For me, Dier was even better. Anyway I'm going on his league form, Kaboul was shocking last season. He just doesn't have the concentration levels to be a good enough CB.
If Kaboul can remain injury free then he is class. He was out for ages and then he came back in v Newcastle away and looked great and then it went badly downhill from there. I'd like him to be given another season at least before we look to sell him.
Agreed. Kaboul was woeful when he played last season, but he was quality before that, and last seadon may well gave been down to his injuries. If he really is fully fit (and ive heard people before saying he never would be), then he's a keeper. Just the type of player we need to compliment the vlad, verts types of cb as well.
Dier looked composed and comfortable on the ball. However, I am 60 and I reckon I could have played alongside Kaboul yesterday.
He has come in late, but it does add to the list of unanswered questions after this pre-season. As PNP has said on a couple of occasions, thie pre season games leave me with a nagging doubt that we go into the season somewhat under prepared.
Whether he's ready or not just yet, he looked absolute class, and in a couple of seasons that's going to be some player i reckon.
I would say Its difficult to be fully prepared when you first take over a club pre season as first Pochettino has to assess the players (which isn't always possible in meaningless games), then be sure of new arrivals, so for that I won't be too harsh. But if he is still here next season then I would expect him to have been planning for next season by christmas and sitting down with the Dof and looking at targets to make sure they are finalised quickly. ....Just we also need to accept there is "Levy time" which means added time needed to strike the best deal possible so that often leaves us unprepared!
It's always harder after a WC, with players coming back into pre season at different times, and of course he inherited a pre season schedule which wasn't his making and, maybe one he disagreed with, as Van Gaal has disagreed with the one he inherited. So I will join you in cutting him some slack here, but one of my concerns is the Celtic game was a farce and I thought yesterday that Schalke turned out to be average opposition. Under AVB and also Harry Redknapp, the general club rule of thumb was 35 days work ahead of a new season including at least 315 minutes playing time within that schedule. I understand that after a WC, different personal pre season programmes apply, but I remain dubious about how ready some of our players are.
I suppose it depends on who we face and how prepared they are, but then this is the case in almost every game during the season. Last season we managed to look underprepared in most games with very few confident and 'driven' performances. In fact I find it hard to think of a memorable game from last season. We surley cant be fully prepared as we have players coming back who have yet to play and a manager still finding his feet. Having said that I can only once again refer to his running start at Southampton last season, it's a simple game it's just played at a very high level in the PL and you have to be up for it. So many games are decided by who is quicker to the ball and quicker to close down the opposition and Poch seems very well aware of that, it is after all very much the Argentinian way.
Pochettino has seen as much of the available seniors and prospect Academy players as he can for the games there were. Hopefully that + pre-seasoning training will give him enough info about which squad players are likely to adapt first to the style he intends his teams to play.
Some of our players won't be prepared at all, as they haven't featured for a single minute. That is just ludicrous, to me. How is Pochettino supposed to pick his strongest team for the opening game when he hasn't seen a large chunk of his squad in action? Can he risk selecting Vertonghen, Paulinho, Dembele, Chadli and the like? Is it a bigger risk to leave them out, especially as the transfer window's still open? I don't envy his initial task, frankly. Very poor planning, whoever's door that rests at.
PSV opened their Eredivisie campaign today with a 3-1 away win against Willem II. One of our supposed targets, Memphis Depay, scored their 2nd and 3rd goals, though his second was a fairly **** penalty. [video=youtube;TrlI3JcgjyQ]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TrlI3JcgjyQ[/video] Nice pass to Wijnaldum for the penalty and sending off, though. Put the keeper in real trouble. We were linked to him a couple of years ago too, IIRC.
According to the Torygraph, Poch says our squad is too big - the exact quote being "We have a long, long squad. I think we need to take a decision now to decide how many players to keep, because we have more than 25. For me, too many players. My idea is 25. No more than 25. We need to decide now, after our tour in America, and start to work here and decide our squad for the future." That would imply three or four may be let go. It's easy to presume BAE will be one and (based on rumours, anyway) Chadli another.
hbic : If you look at the "2014/15 squad" article, you can currently get to 25 squad players over 21, by selling BAE and two of Carroll/Mason/Obika.
Nice. Close control. Looks smooth. Quick. Eye for a pass. Accurate. Dont think ive seen one clip of lamela i like as much as that.
