I keep beating this drum. No team should bring in too many new starters each year. What that number is varies, but the key factor is whether it leaves you wondering what your style of play is and/or should be. It doomed us with the seven, and I agree you look to have all the signs of the same problem. In a game of fine margins, it makes all the difference in the world whether players can anticipate what their teammates will do. One player can be integrated fairly rapidly, but the problem increases geometrically with every additional player. The sensible thing would be to say: you’ve got to win your spot, and to bring in new signings very gradually, beginning as late substitutions. I think you have an only partly related Schweinsteiger problem as well. It made no sense to bring him on in the game against us where you had been comfortable. Subbing the 25 year old Schneiderlin while leaving Schweinsteiger on made no sense yesterday. Having to put a star’s interest first and the team’s second doesn’t help.
The French seem a tad surprised by the price that the Dutch spendthrift paid for Martial!., http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0317pty
Judging by the increasingly absurd things being said about Rabiot, and OM forgetting how their own league's loan rules work, I wonder if the French know how football transfers work at all.
Stan Collymore, on TalkSport tonight, reckons that he spoke to one of the top agents in the game and that Levy was offer this player by Monaco for £14 million, three weeks ago. If that's true, either Levy has ****ed up big time or United have been ripped off by £28 million!
Martial was the player I most wanted, but the thing to do in retrospect was buy him for 14 million, then sell him to United for 36 milion. 22 million will buy you a lot of Windows upgrades. You might even be able to afford a project manager for the transfer paperwork.
"Harry Kane has sought advice from England team-mate Wayne Rooney after his failure to score this season." Not sure why he's asking Rooney - the only thing you can learn from him is how to spend a decade coasting on reputation alone.
And Gylfi has led mighty Iceland to a win over Memphis Depay and the other Dutch minnows. That’ll teach ’em not to include Michael Vorm.
Spurs beat Bosnia 3-1, with goals from Fellaini, De Bruyne and a Hazard penalty, while 2011 Spurs drew 0-0 in Baku - the main talking point being Modric getting replaced by Marcelo Brozovic with twenty minutes to go.
Interesting little titbit buried in the details on the BBC website: "(Eva) Carneiro is in ongoing discussions with her lawyers."
