HarvSFC

Oh dear.

Think Martin has to take a fair amount of the blame today, him and Angus... Sorry Bazunu in goal. When the line-up came out it looked iffy. First things to notice was that Charles had dropped out of the team despite looking good in his recent appearances and giving us some form of solidity in the midfield. As with Norwich, him being dropped for Smallbone saw us surrender the midfield. Then you look up the pitch and think Sky have got it wrong. Surely it's S. Armstrong out wide, A. Armstrong in the midfield and Mara upfront as that's where the two latter ones have looked most effective this season. Nope, we carried on trying to see if A. Armstrong can come good as a number nine when he's looked pretty hopeless every single minute he's played up there this season, while he is actually an asset in the midfield. Keep him in midfield. Then you go to Mara, who I don't rate as a striker and out wide he's even worse. He just doesn't do anything, like Aribo, who replaced him. It should've been Adams up top for me. Yes, he's had a lot going on in the last few days, but he's been professional in the other early games this season and he ended up playing 45 minutes anyway because the selection was wrong. Then you go to a lack of a plan b. At 2-0, 3-0, 4-0 we were still playing the same way. Passing it around our midfield, defence, not really creating anything and getting caught out by one ball over the top from Sunderland. We have the attacking quality to maintain pressure and overload in this league. At 2-0 down I wanted to see a bit more forward running and risks being taken, but we just continued with the ponderous stuff which Sunderland were soaking up easily. A top manager needs some flexibility and a need for adapting to the opposition, the game is what's required in football. Stubbornness sees you get thrashed and outplayed when the opposition have worked you out.

Quality. Strength in depth at centre-back, centre-midfield and striker is a level above. Only area you'd say we look slightly weak in is goalkeeper due to not having a proper number two, or competition for Bazunu and the right wing slot because SAA is still untested. Although, you'd hope Edozie/Fraser could move over to the right if needed. We've signed some real Championship quality this summer, improving from last year and the untested kids route and you can tell from the outside that Martin has had a say in all of the transfers. Keeping KWP, the best right-back in the division by some distance, Adams a free scoring striker at this level, Alcaraz, a potential top talent and Sulemena, again if he knuckles down now then he could be a Championship star is the key.

Weren’t Sulemana and Onuachu both deal sheets in January?

Is Tella's replacement going to be this year's Gakpo? 🙁 Still wouldn't be against another striker either even if Adams does stay. One injury away from taking Adam Armstrong away from his new good position, or relying on Mara. Adams is going to be playing a lot as well this season with Scotland and the league fixtures, should he stay. Lets pull one out of the bag.

Can't say the club haven't learned from last summer's mistakes either. I pointed our the other day they're all the manager's signing's as opposed to this time last year. As well as this, we haven't gambled on a load of kids. Manning, Downes, Fraser, Holgate, potential Stewart, Roberts and Harwood-Bellis all have good Championship experience and some have Premier League also. Only first team signing that fits the young, hungry.... spiel is Charles and he has fitted right into the team.

I said we should get Stewart and Cannon if Adams was to leave yesterday. Cannon would be a good stop gap while Stewart gets fit and then be a good backup. But, there has to be a heavy O'Rourke tax. Bloke knows nothing.

Harwood-Bellis would be a phenomenal signing. Maybe he doesn't want to commit to us on a permanent in the Championship, but I'd be disappointed if we didn't include an option to buy dependant on promotion in the deal. He'd be one of the signing's of the summer in the Championship either way.

Option three would be the best one. Keep Adams and add Stewart. Given Armstrong's new role in the team, he can be the third choice striker and first choice hybrid role he's playing at the moment. Mara and Onuachu don't fit the way we play, so neither should be here after deadline day and Ballard isn't considered to be ready yet, but can be fourth choice in an emergency. So, we have Adams leading the line for the next month or so, while Stewart gets up to speed from his long layoff, which is still going to take a while after he returns to training. Then you have the two battling it out for the top spot for the rest of the season. Competition is never a bad thing. I think if Adams does go then we will need Stewart + one more. I said last night the + one should probably be a loan, so that we aren't so dependant on A. Armstrong/Mara while Stewart gets fit. If Everton are so keen on Sulemana, then Tom Cannon from them wouldn't be the worst shout. On that point, I wish there was more morality on the side of the buying clubs when they seek players who go on strike/refuse to train. What I mean by that is that they see a player who's not complying to their contract and they pull their offer with the reason that they don't want a player of that attitude within their dressing room. But, that's never going to happen now, unfortunately. The horse has bolted.

The key positive from this summer is that the player's being brought in are being brought in for the manager, the man in charge and the man who selects the team, as opposed to last summer. Joe Shields was like a kid in a sweet shop, and still is at Chelsea given their high spend, high turnover and relatively poor results. None of Mara, Aribo, Maitland-Niles, or Edozie fit in with Hasenhuttl's high pressing, winning the ball up the pitch tactics. Mara, Aribo and Maitland-Niles barely break into a jog, while Edozie's work off the ball is pretty lacklustre. It was as though the manager had no say last summer while in previous seasons he had a big input. Pretty sure it's a big reason as to why his whole persona changed in the final months at the club, that and his coaching staff getting the boot and having Selles forced upon him. Now, this summer we've got Manning, Martin's POTS last season, Shea Charles, a Wilcox signing, Downes, Martin previously managed at Swansea, Fraser, former teammate of Martin and Holgate, a ball playing centre-back. At least we look to have a plan this summer, just need a few more to come in before the weekend. It would be nice if we signed a permanent striker and got one in on loan like we did when Ings left and we bought Armstrong and loaned Broja.

