Saint Charlie

I mentioned De Guzman on the HCDAJFU thread. Good player who gets goals from midfield.

9.3

Cool, I hope he is quality there and his composure and passing ability will help, but Im not overly convinced Clasie has the attributes Davis and JWP lack when playing as an advanced midfielder. He has played most of his career as a deep lying playmaker, so will be something of a role change although Koeman obviously knows his capabilities.

The main difference being we paid bigger fees for each of Bertrand, Mane, Forster, Pelle, Tadic, Long, Wanyama and Lovren than anyone signed this summer. Time will tell if the new lads are successful, but we haven't paid the big bucks (don't always need to) that we have previously and so far none have overly stood out as being quality.

Whilst he is poor, if thats your biggest concern then you should be set for a good week.

Is the "you might get away with it once but won't ever year" argument completely unvalid though? I don't see it in the huge extremes some do, but can see why people think it. Hopefully once all the summer signings have bedded in though we won't be too far off. The injuries to Bertrand and Clasie really haven't helped, whilst Cedric and Juanmi are adjusting to the PL but clearly capable and Jay Rod still finding sharpness. Tadic of the players is probably the biggest concern as he was so key to our early season form. His decline is bizarre.

That is fair I think, especially with 1.) The money in the PL and 2.) The fact our European rep is probably never going to be higher so players will be keen to play for us. We were level pretty much with Spurs and Liverpool (on the pitch) end of last season but are obviously miles and miles away off it.

Celtic say no deal in place with anyone. http://www.skysports.com/football/news/11787/9963211/celtic-deny-deal-has-been-done-to-sell-virgil-van-dijk-to-southampton

Ronald noticeably post match compared this Watford game to Swansea and Hull last year both of which were 1-0 wins and said we are a bit behind that sort of level. He has already mentioned a couple of times post match the difficulty of integrating new players and changing the team. He is probably feeling the frustrstion as much as anyone. Last summer was different for him as he hadn't worked with Lallana, Lovren, Shaw etc. As Allardyce says, eventually you will not be able to replace the quality. In addition maybe the intensity of the other players drops slightly as they get the feeling the team is less capable than the previous seasons, as well as seeing some of their pals earning double or triple what they do and playing in bigger matches for better clubs. It is bound to have an impact. I'm sure we will improve, but it is unrealistic to expect us to be the same force as last year, with an inferior team, more expectation and possible increased workload with Europe. Nothing wrong with saying that surely? Its the truth.

https://audioboom.com/boos/3495615-ed-chamberlin-s-blog-big-sam About two mins onwards.

We have a fast mobile striker in Mane (Austin has neither of those attributes anyway). What need is Tadic back to his best and a better version of Davis, JWP who creates rather than is just neat.

On paper we had a great start to the season which makes the peformances even more disappointing.

Clasie doesn't play that position though. In fact, we have nobody that does it well.

Point away is never terrible, and looked better at the back (playing a back 7) but on the ball pretty dire again. Not clear what our style is, who the key players are (Mane aside) and too many passengers in the team (the likes of Targett, Long, JWP, Davis). Positives were Caulker and Romeu but if we don't improve very soon both then we will struggle to challenge for top 10 IMO and will get dicked by the better sides whereas last year we often competed. Koeman needs to find a system, and if he doesn't' think our key creative players like Tadic, Juanmi, Davis etc are up to it then he has a week to persuade Reed. Tadic especially is a big disappointment, such a key player in our good form last season at the start yet anonymous so far this. Oh, and Long should be kept as a last 20 sub, feel for the others having to link with someone who can't control/pass a ball! The PL moves on very quickly and I think the club and some players have maybe become complacent.

How does Long get on ahead of Jay, Juanmi or even Tadic?

Long is woeful.

We have signed a load of players for one style, technical neat football. Then seem to be playing hoofball. Would rather we made mistakes at least trying to keep the ball and create.

Surely the Cocktail might be a better option than Targett? I would go back to the 4-3-3 and give get Tadic on to combine with Cedric.

Not sure what our style is or what our best team is. Pretty dull and uninspiring.

Whats the best stream anyone has?

Tough to watch after playing such good football the last 2 seasons.

Poor so far. Targett just a body, has barely played a single pass forward. Long's composure is dire. Can't string passes together, although they look average too. Not sure who is meant to be creating anything now, so will just be hoofs to Pelle for Long to aimlessly chase.

Think in this system we could afford to play a more forward thinking player than Davis.

This system doesn't suit Caulker. We have regressed on the ball quite a lot since last year. Barely strung 5 passes together once in 10mins!

Would be strange. If Martina isnt a better RB than Yoshida or Jay/Tadic better attacker than Cedric then something is wrong!