carefree franco

Ah last summer Arsenal spent a load of money on calafiori who can cover left back or centre back when they already had timber who can play right back, centre back and left back. They also have Ben white who can play right back or centre back. And Lewis Skelley who is the future wonder boy of left backs. The centre backs they have on top of those are Gabriel and Saliba who you would expect would play when fit. So 60 million for a player who’s competing with Calafiori, timber, Gabriel, skelley all seems a bit bonkers

I am definitely in the camp that garnacho should not be signed but Simons would be a good signing. I don’t want the club to spend recklessly but by and large recently the signings have been more hits than misses.

I think it’s completely reactionary to say he’s inferior to George, he has played a lot of minutes in Germany and looked like a great talent and sure George might be a great player but he’s still quite a way behind gittens in his development. I have previously said getting gittens who favours the left wing for madueke who is a right winger when we have estevao palmer and Neto who play there this season and from next season Quenda and Paez is a great for squad balance. After this weekend I’m not sure maresca will be tactically flexible anymore but lw, gittens garnacho cam palmer Simons rw, estevao Neto with palmer estevao and Simons able to play in 2 of those positions means that we won’t be predictable in how we set up at all. I know this is a gittens thread but Simons estevao and palmer as the three behind the striker rotating could be very exciting to watch

It wasn’t just the like for like subs that was baffling, it was the bring gusto on for James and ask him to do the exact same thing as him. If something isn’t working try the same thing with different players mentality

I haven’t seen enough of Gittens to make a proper judgement on him yet. However if he is the same level as Madueke I don’t really get the criticism, palmer, estevao and Neto all favour the right hand side and no one was naturally a LW so if we have just got a player on Maduekes level on the left then it gives the squad more balance.

I meant that although it was given for that, the contributing factors also played a part. The ref in the United game did also make a mark on how close the attackers were to the wall so maybe it’s a thing that’s being enforced more this season

Agree with everything apart from the disallowed goal, it could have been disallowed for a clear push and him being that close impeded Sanchez’s view, even though he should be doing better with that

I’m half and half if we need another cb. In my ideal world we would see fofana, disasi and badiashile for football and injury reasons. That leaves Chalobah, Tosin Acheampong and Colwill. Acheampong is looking very promising but I always thought he’d be a right back but maybe this season he’ll cement himself as a centre back. In that situation one more defender is needed and I honestly think it should be Scalvini, him and Colwill next season and for a good few years could be an incredible partnership. If acheampong does impress this season we’d have incredible depth. Fofana if he could stay fit would be as good but I just think that ship has sailed now and it would be good to move on.

Arsenal being Stoke again this season! It’s really funny that in the main it was arsenal fans banging the drum that mourinho was anti football when he first came in and now they don’t care even though they’re not a touch on what his team was

Maybe not, he’s definitely more explosive and flashier than George which might deceive the eye test somewhat but I’ll give him time to prove himself

It clearly wasn’t working at half time and he should have spotted that and made changes, I wanted pedro and delap up top as a 2 with palmer and estevao behind them and santos beefing up the middle alongside Caicedo. But it took him too long to make the changes and when he did a) it was too late and b) he didn’t tactically alter the game plan he just swapped the personnel that were not doing anything

And that remains a big problem, essugo should be the understudy to Caicedo and who plays next to him should be based on the game, santos should play against teams who aim to stifle us, Enzo should play when the teams a a bit more attacking and he has time to play and Lavia should play when he’s fit.

He didn’t have the best game but was stifled of service. The problem today was the same as last season but in the games he’s played previously i thought that maybe he would be the striker to drag space between midfield and defence and allow palmer more space. The 2 big problems today were both named Enzo. Maresca inverting cucerella rather than asking him to hold width and stretch play one side and to facilitate Fernandez to be one of the attacking players who slowed down the play even more than the tactics were meant to do and occupied space that palmer, Neto, pedro and gittens should have been in. By the time we were near the area Palace had 3 centre backs who could deal with anything that we could throw at them.