Just got to hope this deadline day is better than last summer's.

Spence can go one way or the other. He's known to have a bit of an attitude, receiving criticism from both Warnock and Conte. But, he also starred for Nottingham Forest in this league, so if you can get his head right he's a very good player, but not without risk, hence why he's moving back down here. Forest themselves signed a different right-back on loan recently in Montiel.

Momentum's huge in football and we've gone from a losing every week, picking up 25 points from a 38 game season mentality to an unbeaten league start, winning three of our first four. That alone deserves credit. Then you have to consider everything that's going on behind the scenes. Started the season with JWP, got an assist against Sheffield Wednesday, his last appearance in a Saints shirt, replaced by a currently half fit Downes. We also lost Lavia from the squad, but his replacement in Charles was already here. Eased in a bit due to his age, but has looked very good since his first start last weekend. This has left us with a fairly unbalanced midfield in the recent three matches, which Smallbone's injury also hasn't helped with and we're still grinding out results. Then today, we didn't have Adams, nor did we have his replacement should he leave, which is looking increasingly likely given all the sounds coming out of the club. So, again, we were a lot weaker in that department. Then to add, we also didn't have Tella, and again we don't have his replacement in either. An important player from the opening fixtures. Fraser's not his replacement, as stated by Martin and again, Fraser's not fully match fit right now as he didn't feature at all for Newcastle in pre-season and has been away from their first team squad for a near half a year. Essentially, we're playing with a patched up squad at the moment, slightly hamstrung by not having replacements in through the doors, or those replacements needing to get up to match fitness and not being ready to start from day one and Martin is navigating through this amazingly. He had his doubters when he was first linked, which I think was fair given the mess of Nathan Jones and Ruben Selles last season, but long shall the Martin reign continue now and the board needs to back this man in the market before the next game.

Pretty funny how Everton are one minute skint and struggling to meet FFP rules, haggling over our price for Adams and then the next they're going out and putting £35m down on Beto, a player who was brought up a few times on here last season. They act the same way with FFP as they do with relegation. Always reported to be failing it, but always go out and spend big money anyway.

Hopefully our weakest 11 of the season. Of course the two match winners against both Plymouth and Sheffield Wednesday are gone. Need the others to step up.

Possibly! Steve De Ridder when Cortese hated the Echo a close competitor.

You only need to look at his Wikipedia page before stating "You clearly have no idea of the actual situation." "He ranked highly in the assists chart during the 2018–19 Premier League season with 14 assists and 7 goals, leading to transfer speculation linking him with a move to Arsenal. No summer move materialised and Fraser admitted in January 2020 that this speculation had caused a decline in his performances during the 2019–20 season." That's prior to him refusing to end the season with Bournemouth, the final season where he scored 1 goal and got 4 assists. We all speak negatively of the way Lallana and Van Dijk left us to go to Liverpool. Can't turn a blind eye to a new player coming in who downed tools to join a pre-takeover Newcastle.

I really dislike Fraser. Awful attitude, gave up at Bournemouth because he was linked with Arsenal and Liverpool, then found the best move for him was a pre-takeover Newcastle and Howe has gone in there and kicked him straight out of the squad. Thought Martin/Wilcox would have been a bit wiser to character’s like him.

Max Aarons was having a medical at Leeds, lets do a Bournemouth.

Would be a record signing in the Championship if we did. Ruben Neves for £15.8m the current record. Be nice if we could find a striker as good as Neves is in his position.

Doesn't look like there's an option to buy, damn. Ah well, help us win promotion and we can start #FreeDownes next summer.

Maybe it was just the likes of Salisu and Vestergaard who were shit at attacking corners.

We bought Onuachu for more. I know there's other factors in play, but ffs.

Take the three points with a more depleted midfield than the one that turned out last week considering we were missing Alcaraz and Smallbone also. Similar to Sheffield Wednesday as well in that Plymouth have a very good home record. A. Armstrong my MotM, which I never thought I'd say. Two big roles in the goals, goalkeeper had to pull off a worldie save to stop his free kick and he made a crucial intervention at the end with two Plymouth players lining up to score. Also, shout out to Bazunu, came out and got good hands to three balls at the end. Something I feel that's been missing from his game. Shea Charles was also good in the middle. Another week until the next game, lets hope we're going into it with Adams and Tella. God knows what Mara was doing at the end. Again, don't think he'd have helped himself with Martin.

Nowhere did I compare Solanke, Pukki, Mitrovic to JWP/Lavia. @Smirking_Saint and @CB Fry so you're both just hyperbolising what I said to get a few laughing emojis. Because we've sold JWP, Lavia, Livramento and to a lesser extent Salisu, that should enable us to keep our current players who didn't particularly standout in the Premier League, but are top Championship players. Players like Pukki bagged 26 and 29 goals in the Championship, scored 11 in both Premier League seasons, so has a comparable record to Adams. THAT was the point I was making. Norwich didn't put a price on everyone with a pulse and held onto those like Pukki and Buendia, who were key players in them winning the Championship again and returning back to the Premier League. You also laughed at Solanke. A player who again, is very comparable to Adams, not JWP and Lavia in that he's not a particularly great striker in the Premier League, but he's in that limbo position of being a better striker than most in the Championship, hence why I brought up him scoring 29 goals in his Championship season, Bournemouth got promoted, which Adams could also be capable of. Oh and he's currently linked to West Ham for £40m. Three posts are done, I'll be back to enjoy/cry at the Plymouth match tomorrow, but lets not start making up what other posters have said to get a few cheap thrills.