jordanl5182

Me!

The guy clearly doesn't like Chelsea and while a lot of it's rubbish, it's an interesting read nonetheless. Guardian I've got my reservations about the diamond and I definitely don't think we can go through the whole season without mixing things up a bit, but Frank's said it's not going to be our only formation, so I guess we have a backup plan.

Why do you want the most bloated squad in the world? Not going into strikers, but in defence you have Richards, Bridge, Toure, Dunne, Onuoha, Zabeleta, Kompany, Garrido, Ben-Haim. 9 players for 4 positions! You have 7 centre backs there - why do you even want Lescott, he's not going to add a huge amount to your team? BTW, the Man City website is very nice!

Riccy's runs are great, one of my favourite parts of his game, he just strolls into midfield when he wants to...pure brilliance. As for Drogba playing at the tip of the diamond, the suggestion was a joke, but in fact he might not play badly there. I think he does have the intelligence to play there and probably has the technique too, but he'd be wasted if he's not up front - maybe in a year or two when he loses a bit of his pace. I originally said this in the match thread, but i guess its more relevant here: Lampard didn't seem to excel in his role despite the goal, but again I'm hoping its just a matter of him learning how to play there more effectively. Personally I'd like to see Deco and Ballack given time at the tip as all three players offer something different...maybe they could switch roles throughout the game if 2 or 3 of them are playing.

Lets just wait and see what the papers print... Its a good point about Aquilani, De Rossi is in a different class. It's nice to see we're trying to strengthen the strongest part of our squad??!!! De Rossi's good, but like almost everyone else we've been linked with, where would he play and who would he replace? I'm pretty glad we didn't get him, cos if that were the case, we'd really be putting all our eggs in one basket with the diamond (which on initial impressions doesn't look in play as it does on paper).

Apparently we had a ig offer refused: Sky Sports

If we need someone to keep the ball, let's try Drogba at the tip!!! He's got a mean shot on him as wel!!

I actually thought it was real until it said "14″ pork sword" haha

I think this video shows what a cheating little prick Evra is... Sure, Ballack may have elbowed him IN THE SHOULDER, so whats wrong with his face? The ref knows what a dirty little w**ker Evra is and so he decided to play the advantage. And clearly Rooney didn't see a problem! Man Utd lost the ball and conceeded, what's so contraversial about that? As for Mr Ruud Devil, you don't seem like much of a Chelsea fan. Obviously you love Ruud Gullit, but most of what you've said makes you seem very ignorant and well...a big ugly manc twat! Go away if you don't have anything constructive to say.

Watched the game until 70 mins and then had to go somewhere. Was listening to the game on the radio and almost crashed at 85 when Rooney scored!!! It was great to see us win today, coming back from 1-0 down was great, even though we got screwed in the end (rooney was blatantly offside) and I almost died! What I do worry about is the diamond - it seems to be very 1 dimensional and I can see teams very quickly sussing us out (like last season). I do think however that Ancelotti's aware that we're excellent at 4-3-3 and so I'm hoping that's our plan B when trying to break down teams. Lampard didn't seem to excel in his role despite the goal, but again I'm hoping its just a matter of him learning how to play there more effectively. Personally I'd like to see Deco and Ballack given time at the tip as all three players offer something different...maybe they could switch roles throughout the game if 2 or 3 of them are playing. Drogba and Anelka together are looking great and WILL form the best goalscoring partnership of the season...I'm almost certain of that! (provided injuries etc don't take their toll) The defense looked a bit shoddy, and I would've been quicker in replacing Ivanovic. Guus would have too! ;) We looked solid in the penalties. Cech has been worrying me quite a lot recently, but he had a great game today and hopefully he'll continue his form. Drogba and Ballack's penalties were really excellent and I'd have bet my house on Lampard scoring his. And finally...I think I'm falling in love with Carlo's eyebrow...I smile everytime I see it!

I'm sure that's crossed Ancelotti's mind more than once! If it were true, which I'm pretty sure it isn't, it would basically be like an agreement to buy him next season, just that the cash would be handed over now. If we announced we were 100% buying him next year, we'd all be delighted!!!

Phil O'Donnell's death wasn't that long ago either...really sad news

Doesn't make a difference, we were gonna walk all over them even with Vidic in the team!

