pimpin4rizeal

I don’t believe this .. many people on here was raving about Sam amo Being our best prospect since bale,, likewise people raved over dibling in the cup.. sulemana was preferred over doku by many of the fans at his last club .. and alcaraz was arguably our best player in the premiership at the back end of last season.. i agree we are going for promotion but to make out they are all rubbish is wrong

You are correct with all of this .but I still think martin has certainly favoured experience for the here and now over fully unleashing some of our young players .. I mean In the attacking winger positions we could have probably not even brought Fraser and brooks in at all if we wanted to and used sulemana edozie Sam amo and dibling. The main conflict here is whilst brooks and Fraser have been great you could argue they are blocking the devolopement of the other 4. Charles was a expensive youngster but mainly on the bench meghoma only getting cup games And alcaraz let go because Martin preferred stuey.. as I said it’s a promotion chasing season so I don’t really have a problem with martins approach here but I do think it’s fair to say he’s favouring experience and loan players who are not ours over some really high potential youngsters

Hehe a bit harsh maybe .. I do however think he has definitely preferred experience to youth . in a year where we are chasing promotion I won’t argue against it too much but the likes of sulemana alcaraz edozie Charles dibling haven’t really broken through under him ., and I think that’s more to do with preferring experience to them being not good enough

I think In a way he’s been very unlucky.. when he got injured he was actually first choice. Since then Arma has been immense on one wing, Fraser took his chance well and now we also have brooks as well as edozie with Fraser and brooks you get a ton of end product, frasers shooting is superb and brooks plays killer passes. In a season where every result is crucial they are safer picks. But it’s good that we have a different kind of weapon for when we need it .. i think Martin is tending to prefer the reliable pros for the here and now over utilising our players With the highest ceilings .. same applies to alcaraz and maybe you could add Sam amo.. I can’t blame Martin for doing what’s best for promotion but it’s not been a season that helps our brightest young talents

Good stuff from joe, second time now he has came on and been a total match winner . He’s been a bit of a mixed bag so far, seems very good attacking wise and could be a very useful impact sub when needing a goal

I don’t know why people keep using his transfer fee as a stick to beat him with.. it’s not his fault we paid 22 million for him also it’s a bit small fry to even think 22 million or whatever it was is a big fee anyway .. for a premier league club like we where at the time 20 million doesn’t guarantee you shit .. clubs like united and Chelsea struggle spending 4 to 5 times that.. also we sign a bunch of players at different fees some values will go up some will go down it’s literally impossible for every players value to increase as the ones on the bench values will drop .. its not worth worrying about fees Im just excited that we have a youngster here that if it clicks could be absolutely terrifying

I wonder if he might try a 3-4-3 to accommodate stephens when kwp is back. Would probably need to lose Stuart Armstrong . But would give Stephens more license to roam forward into midfield when in possession ..

He has indeed got all the skills and pace which is exactly why people should have patience with him .. even players like Raheem sterling even though quick can be wasteful or make wrong decisions a lot .. and if all your getting is little cameos off the bench that’s not always gonna happen .. The raw attributes are there for him to be s awesome player we need to devolop him not fuck him off as early as this

We are gonna smoke them!

Seems russ is adamant on getting him in the team now . In ways you can see why, he’s always been pretty good when roaming forward and pretty decent passer for a centre back. Also he’s very vocal and passionate and has some good leadership qualities I think it’s also possible he’s improved quite a lot since we last saw a lot of him. Seemed to have s great spell with Bournemouth. its a brave decision by Russ though and one that be up for a lot of criticism if it doesn’t work instantly. most people will want the thb/bed combo after it worked so well big decision but I think he’s kinda earned enough trust to make this call

If anyone’s being naive here though I don’t think it’s juventus .. they have admitted they where in a rush and want to renegotiate. We must have put the buy option there for s reason ? can see where you are coming from with the tella comparison ..but what the player wants here might be a bigger factor tella in the end got a better offer then Burnley .. but it’s super unlikely alcaraz will get a better offer then juve and he could want them like van dijk wanted Liverpool. not sure I can see us saying no you can’t join the biggest club in Italy when here you are behind smallbone and Armstrong, doesn’t seem the Southampton way

