Van Butsen

I don't really think we should change the new formation just because Willian's found a couple of goals, need to think about the team as a whole. Stick with three in midfield.

45mins if he was lucky. 9 mins generally

It was flat out Salah bashing. I said it at the time and have said it since. He did not get near enough time on the field for anyone to make a judgement on him. The supporters of Salah said there wasn't enough to go on, but certainly didn't write him off, while the opposing views were that he was a terrible terrible player. I remember it clearly. There was no compromise from the other side of the fence and they bashed him any chance they could get with one gif of him missing the target (by a long long way, but everyone's has been there). Very typical of twitter/this forum in general at the time.

How many Salah bashers eating their words? Hope he has a shocker this weekend though, looked to be holding himself back against Sevilla.

His body language has really really diminished. Does not look like the old Willian.

Feeling bad for the baggers now.. harsh call.

Stadium looking mint! Atmosphere sounds immense. Props to the Azerbaijanis

Think we played with those three up front 3 or 4 occasions in my memory all with solid victories. The details are escaping me right now, but I have really positive memories of it.

I hear ya Valerie!!! I'm personally really looking forward to the kick off time, it's a whole new strange world of not having any time between work and game.

My thoughts exactly. We don't need to go starting Hudson Odoi but certainly a game for a few players that have lost their spot in the team of late.

The Matic one. And we aren't a stepping stone, certainly not in England, the trophies will attest to that and if players want marketing fame/Real Madrid over us then that is their personal choice and I wouldn't not have that player for 3,4, 5 years because of that. We saw Matic as surplus once, so it goes both ways. I'll wait to see if Pogba has any more influence on the game in the next couple of years because of Matic, I don't really see it happening but we shall see.

Anyone try and get WC tickets? How did you go? I went in the first ballot but didn't get any. Then did the first come first served phase yesterday morning, tried to get follow Australia tickets also follow England tickets but both options were not working (I presume this was because they were already gone) so I just randomly picked some cities and will be at the mercy of the draw. June 16 Moscow June 19 Saransk June 24 Rostov

Player power hasn't won in this example though. Club and player equally happy to part ways. You'll probably point out Antonio wasn't happy with it, but the club as a whole were keen to not see us fall to stagnant and have an eye on the future. A good balancing and compromise in my eyes. Rotting on the bench doesn't help the club at all, let alone the player himself and I don't think we (or any club) should deliberately kill players seasons. It's a bit sad from a wider footballing family point of view. It doesn't look good for other players who may come in and not enjoy playing for us for any reason as well. The Dembele and Modric situations are entirely different as they were only going to improve (personally and for us as a team). A better example would be us selling Hazard to any of our rival English teams, which we won't.

I'm more relaxed about it than you and most. I don't think anyone we have sold them has made them stronger than us and subsequently our acquisition of players with presumably some of that money has been far superior (if we are talking what the team needs and not what the marketing department wants). Edit: For the record I think David Luiz would absolutely make them stronger and I'm not suggesting we sell him to them at all. But the players we have sold have been in decline.

Why not? It's worked well in the past selling them our left overs, nice little earner.

What did you think of the game? I was personally thoroughly unimpressed. Great result though.

Ahh good shout. Always loved seeing their three piece designer suit compared to everyone else.

Last 6 World Cup playoff games.... Honduras 0-0 Australia New Zealand 0-0 Peru Denmark 0-0 Ireland Switzerland 0-0 N Ireland Greece 0-0 Croatia Italy 0-0 Sweden Now 569 mins (9.5 hours) since last goal when Sweden scored on Friday.

It might be

Yes this is a thread about Lewis Baker so please stop talking about what threads a for, there is a thread for that. Christ

Which part was he proven right in? The part where Chalobah and RLC have made senior England debuts or the part where Chalobah and RLC have made senior England debuts.

Put it this way, they aren't disqualified...

They haven't qualified

Just don't really see how people liken him more to Cesc than to Baka. To me, he is almost identical to Baka both in skillet and physically.

Can't believe we just signed Neymar