I missed the game but I'm glad he chose the lineup I wanted with actual capable wide players and Havertz in the no 10.

We have been screaming for width all season. I’m glad the stupid experiment of playing Havertz wide was quickly binned. Now stop playing Werner wide and we will be onto something. 
 

Absolutely delighted to see Pulisic back. Ziyech next. 
 

I will also hold my hands up about Chilwell. What a performance. It’s still early doors and his positioning was a bit mental at times but by god what an upgrade on Alonso. 

4 hours ago, bluedave said:

It's only Palace though, and, most importantly, he didn't bring my favourite player on until 83 minutes. It's like he doesn't care about my feelings at all.

Give him a break, he left his favourite player on the bench 

Everyone can see that back 6 is our strongest. 

Mendy - French speaking 

Azpi - English speaking and captain 

Silva - French speaking and captain 

Zouma - French speaking 

Chillwell - English speaking 

Jorginho - Vice captain and English speaking 

 

3 leaders out of the 6, 2 languages, our two best center backs one the most physical beast we have and the other class and organising.. both center half’s and the keeper all talking French. It just works you can see before yesterday it was going to be our best bet. I’m excited about it. Pair Kante with Jorginho for more of the French speaking spine. 

 

2 hours ago, I Am Gay 4 Diegod said:

Everyone can see that back 6 is our strongest. 

Mendy - French speaking 

Azpi - English speaking and captain 

Silva - French speaking and captain 

Zouma - French speaking 

Chillwell - English speaking 

Jorginho - Vice captain and English speaking 

 

3 leaders out of the 6, 2 languages, our two best center backs one the most physical beast we have and the other class and organising.. both center half’s and the keeper all talking French. It just works you can see before yesterday it was going to be our best bet. I’m excited about it. Pair Kante with Jorginho for more of the French speaking spine. 

 

Azpi also speaks French from his time at Marseille..  SFL confirmed the same in his interview yesterday...

I hope now that Frank has the players he wants, that he can settle on a starting line up. Particularly the defence. 

7 minutes ago, Jangz said:

Azpi also speaks French from his time at Marseille..  SFL confirmed the same in his interview yesterday...

infact now to think of it Jorginho and Thiago should also be able to communicate better given Jorgi's Brazilian heritage!

1 hour ago, JM7 said:

I hope now that Frank has the players he wants, that he can settle on a starting line up. Particularly the defence. 

This was the first time we deployed such a backline this season, Chilwell-Zouma-T.Silva-Azpilicueta. This could very well be our go-to backline this season.

2 hours ago, Jangz said:

infact now to think of it Jorginho and Thiago should also be able to communicate better given Jorgi's Brazilian heritage!

Yep Azpi-sliva-zouma-chilwell-kante-Jorginho can all communicate I would keep this until it doesn't work or someone needs a rest. 

Silva-Zouma-kante-jorginho-Kai-werner should stay for consistency then you can rotate  once settled really should not change just for the sake of changing ... Keep that spine and build off that

1 hour ago, Brutos said:

Yep Azpi-sliva-zouma-chilwell-kante-Jorginho can all communicate I would keep this until it doesn't work or someone needs a rest. 

Silva-Zouma-kante-jorginho-Kai-werner should stay for consistency then you can rotate  once settled really should not change just for the sake of changing ... Keep that spine and build off that

Agree 100%,but we will see if Mason comes back in next game.

6 hours ago, I Am Gay 4 Diegod said:

Everyone can see that back 6 is our strongest. 

Mendy - French speaking 

Azpi - English speaking and captain 

Silva - French speaking and captain 

Zouma - French speaking 

Chillwell - English speaking 

Jorginho - Vice captain and English speaking 

 

3 leaders out of the 6, 2 languages, our two best center backs one the most physical beast we have and the other class and organising.. both center half’s and the keeper all talking French. It just works you can see before yesterday it was going to be our best bet. I’m excited about it. Pair Kante with Jorginho for more of the French speaking spine. 

 

It's actually the best lineup atm because Azpi drops back when Ben moves upfield and Azpi has the discipline to run back or jockey the oppo's left winger.

Kante and Jorginho works with Silva because I believe Silva can see how the game is playing out which lessens Jorginho's burden of telling people where to go all the time

2 hours ago, Gol15 said:

This was the first time we deployed such a backline this season, Chilwell-Zouma-T.Silva-Azpilicueta. This could very well be our go-to backline this season.

