verlaine1979

We do???

RK definitely announced that JWP would be first choice when he was on the pitch, though not much point in having a first choice from the spot who doesn't start. Austin took them for QPR, and he definitely strikes the ball better than Tadic, so even if he wasn't supposed to take it, Austin probably did us a favour by insisting it was his.

Still don't like the diamond - in the first half, there were quite clear passing lanes through the midfield which better teams would have made more of. Still, good finishes from Austin, nice play from Martina with the assists and a couple of other passes, and another goal for JRod. Oh, and Yoshida very frustrating with his distribution - so slow to make a decision he almost always ends up turning and making Forster play long.

I would. Even if you ignore Yoshida's two mistakes, he's so slow to make his mind up with distribution. Almost always ends up running out of time and popping it on to the full back, or turning around and making Forster go long. Not a good option for a team trying to build from the back.

Why not just look at your food and your companions rather than anyone else? If you've managed to spend anything like £200 a head in Southampton, then I'd look even closer, as the waiter will probably also soon be trying to sell you a very fine suit of invisible clothes...

Arsenal dominated possession, and far more of the game was played around our box than theirs. The fact that we engineered one good chance that Long failed to convert, then a speculative shot from distance that the keeper should never have pushed into his path hardly constitutes a game played toe to toe. Like I said, other than the traditionally galvanising story of heroic resistance denied by corrupt bureaucrats, I'm not sure what solace anyone is taking from that game when viewed in the context of the three toothless performances that came before it.

Did RK just bring on an 18 year old for a run out with 15 mins left? Expert trolling.

I see what you're getting at here, but you could reinterpret that as saying that in the course of four games, we've conceded a wide array of goals, which might hint that the entire defensive unit isn't working as well as previously.

Funny, in my recollection of the game, after about the 25th minute Arsenal spent most of the rest of the game camped on the edge of our box.

We were under the cosh from the 30th minute onward and they rested three of their key players. If you take solace from the fact that we could've nicked a point and didn't, then fine, but my point is simply that if you let your rage against the unfairness of this particular game cloud an objective judgment of the obvious deficiencies of this team, then you're kidding yourself.

Don't let the red mist about the officiating fool you; on another day that would've been a basketball score to Arsenal. Our midfield looks so easy to bypass (remember, Capoue stormed through it as easily on opening day as Pogba and Ozil, so it's not just big team quality paying dividends). Our passing lacks zip and there's very little genuine creativity - just the obvious overlapping out ball or a check and pass back into midfield or defence. Coupled with a lack of cutting edge when half-chances do fall, we look toothless.

Blimey, Cedric's crossing so far this season has been atrocious. Can barely remember one that he hasn't boomed out of play.

This squad should be okay for a finish somewhere around 8-12 in the league, providing we don't lose anyone crucial to long-term injury, and that we find a formation makes the most of what we've got (playing a lone out and out striker again would suddenly make our relative paucity of specialist front men seem a bit less daunting). What's disappointing is not seeing us being a bit more adventurous in adding a few more promising young internationals to the squad (Stanciu seemed like a good option, and there were definitely others we were linked with after the Euros). This is, after all, the economic model that the likes of Dortmund and Atletico adopt - not simply replacing 1 for 1, but selling 1 established star and then buying 2 promising players with that money. That way we'd hedge our bets against slow adaptation to the league, injury, and loss of form, and potentially strengthen future revenue streams by having two improved players to sell rather than one... There are plenty of games in a season, and plenty of opportunities to come on and change games for players who don't start, and we certainly had room in our squad to pack in a bit more quality.

Redmond probably would have come to sit on the bench, Hojbjerg would have come to play in place of Clasie under the previous formation, and Boufal would've replaced Davis as our attacking midfielder - easy.

There's room in the squad for a couple more first team contenders, especially if you ship out the likes of Isgrove who is now 23 and unlikely to suddenly make the grade. For me, I'd have liked to see us hedge our bets a little - if you have a player as important to the team as Mane or Wanyama and you sell them for a large sum of money, surely it's safer to spread the risk and buy one or two players who might be able to fill that role rather than trusting that your scouting of a single player will work out. This seems especially true when you're recruiting at around the £10m mark as we do, where we could easily afford both the fee and the wages (anyone who cites FFP here clearly doesn't appreciate quite how much we've increased our non-tv income this year compared to previous years).

Just waiting for the traditional 'Gone Home' tweet from Jordan Sibley now.

I think most PL clubs have databases and projector screens now, so I'd be very surprised if the main difference between our scouting software and theirs wasn't just that they haven't bothered trying to brand it and do PR around it.

And in all those years we've been crying out for a genuine AM to actually make chances and score goals, rather than popping safe 5 yard wall passes about and blazing over or wide 99 times out of 100. Whether we bring in Boufal, Stanciu or someone I've never heard of, I pray whoever they are, they finally dislodge that mediocrity from the starting line up.

You'd seriously rather have Davis trundling along in that midfield rather than putting Redmond on the right and switching Boufal to the middle where he can do most damage? Madness. Academic though, as Puel shows no sign of wanting to abandon the diamond just yet.

Judging by how little creativity there is in the squad, I hope we get both Boufal and Stanciu. Can't afford to write of January and Feb when the former goes to the Afcon, so #10 would seem a position where we need two genuine first team contenders.

Sounds reasonable - whichever way you cut it, I can't see how wage restrictions under FFP would be an issue for us right now. If anything, it sounds like we have a great opportunity to push our wage ceiling higher so that we aren't held back in future seasons where we don't have such an obvious step up in commercial and player-sale revenue.

Sure, but there are quite a number of posters saying that we can't possibly bring anyone else in at the top level because we only have an additional £6m/7m in annual wages to dispense this year, most of which has already been taken up by the boosted contracts to VVD, Tadic, Long etc. If, as the above posts suggest, our wage bill can actually be boosted massively by additional commercial and player sales revenue, the FFP wage argument about why we aren't signing (for the sake of argument) someone like Benteke seems without foundation.

Huh, so it sounds like we could boost wages by the £6/7m allowed in the rules by default, plus the extra £5m a year Virgin are paying above Veho (assuming the £1m/£6m figure is correct) plus anything up to an extra £8m from Under Armor (depending on how our self-produced shirt income was accounted for and whether the £8m per year figure reported is accurate), plus whatever proportion of our player sales income needed to be allocated to inbound salaries. On that basis, unless we agreed to pay JWP £200k a week in his new deal, it doesn't sound like wages should be a huge constraint this year.

I agree. Fonte and JRod leaving would surely be an indication that we have some pretty substantial inbound transfers afoot, as to not have very high level replacements for both lined up would be literally moronic.

If the opposition are playing 4-3-3 or 4-2-3-1 doesn't one of the DMs just drop back to mark your false 9, leaving the CBs to double up with the full backs on your wide attackers when the ball is on the flanks?