Hi Mr Boufel, it looks very much like our whole season rests on your shoulders. No pressure, mate. Have a good one. Signed, The Fans.
I made this point last night on the rumour thread. It seems we are very much relying on him hitting the ground running and staying fit for the rest of the season. If he doesn't and we continue to look vulnerable defensively then we could really struggle.
I'm really interested in seeing how much space he frees up in the penalty area, when he goes past a player. Not sure where Puel will start him, but I have wanted, for many years, for us to have a minimum of 2 attacking players with the trickery to beat players in tight spaces, drawing defenders out of their comfort zones, creating gaps to play the ball through for runners. We now have him, Redmond and Tadic who can provide that spark. Not sure they will all play together, as I don't see a lot of defensive duties being carried out by them, but would add to the excitement when going forward.
I would love to see: ----------Austin--------- Tadic - Boufal - Redmond That would be scary to defend against. And would be diamond free!
PS - Boufel - as a bench mark to gauge your seasons success; we sold our goal scoring strike force this Summer; so if you can score a couple dozen goals plus a few assists - that would be great.
http://freshfootball.co.uk/no-7-inc...igning-named-7th-best-premier-league-splurge/ Another nice piece about Boufel.
I agree I would love to see that spaced. It's definitely possible, but we're not exactly supported by depth in those three roles behind one up top so I suspect it might not happen as often as we'd like. Even assuming everyone was fit, you'd have just JRod and Long on the bench in terms of genuine attacking threat. JRod could play LW or up top (with Tadic moving inside if reqd in the former scenario), and Long could play RW or up top, but any injury/suspension to any of the six leaves you either with not every position of those 4 covered, or us playing Igrove/Sims/Hesketh/Olumola from the bench late on in games.
Or, perhaps you could say that formation would help us give game time to those talented young players?
True. I've no problem with giving youth a chance if they're close to being ready. I was more just commenting that I think we will play the narrow diamond a lot more often than a 4-2-3-1 based on the way we've finished the window in terms of personnel, which is a shame as I don't feel it plays to our strengths as much as the lineup you suggested above. We'll need to wait and see.
Koeman tried similar to this at the start of last season. With Long, Tadic & Mane behind Pelle. We scored goals, but we conceded more. Ultimately Davis came back into the side to offer better defensive solidity and we stuck with three attacking players.
