g3.7

Him and cahill were unlucky to not have matic ahead of them in their defence - we missed his shuttling to the left, especially when de Bruyne pulled wide to create overloads with navas. It was always going to be extremely hard for them.

really good game, we probably lose it 6 or 7 times out of 10, but it is city away- there's no shame in conceding chances or being in difficulty in this one. even at half time I thought we were well in it. not the better side, but well in it- we met them quite high up the pitch too for a lot of the game and to do that away to a side guardiola coaches takes courage from the players and a real belief in what their manager is telling them to do. you can see this side is developing, that is what is so good. conte is improving what we have, and a couple of transfer windows down the line this could be a side capable of giving the absolute top sides in europe a real game. I think similar applies to city too actually. the level at the top of the league is on the rise.

f**king yes

when we get praise are we to ignore it or say it isn't enough, then pour scorn at the victim mentality of liverpool supporters?

I know what pedro offers, but for me they are very different players and I personally struggle to say one is definitively better than the other- it really depends on what the team requires. with two midfield players who stay behind the ball, and with the other player behind costa (hazard) naturally preferring to take the ball to feet rather than make runs behind the defence, there is more of a call for a player like pedro than willian in this team. this team plays with five players either side of the ball when we're in possession and of the five attackers you could argue that pedro is the player who is the most penetrative in his running. in our squad, of all the forwards willian is the least and to get back into the side it is probably something he will have improve (as hazard has). but I don't think saying pedro has more goals and assists at this point proves anything in a comparison. they're different sorts of players and playing in different teams.

think it says more about the limitations of judging influence solely on goals and assists IMO. I've always been a big pedro fan and it is great to see him playing well and he is well worth his place in the starting 11. but I think willian last season (particularly under jose, when we were right up against it every week) was better than any of our players this season, given the circumstances.

agreed. for my money he's still the best defender we have but his mobility is reduced even from what it was three or four years ago, and that makes it very difficult for him to play in the current system. technically he could do the job luiz is doing, but luiz is playing well and has the pace to cover for two players who will need covering from time to time. it is unfortunate for him, but it is good for us that for the first time since (I would guess) 2002 we are able to leave him out of the side and still look very solid and organised at the back. I can't see him getting a new deal though. christensen will come back and I think we'll spend big on another defender too. that doesn't leave much room for him and I don't think he's ready to retire.

if people thought that I was seriously advocating spending £80m on jonny evans then that reflects more on their ability to understand words than my ability to use them. "I would rather" means something different to "we should", the alternative offered was luiz "on a free"- which didn't reflect his contractual situation or availability, and £80m is double what anyone had ever spent on a defender at the time. other than that, yeah, I can see how people might have taken that comment at face value (and now I wonder whether I will be explaining that THIS comment isn't to be taken at face value either).

kablamo is getting a lot of flak for his methods, and sure he isn't above using the dark arts or relying on devastating counter attacks on other posters. yes, his posting style is mainly reactive and he employs deeply defensive lines against anyone who opposes him, but he is highly quotable, his consistency is remarkable and his results are undeniable. truly, he is the jose mourinho of internet forum posters.

@Davey BabyI agree with all the praise he's been getting at the moment and I agree that he's helping to make the back 3 work as much as the back three relieves him of certain things he's not so good at, but he has played in a back four under conte already and for my money it didn't work at all. his natural tendency is to go to the ball rather than stay in a position. he's suppressing that well at the moment, but on the occasion that he does give in usually he's covered by two players and usually he's not leaving a space or a player that needs immediate attention. against west ham away he played in one of the wider (more orthodox) central positions and looked much less assured. I'm not saying "he's not playing as an orthodox defender so technically I wasn't wrong to say he couldn't be an asset to us"- I concede happily that he has already shown that assertion to be false. what I would say is that even with the increased discipline in his game, I think there would be question marks about whether he could translate this form into a flat back four (questions that I would also put against both wingbacks and the team as a unit). now the more he works with conte the better he may get in all aspects of his game, but I don't think we should look a gift horse in the mouth. all a footballer needs to do to justify his place is to make the team better. luiz is doing that.

but how often is a wingback required to win the ball in the air? I take your point that its a nice bonus that alonso is tall (especially for set pieces) but I don't think it is something that should count against dasilva really. you'd lose on height but gain in speed with him in there.

I'm a bit apprehensive about how we will play out of defence in this one- spurs are probably the best pressing side in the country and whilst the way our players are spread out is designed to help us counter that, I do fear that we could be testing the absolute limits of people like cahill etc. in our favour is that they have a potentially tough european game in mid week and we look extremely fit under conte. if we're in the game late on then I expect we should end it stronger from a physical stand point.

