Diabolus Ex Machina

Meant 4-2-3-1 hence talking about the 2 man shield. My mistake.

Aahh fair enough. Still thought we were trying to play 4-1-3-2 from the start. Does highlight how important having that 2 man shield in front of our defenders has been the last couple of seasons though. Also shows just how ineffectual Tadic, Long and Davis were in getting hold of the midfield.

Yup, playing Davis in Morgans position was never a great idea as he is in no way a replacement there. Need to give either Claise and/or Romeu a proper run of games to see how they hold up. The fact we are still waiting on Tobys replacement and have Bertrand out is not helping. Once we have our actual first team out on the pitch things should hopefully look a bit rosier. As for this match, do think Targett could probably do with a rest. Want a strong team out though as you should never take any team for granted and will want a good lead before the away leg. Should take some encouragement from how we played in the last round though.

True, assumptions shouldn't be made either way.

You'd think being a small guy he'd be used to coming up against bigger and stronger players though, it's not like he's new to the game. I do like the signing of Romeu though as if it is a concern he can easily slip in there. Judging by his performance in the second half he looks like he will be a good fit there - one of the few positives we can take from todays game.

Maybe, I still believe Clasie was signed as one of those first team players and so will the new CB be as well as Cedric. The argument then comes down to whether they are as good as/better than Morgan/Toby/Clyne though they were always going to be hard to replace. Think we can agree we did need more depth though what with the added Europa games. As for Juanmi, his natural position appears to be behind the striker in which case you are moving Mane - arguably our best player - from his best position so I can see why they may be hesitant to bring him on.

Last year we started the season worrying about being relegation candidates due to the loss of so many players. Start of this year people want (expect?) us to push on from a 7th place finish and Europa league and think we should only be signing 'top class' players. What a difference a year makes hey.

What's with the complaints of our transfer activity all of a sudden? In the 2 prem games so far the only ones to have played a full game are Stekelenburg and now Cedric and he was only subbed in the first game because he was a red card risk. Martina and Romeu have only had a half each and Romeu has only been here a few days. Clasie hasn't played, neither has Juanmi nor Caulker and we know we are trying to get another starting CB in. We are currently starting with several players who we were hoping would only be backups and the players who were with us last year are generally under performing as well. A full strength team should hopefully look much more solid especially if Koeman sets them out properly unlike he has done the past 2 games. Trying to suggest that all these new players aren't up to it when the majority of them haven't even played a full league game with us is ridiculous.

Bad game all round for us really with the exception of Pelle who I thought did well. Tactically got it completely wrong in the first half which left us chasing the game but we never really looked like breaking them down and seemed over reliant on getting aerial balls to Pelle. Think Koeman really needs to rethink how he's setting up the team. Davis can't play that defensive midfield role so Romeu or Reed has to be put in there until Clasie is back. Wanyama looking disinterested at times is also worrying. Going forward we need a better plan as well. Last year a lot came down the flanks via Clyne and Bertrand which both Targett and Cedric haven't been able to properly replicate. I don't think they are getting much help from those in front of them though in this case Tadic and Long who barely seemed to be in the game at all. There needs to be a direct route from back to front and at the moment i'm just not seeing it. I don't think we've suddenly turned into a bad team and the new players aren't the disasters others are trying to make them out to be either. Once we are over our injuries (Clasie, Bertrand) and get a new CB in we should hopefully look much more assured and solid, we have to set up the team properly though - for all the talk of a Morgan shaped hole in the midfield i'd say it's the fact we're not playing a CDM there that's the biggest issue and that falls firmly at the feet of Koeman.

Saved one from Barkley first half before Cleverly fluffed it didn't he?

Fonte completely left his man there

Manes been very sloppy on the ball today

Players may have been poor first half but i've got to say Koeman has got it wrong this time and needs to take a fair bit of the blame. Davis just can't play that defensive midfield position properly - doesn't give enough cover defensively and can't go forward as much as he needs to hold his position. Obviously hasn't learnt from the Newcastle goal last week leading to us being caught on the break from our own corner again. Long might as well not be on the pitch for all he's done which again has left Targett exposed. Not sure what we're trying to do in terms of attacking tactics either. Don't seem to be getting too much down the wings via long or Tadic but likewise Mane not really dropping off in the centre to link up play meaning there's a lot of long balls to Pelle up front. Just look so unbalanced. Stick Reed or Romeu next to Wanyama and get Long off.