He looked potentially electric in the game against leverkusen but that’s a very small sample size, he’s better than George and could be a Sancho with pace but I’m not convinced he’s a player who knows what to do against teams who pack themselves in. I think Simons would be a lot more creative and able to do more. The physicality did look like it was too much for him though

He was awful today, I don’t think the tactics helped him but that’s no excuse. If he’s played higher up then it should be against teams who don’t pack the area, but when he did come short he miscontrolled balls that should have been easy for him. If he carries on playing I want to see what he can do with “traditional” full backs alongside Caicedo. Today he congested space that wasn’t there for palmer and just slowed the whole team dynamic and if he carries on like this then santos should be putting him on the bench.

He should have been brought on earlier. He has more presence than Enzo, he impacted the game and I think he should have been used deeper to allow estevao more freedom and gusto holding the width but he is definitely a player who should get plenty of minutes this season

I’ve accepted that we will build as a back three but during the club World Cup and brief pre season I thought Maresca had learnt from last season but today really struck home how foolish I was. I then (stupidly) got excited when santos and gusto were coming on for Enzo and James (admittedly too late) because I thought that meant gusto would attack high and wide like he did against PSG and santos would drop into the pivot and cucerella would be the third centre back. All of which in turn meant you could get estevao palmer and Neto in space to cause problems. But no he asked them to perform the same job that wasn’t working when Enzo and James were on. That’s a long winded way of saying, the frustration of last season attacking stubborn defences looks to be a norm again this season.

The solution is in theory quite simple but pulling it off is another matter entirely. Colwill (hope he isn’t ruined by the injury) Chalobah (keep Tosin (keep) Fofana (replace with a more reliable player) Disasi (absolutely sell) Badiashile (sell) Veiga (maybe keep this season for squad rotation) If Fofana is replaced by someone who can play the ccb role then James and acheampong at right back can form the back 3.

I rate hincapie highly and think he’s a very good centre back, however, I don’t understand why we’re looking for a left sided centre back. Colwill was looking fantastic before his injury and I hope he can come back from it strong, fofana is pretty much constantly injured so I would much prefer Chelsea to go after a right sided centre back. Say we get Scalvini in then this season we play with Chalobah, badiashile (should be sold), acheampong, hato as the lcb options and Scalvini, fofana (we’re stuck with him unfortunately) and tosin as rcb options, with colwill coming back next season. acheampong and hato can play as full backs and offer cover there. If we do that then maybe next season if we can get shot of fofana and badiashile and hato and acheampong are considered as full backs then i could understand Hincapie as that’s colwill, hincapie as lcbs and Scalvini, Chalobah as rcbs and with tosin as depth but keeping everyone happy would be a challenge

All the work that Chelsea have done with the wage structure will be undone in an instant if we went for him. I think he’d be an immediate upgrade but would not be surprised if half way through the season there’d be questions about making mistakes with the ball at his feet

I wasn’t that keen when we were first linked but having watched a couple of games and seeing how Maresca played around with tactics a bit more in the club World Cup I really want him. A touchline winger (gittens or Neto) with Simons and palmer playing as “outside” 10s and one of the full backs offering width on the other side sounds exciting. Estevao looks like he can play in any of the 3 positions behind the striker as well so those 5 could offer flexibility and mean that our attack isn’t going to be predictable.

I wanted Chelsea to go for Scalvini before this injury and have tosin and Chalobah as excellent backups, now I want it even more. This season Scalvini and Hato/Chalobah and next Scalvini and Colwill. The only thing that concerns me is he’s just had an acl injury season himself

Only reason I could see both coming in is if we play with 2 cams (Simons or Rogers and palmer) most of the time and estevao goes on loan and be able to switch it to pure wingers with one cam with Neto and gittens at various points of the season. Maybe leipzig are holding out for 80 million and Chelsea see rogers as a better fit and if we have to spend that much then get our preferred target?

Weird, I really like Chevalier and think he’s going to be one of the best around. As for Donnarumma, think I read he wants a pay increase and extension on his contract. He would definitely be an improvement on what we have but his style of traditional keeper will just give us (a far superior) version of Robert Sanchez, where he’s asked to play out constantly and make mistakes and lead to being considered a flop

If Liverpool do get Isak I can see them becoming a mid to late naughties Real Madrid. All shiny toys but no steel. I don’t know how they plan on lining up but frimpong has been a right midfielder for Bayer and I don’t have confidence in his defensive abilities, kerkez looked good but the same questions defensively have to be asked. Then the midfield of wirtz macalister gravenberch seems attack heavy. On paper Liverpool getting these players seems scary but in reality it doesn’t appear at all balanced.