I may be alone I thinking this but if Rafa stays i’d Consider giving Ritchie the captaincy and of course a new deal. The man is the biggest leader we have, on and off the pitch and I feel would do a much better job than Lascelles. Jamaal has had a crap season and if we get an offer in excess of £15m I’d sell.
Only issue is with Ritchie is that he'd only play in the position he currently is in so if we buy a first choice left wing back then Ritchie is a sub at best
I'd keep to Lascelles. He's a natural leader and the players do respect him. However, I think you need as many de facto 'captains' on the pitch as you can, leading by example. Ritchie is a great example of that
Leave as is. Lascelles hasn’t by his standard last season had a good season this year but he has been injured and seemed to play when not fully fit. Also if you sold him then who would replace him?
I think keep all our CBs. The fact we have had good cover there this year has been massive for us with this formation we have been playing. Also Lacelles is one that sits and is more pure CB. It's then good having the more ball playing ones around him.
My issue with Lascelles would be if he shows signs of picking up regular injuries. He's been pretty good since he's been here. However I do wonder if we are paying for last season Rafa asking him to play through those hernia issues. His mobility has been affected, and he is fine after about 6 games, but it takes him that long to build to it. It seems to be a dirty idea nowadays, but could we not have got him fit with a few U23 games. We just seem to plunge him back in and then the fans jump on him saying he looks stiff. Not sure he's been particularly well managed to be honest. We don't want to make the mistake we made with Shola again. We lost one of the worlds greatest talents with our management of his hip issue.
Lascelles is still a good player for us. Remember it is a lot to do with personalities also. We need good people around the squad. Look at Kompany for instance. Never fit but he makes a difference. Obviously Lacelles is not the same level but you get my point. We need to get to a place where it is a real squad effort I think we have made massive steps under Rafa in this respect. The culture is there now where everyone understand they are not going to play all the time but we still all pull I'm the same direction. Issue is now we need some better options in some positions.