luiz' run now- and this is in a less conventional set up where much of what a central defender does in a back four is tasked to others- is by a distance the most consistent defending he's done in his career I'd wager. certainly the best I've ever seen from him. in a back four evans is not a great defender, but he is good. he's reliable and does a lot of the bog standard meat and potatoes things- like man marking- better than luiz. in fact david's start in a back 4 after returning did not fill me with any confidence that he would be better this time. that post was more a reflection of my preference for reliability at the back than some plea for us to sign evans. let me restate- at the time I would've preferred evans because I believed luiz would be detrimental to the team overall, whereas evans may have been a good squad player. so the imaginary fee was illustrative of that opinion (rather than an attempt at financial valuation). I don't have a problem saying that since the back 3 luiz has been a revelation- even more than victor moses, and that I am delighted that he's proving me wrong by contributing to a high level. p.s. I didn't offer a thought process for you to label crazy or otherwise. if this is, as I am starting to suspect, an effort to humiliate or embarrass, then you will need to do better than this. If you want more insight then ask for it 'bro'.

no, obviously not. I'm a season ticket holder, I had seen luiz play live in a blue shirt countless times and it was on that basis that I was strongly against him coming back. I don't see what point you're trying to make.

luiz for me too- wasn't perfect defensively and didn't get near southampton away in that regard (which has to be his benchmark for defensive decision making by a shot) but for the most part he did what he had to and was good going forwards too. since we've switched to a back 3 we've talked a lot about his improved discipline defensively, but I'd argue he's improved with the ball a lot too. he's getting on the ball less and going up field less often but when he does he's making it count much more in his selection of pass. moses was also excellent but should've got himself a goal. hazard was typically good and azpilcueta showed again that he's a great defender. another game with no bad performances!

I don't think so. He made quite a bad decision yesterday which was probably the only real defensive error anyone made for us but aside from that he was as good as anyone on the pitch. I don't think anyone is or should expect him to be perfect. So long as he carries on playing with this level of discipline then no fair observer can ask for more from him. We're obviously still going to concede goals from azpilicueta being short, Luiz going tight at the wrong time and cahill being beaten in individual match ups. So long as they continue to function as a unit which compensates for individual weaknesses we can be happy.

I'd rather give jay dasilva those minutes- which will be rare if alonso doesn't get injured- on the occasions where we don't use what we have in our first team squad. longer term, yes it is a position where we will probably be able to improve (although that could be with dasilva for all we know). p.s. alonso's best game defensively today. although with the 'caveat' that all of our defenders get- he was well supported by his teammates.

in the circumstances (i.e. an away game against a tough defensive side after an international break), I couldn't ask for much more than that. the defensive organisation was good, the fluency going forwards was still present and the game was managed well. no suspensions or injuries and another clean sheet. can't ask for much more than that. we created some really clear chances and on another day the result would've been more emphatic, and that isn't easy against boro. I watched their matches against city and arsenal and they both struggled in that department.

He has no right to be as good as he has been. In particular regard to defensive concentration when the ball is on the other side of the pitch. All hail victor thuram

No , it's about positioning yourself so you are hard to be beaten. Not diving into tackles , standing off or going tight where appropriate. He's clearly bad at that and any time he's isolated he is in real trouble. He's a good wingback though , overall. Clearly in the long term he needs to improve defensively or he'll not be a first choice

We weren't playing with anything like the fluency of the first half of the season, but then that is a consequence of a lack of rotation and tiredness. But we were still good (yes, relative to the quality available ) . And we were so fluent and top of the league in partial consequence of that same lack of rotation. Most titles require the winners to dig in and fight and imo that is the measure of how 'well' the team plays (when evaluating a full season) rather than spanking a bottom five side when the sun is out. For some people (not necessarily you don antonio) mourinho having left isn't enough - they have to rewrite or mitigate anything that he achieved at Chelsea such is their level of antipathy for re manager responsible for 3/5 titles in 110 years. For the life of me I don't understand why. He's gone and he won't be back so why is it still something to discuss? Ironically they will also brand anyone who defends anything he did as obsessed with him.

what is particularly good about this run of form is that it has clearly convinced the players and the fans of his methods. hopefully, this is true of the board too (i.e. abramovich). now when we hit some difficulties I feel optimistic that he will be backed because we have clear evidence of what type of team he is capable of producing. I mean I think anyone who was familiar with his work at juve would've been positive about him, and anyone who saw italy could see he was capable of making players play beyond what you might expect, but he has now shown he is capable of doing that here. that is crucial.

hard not to get carried away at the moment, because as a team we have looked amazing in the last month or so- more than the sum of our parts. but I do think city for example are still a potentially better side and have more individual quality. there is a nagging feeling that maybe matic could lose form again, or that the back five, all of whom have clear theoretical weaknesses, could get exploited. it is hard to believe this squad is capable of maintaining this level of performance. push comes to shove I don't believe it can.

wanted to vote pedro, who by the way really does a lot to allow hazard freedom to not track back- last week his average position was right alongside kante (!)- but it is hazard. five goals and he was involved in all of them.

its a fair point and he could probably play in this system as one of the forwards alongside costa, but I was looking at the average position map for the game against soton and what was clear is that it was essentially a 352; hazard slightly ahead of costa and pedro in the midfield line with matic and kante. I think that shows how much unsung work he put into that match in particular and I don't think it is a job batshuayi could do as well. when we play like that for me its willian or pedro. in home games it might be another matter. at home to leceister, especially in the first half we had four and at times five forwards on the pitch. against southampton it was only two.