once every thee games.

you are right, he should adapt to the situation, but there is obviously a concern about pushing these guys beyond their limits and them getting injured, plus it could be argued that all three were doing fuck all and could have been subbed earlier. We may have spent £40m on Sulemana and Onuachu, but it doesn't mean they have a divine right to play.

as do the other players in the side. Bednarek may not have done enough to block the shot, but the defeat is not on him. The rest of the team did little. Strikers that don't score, attackers that don't create, midfielders that don't dominate...need to share the blame.