 I think keep the back 5 constant and that gives you the spine/consistency you need. Can’t blindly argue for a starting lineup as such though, as there needs to be some rotation depending on who we’re playing. For example there are legitimate concerns expressed by some members about Jorginho vs certain types of opposition and he should sit those out. At the same time , there are other types of opposition where Kante can be a bit of a spare wheel and these games are a great opportunity to rest him. 

Watching that united game and realised they have no one of note out injured. No one. The meltdown must be immense over there. 

I hope we get a chance to see our team with no injuries at some stage this season

5 minutes ago, bisright1 said:

Watching that united game and realised they have no one of note out injured. No one. The meltdown must be immense over there. 

I hope we get a chance to see our team with no injuries at some stage this season

And we play man u in a couple of weeks.

Just now, Kev56 said:

And we play man u in a couple of weeks.

No doubt they'll beat us somehowb

Just now, bisright1 said:

No doubt they'll beat us somehowb

Noooooooo we'll spank them.

6 minutes ago, Kev56 said:

Noooooooo we'll spank them.

Not necessarily they might have the new manager bounce by then.

3 hours ago, Strider6003 said:

Not necessarily they might have the new manager bounce by then.

Cavani enjoys scoring against us from memory 

If Lampard doesn't take advantage of the mess at city and Liverpool then I don't know what to say..get a spine don't tinker and let's have  a go....

I notice you often get some strange results this time of year and then November the league starts to settle down.

The international breaks don't help either unless you get a 5-0 drubbing of course, then the negativity gets forgotten by the international break.

5 hours ago, Kev56 said:

Noooooooo we'll spank them.

Tbf I thought this last season, when they were playing like guff and we were in right form and they ended up beating us 2-1 at Stamford Bridge in the Cup. 

 

10 hours ago, bisright1 said:

Watching that united game and realised they have no one of note out injured. No one. The meltdown must be immense over there. 

I hope we get a chance to see our team with no injuries at some stage this season

As a lurker on redcafe ... a lot of it is directed towards the glazers and Woodward! They have their usual suspects to beat up in Maguire and Pogba..

also interestingly the ref there was Anthony The C^^t Taylor... strangely Lamela escaped any punishment and so did shaw for a horrendous tackle.. but that doesn’t surprise me when the tackle on zouma didn’t get punished either.. those are real violent conducts not a pat on the cheek.. 

clearly this Ref has no idea of the emotional side of football... also I still can’t believe how lamela always escapes. he is a dirty dirty player.. I still remember the stamp on Fabregas.. a few years back.. 

These Pool and ManU results were freaky as was our 3-3 against Brom. They mean absolutely nothing. Liverpool and City are still the sides people want to catch. We are still one of the challengers. The non-preseason is just so weird for anyone and all sides are struggling to manage the fixture congestion. I am also throwing in the empty stadiums. That could have some effect in these freak results. It is relatively new thing to football. 

1 hour ago, evissy said:

These Pool and ManU results were freaky as was our 3-3 against Brom. They mean absolutely nothing. Liverpool and City are still the sides people want to catch. We are still one of the challengers. The non-preseason is just so weird for anyone and all sides are struggling to manage the fixture congestion. I am also throwing in the empty stadiums. That could have some effect in these freak results. It is relatively new thing to football. 

It's true that they are still the teams to beat but if Man City keeps having injuries their spending might not be such a big factor and we have seen that Liverpool could be beaten like this last season as well, we broke their backline as well just that nobody could score that many goals, maybe this is a sign that they are slowly being figured out.

Can we please just use the City, United and Dipper results to apply a bit of context to our own start please ? 
 

being 3-0 down to West Brom and coming back for a draw doesn’t all of a sudden look so terrible does it ? I was looking at Liverpool 4-1 down at half time yesterday thinking they will 4-4 .. they conceded another 3 goals in second half with the best CB and full backs in the world apparently. They just had a dodgy keeper... like we have had. 
 

if we had lost 1-6 at home to Spurs people would want franks head on a spike. We are as good as any team in the league this year if we can grease the groove and get our defence playing like against palace with regularity we may even have a shot at the title!