When I look to the bench?

[octville]

When things are not going well, and we need to look at bench for fresh inspiration in attacking options....

At Manure...

Berbatov, Cristiano Ronaldo, Wayne Rooney, Tevez

At Liverpool,

Dirk kuyt, Robbie Keane, Torres, babel,

At Arsenal,

Adebayor, Van Persie, Walcott, Bendtner

Meanwhile, at Chelsea....only Anelka & returning Drogs.

For the longest time, we have depended on Malouda & Kalou as quasi-strikers & Deco/Lamps to provide the goals.

No wonder when we are facing tight opposition, we cannot score ...

Robinho was supposed to be part of that solution. I just hope that we can have Benni McCarthy, Santa Cruz, Zaki or even swapping Malouda for Adriano ( This can happen... Jose wants Malouda & Adriano is another fellow Brazilian)

You get the drift... we need more out and out attacker.

[Tim]

I agree our bench isn't the best, and is normally packed full of defenders rather than attackers who can win us the game (which adds further mystery as to why Stoch or Sinclair haven't been given more bench/playing time) but your above lists are a bit misleading.

Normally two of Torres, Keane and Kuyt would start for L*verpool, and ditto for Berbatov, Ronaldo Rooney etc..

Your lists are more a critique of the top clubs total attacking options, and on that point I think we all agree that we DO need to sign someone in the transfer window AND give the youth a chance, as if Nico loses form/runs out of luck at any point soon, we are a bit f**ked, especially with Didier doing his best to ensure he has another season where he is largely peripheral through injuries and suspensions and FDS now out for a few weeks (and still completely unproven at this level).

Edit: On a side note, I really am warming to the idea of a bid for Zaki asap. I normally shy away from jumping on the 'this player is amazing, he will be the next Ronaldo etc' after only a few games, but he does looks so so good and has the physique to play as the lone frontman. Question is, how much willl he go for. Not less than 20 I reckon, in which case he may be out of our price range, if Kenyon's quotes are to be believed.

Edited November 14, 2008 by Tim

[byatt]

Our bench has the ability to be exciting and it also has the ability to host a few options, just got to put faith in the youngsters like the likes of Arsenal do

[TheWestwayWonder]

Byatt, lets face it: arsenal's quality and style of play often lend themselves to far more sensational debuts than ours. Franco doesnt have a single goal yet. If he was a gooner, I doubt that would be the case

What Octville has been saying is something I have thought for a long while now. But I dont think the answer is to go for some megastar like Adriano that has barely returned from the brink.

In my view we need one or two young players like Robben or Kalou that can go outside or up front and can inject pace and runs into a game. Arshavin fits the bill very well, IMO and Zenit might be much more eager to sell now. He has stinging pace and movement, and a lethal shot. Not the traditional "trequartista" because i think we have that with Deco, but someone who can provide runs and scoring from both flanks and the middle.

The other thing I think we are lacking is a really world class striker to compliment what we have. IMO that player should be young too. Aguero is a dreamboat in that category, but I feel like that ship has sailed. I dont think he leaves Spain unless its for a club with a larger stature than ours. Like Milan or something.

To me Klass Jan Huntelaar is big, young, and very gifted. He is also not cup tied. If not him, someone like Vucinic or Zarate. But you get the idea, hopefully. Young, proven, but not on the "superstar" radar. Hopefully we get them before Man City try and scupper us.

[mad_mac]

You'll have no arguments from me if we were to bring in Huntelaar. however, I'm not sure how may "strikers" we need when we only play one!

[midlandblue]

wasn't much wrong with our bench on Saturday.

[Kerry]

Regarding Youth I'm always sceptical to take the Gooners as a reference. Surely they have achieved some great results, as the win against ManU (and we just draw). Regarding entertainment, I'm not quite sure if Arsenal is the more entertaining side. And their "youth development" is bringing even worse results than Chelsea is doing at the moment. Sure, Wenger has promised the youth development will bring the results "somewhat" later. But when? Surely I can say: not yet.

The attacking positions are weak this year, despite Anelka's great run so far. We'll see if he and Drogba can form a partnership together, but as Drogba prefers to stay injured all the time or catching trouble with coins I don't know when this will come. Maybe Christmas. Maybe January. Maybe never when Drogba prefers to exit in January. No idea.

One problem in the summer was imho that Scolari / the board concentrated themselves too much on Robinho it seems. There have never been some infos they're tracking other players; even Arshawin was left out of attention (OK he was too expensive - but not more than Real demanded for Robinho). Scolari's reaction after the balloon as been shot was proves that he seemed to be convinced Robinho would go nowhere else than Chelsea. At the end, he didn't. If there are spendings in January, and I hope they'd do at least something, then please do watch out all the possibilities. If Chelsea is not going to bring in some new additions to the current squad (especially with the injury situation we had since the start of the season) then I doubt we could do much in the CO-phase of the CL. Maybe Scolari can win the league with drawing against stronger sides and big und fat 5-0 away wins. That would be great also. But in European competion we won't compete against weaker sides than Roma and giving our form against them so far, the final is far, far away.