Great news about Pirlo if its true! A couple of seasons ago people would have gone mental (in a good way) about signing Pirlo, just because he's 30 doesn't mean he can't be instrumental in our premiership win this season! I'm starting to have a very good feeling about our chances now!! Our midfield, defence and even our strike force (while a little thin) is unrivalled in the League!!!

A $10m investment gets you double digit returns?!!! I'll keep my $10m under the bed thank you very much...

Best video I've seen in ages!!

Are they getting Senderos back? He'll sort them out! either way I don't think they'll be too worried about Man City taking their top 4 spot. (In fact Arsenal may just finish above Liverpool next season) Look at what happened to Tottenham last season, they signed Pavlyuchenko, Modric, Bentley, Corluka etc and on paper the team looked quite good!! I don't need to tell you what happened there...

I set that one up perfectly!! :)

Erm...we have Bruno now!

The way Inter are doing business this season, we'd be paying £8m for a 1 year loan and giving them Deco and Riccy for free!

By making this thread, I wasn't looking for fact...it was just a little fun to detract from formations and Aguero and Pato! By having people agree with me, I'm not going to be any more confident in our team's ability to win titles! I think some people are taking the thread a little too seriously...most of what is said on this forum is just speculation...there is no fact here! :( And surely not everything needs to be taken back to the fifa/football manager argument. People can see that Ronaldo was Utd's best player and any team would be worse off without him! Obviously if you're looking at facts and figures, there are better teams and we're only the 3rd best team in England, but we can all see what the statistics don't show. If the best team title was between us, Utd and Barcelona and 30 games into next season we were top of the table and the other two were placed 6th in their respective leagues, would that make them better than us because they won them last year and we haven't acheived as much as they have recently? If you can't speculate, then what's the point of being on a forum and trying to voice your opinions?? Why even discuss next season? Aaah, I feel better now!

So you're saying Man Utd are currently as strong as they were at the endof the season?

I first made the thread outlining my thoughts and then it got deleted accidently...couldn't be bothered to rewrite it all, but yeah... Obviously 'best team in the world' is a vague term, in fact it wasn't really what I was thinking, 'best squad in the world' would be more fitting to what I had in mind. Barcelona are clearly a better team than us, while not beating us, they certainly controlled much of the 2 legs that we played. I think hands down Barcelona are the best team in the world (although the change in their front 3 might cause a real disequilibrium!). Real Madrid are obviously an exciting prospect and will surely be challenging for the 'best in the world' crown next season, but the reason I put them into my example was in regards to their squad. In terms of best squad in the world, I think we are definitely in the top 2 or 3. Barcelona while a tremendous team, don't have a lot of substance when you get past Iniesta, Xavi and Messi. They have good players, but the depth of their squad isn't so great. Even the likes of Abidal, Keita and Pique who are supposedly in the first team aren't really all that good (or at least I don't rate them). Real Madrid on the other hand, (while I'm sure some of these players will leave) have the likes of Benzema, Ronaldo, Sneijder, Kaka, VDV, RVN, Pepe, Albiol, after that you still have Raul, Guti, Gago, both Diarras, Robben, Negredo, Higuain etc etc. The squad's lack of a defense makes me think ours is better. When we have a defence of Bosingwa, Cole, Carvalho, Ivanovic, Terry, Alex, Mancienne, Ferreira, I think anyone would be hard pushed to argue that we didn't have the best defense in the world! A midfield consisting of Deco, Lampard, Ballack, Mikel, Essien, Joe Cole, Malouda, Zhirkov and Belletti couldn't possibly be topped could it? While possibly not the best strike force, Drogba and Anelka are world-class players who WILL score! With Shevchenko, Pizzaro, Sturridge, Kalou and Franco as backup, we don't have a bad bunch of strikers! Obviously this is all subject to form, injuries etc but on paper I don't think I'd be labelled an idiot for claiming that we have the world's best squad!?

This thread could very easily make us seem a very arrogant set of fans, but I actually pose the question seriously. In my opinion, right now only Real Madrid could be seen as better, but their lack of a defense puts that into doubt. Pound for pound I'd say we were actually the best team in the world and certainly the 'deepest' team. What does everyone else think!?

It says a lot about Eto'o's personality...Barcelona effectively pay 40m to get rid of him!