Just sounds to me like they are being very clever here agree a deal they won’t pay to get him there and then renegotiate.. i think when you loan a player to a club the size of juventus you are allowing him to be tapped up to the max .. it can only strengthen their hand that he’s already there and they can talk him into the move as much as they like if they want him he will be gone

He had 2 or 3 chances he just smashed wide with no technique.. nearly fell over before scoring . But this is what he does and we all know this by now .. the goals he does score are usually close range efforts of no quality anyway. Do u ever see che have any awareness in the box when finishing ? He’s just so frustrating in front of goal

Yeah it was a clever run tbf. Saying that though if Brooks doesn’t do the hard part of cutting in and scoring with a great strike no one would give a shit about smallbones pass here .. he’s just played a fairly streight forward pass to brooks and followed it with a run .. surely this wouldn’t be counted as a big chance created ?

I know he scored yesterday but it still amazes me that we are still starting wth this absolutely shocking player after years of his dogshit finishing . Another bunch of scuffed shots yesterday. Rose Stewart with one leg would probably finish better .. It’s just shocking that he’s been allowed to prove he’s terrible for this long, you just know he’s gonna end up signing a new deal and starting next year as well 🤮

It’s a stretch to credit smallbone for brooks goal .. sure he played it to him but brooks still had a ton to do .. he had to cut inside and unleash a great strike .. hardly like smallbone set him up

Crazy that smallbone starts over aribo.. I don’t hate smallbone but he’s just a tidy passer and not much else .. Aribo can take the ball on turn so more press resistant, better dribbler, stronger more creative .. he’s just so much clearly better it’s not even close 😕

You don’t think these stats might be skewed by the way he’s had over 3 times the amount of games .. and arribo coming of the bench’?

Needs to start every game now .fantastic again last night.. receive’s the ball on the turn. Holds off players with his strength,, has the ability to hold the ball long enough to open space for others and sees the passes too . is there anything will smallbone does better then him ? i think he’s maybe better then downes too personally .. just absolutely should be one of the first names of the team sheet

Frustrating game .. we done a lot of good things in the first half. Created loads of chances and if scoring one of them it’s probably a different game .. Neutrals I think would love russ style of play he had us playing last night but it did also demonstrate how soft we can be ..a lot of needless errors passing out from the back. Again thought Aribo was quality and probably our best player, some great taking the ball on the turn, holding off players with his strength and also is vary aware and holds off players before playing incisive passes .. surely Aribo has to be in our first 11 every week now ? sulemana looked a constant threat especially when used to break the press but nothing quite coming off in the end, but sake goes for the rest of the attack really. in the end we looked a bit powder puff, just wasn’t clinical enough but this could have been a very different game

One thing I’d say that’s really positive for him at the moment is that he seems to work very well with our passing out of defence tactics .. especially against teams like Liverpool last night, a few passes and we break the press by hitting it down the line to him ..it turned defence into attack very fast .. he was a constant threat but also frustrating .. seems to always like slowing down instead of just using his pace . Also doesn’t look quite as confident as edozie imo .. still think there’s a lot to work with here and we can maybe drill some of these things into him

Attitude wise I think Fraser is maybe the most likeable at the club, his comments show a real desire to stay and he also seems like he doesn’t mind being a team player or having to be on the Bench at times . its a blow but I think we have 3 potentially fantastic wingers that all offer different things . Door now opens for sulemana and edozie to show what they got id really love to keep all three of them next season no matter which league we are in

Its a real shame about the Fraser injury and he’s been a model pro, but still feel kinda excited that this may open the door for sule to shine now All the talk of no end product but he absolute destroyed the millwall defender and put in a beautiful cross for the Arma header

I think playing downes in this would be way too risky .. could you imagine if he started the cup game and got injured again? As much as I’d like to beat the scouse,league has to be priority

We don’t usually stand in players way when they don’t want to be here do we ? juventus are openly admitting they did this deal to get him there and then will look about negotiating a price in the summer . at that stage (if they want him) he’s going to have his heart set on juventus. So we have a player who doesn’t want to be here or we negotiate with them . can you really see him coming back or juventus paying 49m euros ? I can’t