Dave, we need two midfielders - one who can run at and beyond defenders and score goals and one who can sit in front of the back four. Khedira and Fabregas would have been ideal. Fellaini is better than no-one. At least he should add goals from midfield - and he's proven in the PL.. A lot of the top clubs - Spurs included - have paid big money for foreign players who are unknown quantities in the PL. I'm sure Ozil will be a success, but only time will tell for the rest. Some are instant successes - Aguero & Silva did the business for City straightaway - but many don't live up to their billing and price tags. I wait to see if Fernandinho, Jovetic, Negredo etc will improve City.
Except i'm not saying it's because he is on the pitch that he is good. Arsenal went unbeaten and Lehmann played in goal for every game. If he wasn't a quality GK you can guarantee we wouldn't have gone 49 games in a row without losing. He was a great keeper, simple.
Don't be silly, Reina has been like Almunia over the last couple of seasons, constant keeper blunders costing Liverpool goals and points.
A video of a single mistake in his first season as our number 1 (infact that season we hadn't made him our number 1 by choice but through injuries to our other keepers) is somehow relevant to me thinking Reina has lost it? Quickly looking it up - he made his premier league debut in December 2010 and that mistake in February 2011. He was 20 years old at the time. Hardly a good judge of where he is at currently as a keeper. That's like me taking a video of Drogba in his peak and claiming that it shows how he is currently the best in the world - it just doesn't make sense.
He's kept it up during his entire time as your number 1. He went walkabout as recently as your loss to Villa on the opening day, though he managed to get away with it.
Cech Courtois Lloris Friedel De Gea Reina Mignolet Hart Vorm Foster Jaasekilnen (sp?) Begovic Stekelenburg All better than Chesney. Butland Lindegard Ruddy Schwarzer All around the same level as him. I'd say Cech/Lloris/De Gea/ are all around the same level and the best in the league respectively but with Begovic/Vorm/Mignolet/Hart in the next bracket but nobody else comes close. A club like Arsenal should have a GK easily top 20 in Europe. Koscielny and Mertesacker would benefit more from having a more solid GK.
He often makes mistakes under pressure, which top quality keepers don't do. In two consecutive seasons at our place he's gone AWOL and been fortunate not to see red. There are not many keepers (if any) that would make the same mistake twice in a row at the same ground. Chesney is a good shot stopper but being a GK is about more than that. In terms of commanding area, being quick and effective off the line and organising a back line he isn't close to any of the top keepers.
Spurs' club record for consecutive clean sheets had Ian Walker in goal, plus Dean Austin and Justin Edinburgh in the back four. None of those players will ever be in our All Time XI - but at least two of them feature in our All Time Worst XI. It wasn't Lehmann that won you anything, it was the back four in front of him coupled with Henry, Pires and Ljungberg scoring for fun.
When Cech had his skull injury we had Hilario in goal for 24 games and kept clean sheets in half of them with only 2 losses and unbeaten against Arsenal, United and Barcelona (twice) in that period. If you have a good defence in front of you (like you've already said) its possible to beat anybody. It was almost unanimously agreed that Lehmann was the one weak link in that Invincibles side. Good but not in a million years was he a "great" keeper though.
Joachim Low cannot understand why Real let Ozil go to Arsenal but thinks he'll do well there. Well Ozil to Arsenal doesn't seem right to me but let's just see.
Arsenal strengthened where they were strong. There's plenty to be said for that. But not addressing their weakness, squad depth, might just work poorly with that strategy. The more quality the midfield has, the farther they may get in competitions, and the harder fixture congestion may eventually hit a thin squad. Also, whatever you may think of them, Arsenal's fortunes seem pretty tightly tied to Chesney and Giroud.
Didn't he go an entire Champions League campaign without being beaten? Then got sent off.... And Arsenal got knocked out Or am I wrong as usual?
Chris Coleman thinks Bale's move will make him a great player for Wales. It was rumoured last week Factitious would ask him to sack off the games with Macedonia and Serbia, so probably not...
I can't see Bale being a mach winner for Wales against major opposition hbic. Wales are minnows and being a great player for Wales doesn't say much.