Haha, think it was Monks update in regards to Fonte which also mentioned Reed possibly going on loan that got the ball rolling. Point taken, though to be fair this became a bit of a non-story after the press conference.

Agreed, though I really think he should have been getting them here. When we sold Cork last year our only 3 recognized CDMs were Morgan, Vic and Reed yet whenever Morgan or Vic couldn't play Koeman looked to put Toby in that position rather than Reed and we've seen at the start of this season that he'd rather but Davis in there than Reed. It suggests to me that Koeman doesn't thnk that highly of him. Having got Clasie and now Romeu in has just pushed him back even further in the queue. The question then is with a loan out does he overtake some of our current players when he comes back to get first team oppportunities or will the players we've bought still take precedence in the first team considering how high we are aiming?

In regards to last post obviously can add Shaw and Chambers to list of players that have come through but as they've both left it doesn't really help in adding academy players to our current first team.

Let's not get too carried away with having 5 academy players getting prem debuts as most were cameos at best. Not sure if these are the 5 you re talking about but the overall amount of game time they had was insignificant. McCarthy - 1 game, 8 minutes Seager - 1 game, 6 minutes Gape - 1 game, 5 minutes Hesketh - 2 games, 52 minutes Isgrove - 1 game, 13 minutes Outside of Reed, Gallagher and Targett (JWP has been a regular for 3 years now) no-one else has really pushed through to challenge for a first team position. I have no problem with the youngsters going out on loan but is there going to be a place available for when they get back? You can say there will be if they are good enough but surely you can only prove that by playing in the top league and being given the chance?

The whole thing with betting companies is shady at best. For example today we have announced betfair as our official betting partner. Who's to say that someone within the club couldn't have leaked rumours that Fonte may be leaving in order to encourage bets on it that they knew wouldn't pay out? Purely hypothetical of course and i'm not suggesting anything of the sort would happen at the club but getting any betting company directly involved with clubs seems like trouble to me as there is potential for this sort of thing.

Don't get me wrong I wouldn't expect any manager to say they thought a player would leave (though it does happen - see Austin/Fer at QPR for example, not that either has gone yet). My point was that Delia had left a window of doubt regarding VVD though by only really specifying that he would be at Celtic for at least the Champs League qualifiers. Glad that Koeman has nipped this one in the bud quickly however in regards to Fonte.

In terms of the Delia being clear on VVD bit I would add that most quotes seem to infer that he will remain with Celtic until the Champs League qualifiers are over but after that is much more unclear.

Hahahahaha! Now that's just cruel.

Wouldn't matter if the club didn't want to sell anyway - signed up til end of 2016/17 season and it's not like we have a large signing bonus to recoup. Could easily make him play out his contract if it was necessary.

The wording is always interesting in these things "Aston Villa pursuing", "is a transfer target for", "Villa are in talks". The first 2 purely relate to what Villa may want and not necessarily anything that's going on while the "talks" could be as simple as Villa saying "Would you sell?" and us saying "no". Now having links to Van Dijk and Koulibaly may indicate a slight bit of truth to this but I can't really think of any good reason for Fonte to leave for a lower club unless they could offer him a dramatic pay rise and even then you'd think that would affect his international career he's worked so hard for.

For those suggesting he could play CB has he played there much in the past? Can't recall it myself but admittedly don't know the player that well. I'm still of the belief that we want VVD as a replacement for Toby (no smoke without fire and weren't we even rumoured to have put in a bid?) and with Caulker on loan as a replacement for the injured Gardos and Yoshida and Fonte as first teamers I can't see the need for any more CB cover (have the youngsters as well if desperate).

Sounds like just what we need to add some depth to the CDM position. Only slight concern would be that it could hamper Reed's progress a bit but Koeman seemed to prefer slotting Davis/JWP in there instead of him when there was an injury anyway so might not really make much of a difference in that respect. Also wonder if the club have the possibility of Vic not signing a new contract in the back of their minds so trying to reinforce that position early.