I have always said that we have three crucial players. Fonte who marshalls at the back and has the pace and experience to deal with the best of them in this league and he has gotten even better since the arrival of Hooiveld. Lallana is our attacking lynchpin. Most of our flair and opportunities are from him. He terrorises defenders and teams used to kick him from pillar to post in L1 he also chips in with the odd goal. We have no other midfielder like him as guly is a striker and de ridder is far from proven. What can I say about Lambert. Our main aerial threat superb footbal brain, link up play and a thunderbolt of a shot. Without these three I think it is fairly safe to say we are truly screwed. We need to sign back up for these. Falque is a good start but a sriker in the mould of lambertand maybe Watford's marriapa are the only way forward.
Hooiveld has been twice the player Fonte has been so far this season, but I agree with everything else you say. We look half the team without Lambert.
The good news ... Rickie wasn't out injured so no worries how he might cope on his return. I reckon he'll be ready to eat an opposing centre back when he pulls that shirt on.
Sign backups for Lambert, Lallana and Fonte...easier said than done methinks. Take the best three players out of any team and they will struggle, in fact we have been very lucky with injuries since Adkins came in up until about a month ago. The good news is that Lambert is back now and hopefully the rest are on the way, and we will return to the swashbuckling, swaggering side of a few months ago. In the words of Graeme Murty, "keep the faith".
