Jonty

So the big questions are, with JT and Zouma both possibly returning, do we; 1) Go with 3 at the back again, and; 2) If so, do they both come in, at the expense of Cahill and Moses (Dave going to rwb)? Hopefully yes on both for me, although given that Moses had a fairly decent game I wonder if perhaps Zouma stays on the bench, Moses retains his position and Dave stays at 3rd CB?

Have to agree, put in a better shift than we've seen lately from Oscar or Pedro but my first thought wasn't running to this thread to lavish praise upon him, a 7/10 performance at best, but hopefully he'll continue to improve. Still not sure that i'd rather have him in the team ahead of Cesc but we'll see, so far so good.

He's certainly no Ashley Cole, he's probably not even a Felipe Luis or even a Ryan Bertrand, but he isn't Ivanovic and for now that will do me.

Well this thread certainly has been quite since yesterday. Who would have thought having someone other than Ivanovic playing behind him would open things up a lot more for him?

2? It's not exactly a huge sample size is it.

It seems like you and the rest of the anti-Jose pitchforks squad are the ones with the Jeremy Kyle-esque drama, I just find the whole thing bemusing.

United is infinitely more bearable than Arsenal in my books. And as a manager he was also far more limited in his options.

I wonder if people feel the same way about Lampard and Cech.

It is a bit embarrassing really the way Mourinho is now suddenly the reason everything turned to sh*te, I still suspect a number of players were more to blame. The fact Jose won the league with a squad that is now universally considered on this forum to be sh*te and in need of a major overhaul shows just how good he was. Unfortunately he set such lofty expectations for himself in the first half of our title winning season that it was impossible to meet them in the next, particularly when the board failed to do their job and sign anyone useful. Only thing you can (maybe) blame him for is moving on KDB, but again who knows if he was being petulant of it it was Jose. If KDB couldn't handle being dropped when his form was poor then while it is very much our loss, I can't blame Jose for wanting to be rid of him, and I can think of another fairly successful PL manager who had a track record of not allowing players to be bigger than the team or manager. Unfortunately our board was not as supportive or loyal as his was.

His first few games of the season were very good, then he had a few sh*te performances in a row and got dropped from the team and never re-surfaced, whether that can be blamed on the attitude of Jose or Kevin we have no way of knowing.

Very disappointing that JFH is mixed up with this, was hoping we'd see him manage in the prem one day. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/09/28/qpr-manager-jimmy-floyd-hasselbaink-asked-for-55k-to-act-for-spo/

You could say the same thing about every manager who has come in since Roman took over the club.

I'm rooting for him, but i'm wondering if the news that Simeone is planning on leaving Atletico at the end of this season (I suspect he was Roman's first choice after Jose left and Pep had announced he was going to City) will prompt Roman to look as Conte as more dispensable if he doesn't turn this around quickly.

Perhaps having a better RB outside him would do him the world of good? Opposing defences don't even bother marking Ivanovic. Their tactic seems to be to double up on Willian on that side, hope he passes to the open Ivanovic, who then swings in a useless cross that gets cleared by the first man and turns over possession. I think both Willian and Hazard would benefit from having someone more dynamic outside them that actually offers a threat, by starting Alonso on the left and Dave on his natural right.

Even once JT goes and if we're writing off Cahill, we have Luiz, Zouma and Christensen who should see us through the next decade, I actually think CB is one of our least problematic areas. Plus this signing would have a very Cahill-esque flavour to me, another decent yet unspectacular English CB playing for a relegation candidate, the main difference seemingly being that he wouldn't come with Cahill's very reasonable price tag.

I still don't think Hazard has ever lived up to his potential but asking for clearly the most talented player in our team, if not the league, to be dropped when he's still probably the 2nd or 3rd best player every night is madness. Particularly if, as you say, he is a flat track bully, and we are playing against Hull, it seems like exactly the kind of game he'd shine in, according to you.

What an idiot, worst of all I thought he was probably the best manager for us at this point in time, and now we'll end up with a useless plank like Steve Bruce.

Well he'd be at best our fourth best CB (Zouma, JT, Luiz), not sure whether he'd even be better than Cahill, and also don't think i'd want to be playing him ahead of Christensen from next season onwards.

You know our form is well and truly in the toilet when there are calls for Mikel to be put into the Starting XI.

And here's me thinking we had Matic and Kante who were supposed to be specialists in defending/tackling/winning the ball back, and our #10 was supposed to actually create something.

What i'd like to see: Begovic Dave - JT - Luiz - Alonso Kante - Fabregas Willian - Hazard Costa - Michy What we'll inevitably see: Courtois Ivanovic - JT - Luiz - Dave Kante - Matic Willian - Oscar - Hazard Costa

I thought Baba was pretty awful, but compared to Ivanovic I think even resigning Yossi Benayoun and sticking him at RB would be an upgrade.

It's hard to gauge how well he's playing when everyone around him is a shower of sh*t.

Sacked a world class manager, barely changed the team, brought in another world class manager and the team is still sh*t, who could have guessed? Perhaps we need to sack Conte and bring in another manager who will be expected to work miracles with the same sh*t again. Although he really isn't helping himself by persisting with the likes of Ivanovic.