Whats_The_Mata?

What attacking talent? We have one of the least talented set of attacking options in the entire league with Nkunku injured. People will blame Poch but the problem is despite spending one billion pounds on transfers we don't have 3 talented attacking players at the club. Madueke and Mudryk are worse going forward than Chilwell which says everything.

The plan makes no sense, other clubs have tried and failed with similar but better plans. You can't only sign only young players and expect any success, success is brought by a mix of quality experienced professionals and talented young players and we've neglected the former. Most promising and talented young players never fulfill their promise, some will be stars and others won't be which is why you integrate 4 or 5 with an existing group of proven performers not build your team around kids. The only possible outcome I see from our transfer policy is the actual talent like Enzo putting in a transfer request in a year or two and joining a club that can compete while we're stuck with a conveyorbelt of kids. Very similar to Arsenal in the back half of Wengers time when the quality like Fabregas, Van Persie, Adebayor, Nasri and Sagna all moved on to win trophies at other clubs while Arsenal kept producing and buying young talent.

I'm writing us off. And I know people will say it's only been 2 games but I wrote us off for even challenging for a top 6 spot even before a ball was even kicked this season. I wrote us off for the same reason we have all wrote Luton and Sheffield off for winning the title this year, the squad just isn't good enough there's very little actual quality in it. Our squad is the biggest lump of dogsh*t I can recall a top club ever possessing and it's genuinely shocking to me how we could end up with such a poor squad given the money we've spent on it. How can you spend a billion pounds and have 2 of the worst keeping options in the league? A 39 year old centre back in a squad built for a back 4? Next to no players who actually score goals? I just can't believe how we've managed to spend so much money on making the squad worse, since Boehly came in we've made in my opinion 3 good signings and all 3 are completely unproven but they're players I think have the talent to grow into real quality players for us. The rest? It's reads like a who's who of the most overpriced transfers of all time.

I don't want him to ever wear the shirt again. But he'd have scored 2 in the first half against West Ham, would probably have scored penalty too.

I agree that Lampard should have played him and the rest of the young players last season when we had nothing to play for, I don't think Mudryk should be getting minutes here this season. The problem I have with Mudryk is that I don't think he has much potential at all. He's fundamentally a really bad footballer, people say he's raw but he isn't. He's fast and can kick it past an isolated static defender when he's already running but that's really were his skillset ends. in terms of technical quality he's nowhere near the standard required and I'm not sure at 22 he can develop to even be squad player standard here there's so much he needs to work on he's the kind of player you buy at 18 and loan out not sign for big money at 22. His touch isn't good enough for this level and a good first touch is what separates PL level players from lower league players.

Excited to be back at the Bridge. Can't wait to see everyone again both old and new faces. Except that c**t Taylor

https://www.sportbible.com/football/stats-fails-kepa-has-the-worst-save-percentage-in-premier-league-history-20200729 In 45 years as a supporter I've never known a player that has been consistently so bad for us get so much rabid defence from a small section of supporters online. I really have no idea why. Surely no one can dispute that Kepa is one of the worst signings in the sports history and he's had a lot more bad games for us than good ones.

Don't see why people think this is a bad deal. He's our number 2 and he's on £170K a week. The club have tried to get rid of Kepa year after year with no takers. Madrid reportedly preferred Bounou but weren't willing to pay his £20m asking price so I'm not sure why people were expecting them to pay a fee or a big loan fee for their backup option. If they're paying all his wages it will save us £10m a year which will cover a sizable chunk of a replacement.

He'd surprise me if he's anywhere near as bad as Kepa so I bloody hope not!

Yet neither are willing to pay a single euro for Kepa and have only considered him as a cheap last minute loan option after both losing their number 1's too injury. Think that's a bit different than the people here thinking Kepa should be our number 1. If Madrid or Bayern really wanted Kepa they'd have moved for him before they both ended up with no keeper days before the season starts or they'd actually pay a fee for him.

I don't think you can read too much into it given Sanchez is drastically more talented than Kepa and no doubt was signed to replace him sooner rather than later. I expected Kepa to start the season but Sanchez to be our number 1 by October so seeing Kepa phased out earlier wouldn't be a surprise. This news has given everyone I know a massive lift. We all thought we'd be stuck with Kepa till his contract expired and he left on a free but if we can actually move him on we've done a tremendous job.

Yes? Given Madrids board considered him as a homegrown backup to Navas after they failed to get De Gea but Zidane turned him down because he didn't think Kepa was good enough to be Madrids number 2. If Madrid wanted Kepa they would have paid his £18m release clause but like every other club at the time didn't think he was worth it.

Given no club wanted Kepa for £18m when that was his release clause months before we signed him and no team has been willing to pay £20m for him at any point since I'm not sure that's much of a point. The bar to upgrade on Kepa isn't exactly high. Better keepers frequently move for less than £20m.

I agree with parts of this but massively disagree with the bold parts. Kepa's biggest problem is he isn't very talented, he has an extremely low ceiling much lower than the requirements of a keeper for any serious club. Even at his best he's still going to single handedly lose you 4 or 5 games a season like he did for us this year because he's fundamentally incapable of dealing with the crosses or long shots he'll face over a season even at his absolute peak he doesn't get near thing other PL keeper look routine and he's still going to be poor with his feet Despite people pretending otherwise which I'm assuming is because he's short and Spanish. I'd be happy to sign a promising keeper providing they're actually a promising keeper. Kepa wasn't very good in Spain. He wasn't very promising he was the kind of keeper that typically spends his career at Elche or Osasuna without anyone outside of spain knowing him. Why we decided to pay £72m for a player who had a 20 million Euro release clause a few months earlier I'll never know but Kepa has never been a player with the talent to play at the top even if he has a good attitude. I'm not sure many people here would want Unai Simon who's a fairly average keeper but he's rightfully benching Kepa for Spain because Kepa just isn't good enough if you want to be competitive not at International level or at PL level which is even higher.

Lets not be bias because he's from Cobham. we've completely pulled Milans pants down with the fee. He's nowhere near SMS. Think he's probably the most overated player Cobham has ever produced from a talent perspective and always had a low ceiling. A few Cobham marks gush over his physicality and ability to carry the ball in midfield but how can a player who can't pass, can't shoot, doesn't know when to pass, has extremely low football IQ, no positional awareness and a low work ethic ever be a useful player? Been a blue for longer than he's been alive and I can't recall many worse players to wear the shirt.

Today is like winning a 3rd champions league. I joined this forum 11 years ago ahead of the CL final against Munich Sacking Potter has made me happy enough to make my first post. A long overdue sacking as he should have gone during the world cup but we got there in the end. Today is the highlight of our season and the first step to getting us back were we belong! KTBFFH