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That’s it in a nutshell for us Spuds. Our 1st 11 is pretty damn decent when all fit, but how do we improve? we’ve spent a couple of seasons buying the “stocking filler” type of players, young, dumb and full of potential, and that has very obviously proven to not quite get us to the next level. I can’t help thinking it’s time to adopt the, dare I call it, the Liverpool approach. Rather than a 20/30 million pound stocking filler, we need to look at the 80/100 million pound swimsuit model who can go straight into the first team…no more FHM slappers who look good on a Friday night!!
Over to you, Danny-boy!! ๐
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Ed , if I came across over defensive that wasn’t my intention. I was wondering if we could have done any better if the injuries hadn’t occurred .I agree we haven’t been that good and in a different season we could easily be out of the top5/6.
Oz kind words mate , I can’t see us holding Ajax unless we have some acts of god from the treatment room.
I believe you will beat Barca and I for one would like to see that, if the gods smile on our teams who knows ??_____________________________
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Chucky, you are right our best X! is good but you look at our bench the other night, Skippy, KWP, Janssen , Davies, and Gaza not too many match winners. We need big investment if we want to keep up with the rest and not 8 ยฃ15m prospects like you say, in Daniel we trust, yeah right.
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As above.
You cannot rely on playing your best eleven every week. A strong bench/squad is the key.
From our perspective. Yesterday no KDB no Fernandinho. Two top top players.
Spurs first eleven is good but then what?_____________________________
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Yeah Adlab, you poor buggers, you only had Stirling, Aguero, Sane, Silva x2, kompany you know just bums like that starting. Then I bet you really panicked with the likes of Jesus, Otamendi, stones & Mahrez on the bench. I donโt know how you cope missing a couple of 1st teamers.
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Oz,youu always seem to return to the same theme we know City have got a strong squad but City still struggle to replace the likes of KDB and Fernandinho when they are injured they are that good and so integral to this City team.
KDB has missed most of this season you take the best players out of any team and you will notice the difference no matter how deep the squad is.
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Would love to see Liverpool nick this title race. not because i like Liverpool over this City team. but because i want to see a new PL champion. City win will make it a monopoly. believe me, i’m not a City hatter. on the contarary iove warching them. but this time i want Liverpool to win it. just to make it more competitve. as for the top 4? as many has said, non of the 3 teams who are competing are having a geeat season by their usual standards. and that is a disappiontment to the league.
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Ya, I mean Spurs were the only side keeping pace with the top 2 until they fell off rather suddenly. ยฃ250m would certainly go a long way to raising their level and ability to sustain that level throughout a season.
They will need more than money though, however. You don’t aim for 90+ points. Traditionally the Pl has been settled on fewer points and for good reason. You need to have EVERYTHING going right, from top to bottom in order to become a kinda freak. I’ve no doubt in my mind that City and Liverpool are freaks. Is their level sustainable? I said that city’s run last season wasn’t but it would appear that I might be wrong. There are still 2 games left for them to drop some more points but it’s fair to say that they will likely get close to the record they set last season.
I’ve learned a lot from and about Pep over these 2 seasons and that is that money really only is a platform. Like in normal life, it represents potential or options and you’ve got to maximise it’s effect, or you waste that potential (case and point : Utd). What Pep has done though is he’s maximised his potential and I would say the same of Klopp. Both managers have had a vast wealth of money/resources at their disposal and the clubs themselves seem to have everyone all facing in the same direction. There’s very little wasted energy there, resulting in this 2 horse race.
Now that Utd/the media are no longer unsettling Poch and Spurs seemingly willing to spend again, can they hope to finish next season with 90+ points? I dunno. I definitely think 80+ is within their reach. Maybe they get 85 and the other 2 are slightly less freakish next time out. I think that is far more likely. I would definitely expect there to not be 21 points between 2nd and 3rd this time out next year. We’ll revert back to a big 6 (or something like that) soon enough. There are a few projects that are maybe further behind than others with Spurs or Arsenal, the most likely to come to fruition sooner.
I’ve not come to many conclusions here in this rambling post but I will say this. Although I think Liverpool will improve again next season, I don’t think we’ll go through 36 games of next term with only 1 defeat. Each year under Klopp has shown another layer of evolution. Not only are there overall identifiable qualities that developed within each season but also, a point A (start of season) to point B (end of season) gradual transition.
Last time out it was all about our attack and how deadly they were etc etc but it was the defence that evolved between the points. This season we started from a position of having a great defensive game, with the evolution of our game being focused on our midfield. Point A : A rugged and effective, yet samey-samey kind of midfield and Point B : The emergence of Fabinho and Keita, offering some distinct and definable individual roles to our midfield. This is something we’ve been crying out for.
So, how can I go on about this whilst also saying that we’ll lose more games next season? A combination of luck and progression from other teams. Our quality as a team is sustainable but I don;t think these points totals are. I think the PL has got to and will improve, not just Spurs or Arsenal but maybe Wolves, Leicester, West Ham and even potentially Newcastle (depending on whether they back Rafa) because the gap between 6th and 7th is too much also (even with whats happened the last 3 weeks).
I’m going to end this meandering but hopefully not entirely awful post by saying that I think the PL will be decided by a points total within the mid to high 80’s next season.
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City don’t have many FHM Slappers on their bench, that’s for sure. Sexy Bums all around!! ๐
I do think (sometimes) that the current gaps shown in the table are a bit larger than they really are… the margins in some games have been a lot closer than the results have shown and this will be reflected next season depending on who the footballing gods are smiling upon next year. As I menetioned in another post on this thread (I think), Toby’s own goal at Anfield, the Walker hand-ball that wasn’t given, Doughnut Boy having three shredded Wheat in the 2nd half at Wembly (before he turned into a big cream-puff!)… and I’m sure you can all think of games featuring your own teams…
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Ed-It indeed sounds like you have got someffin against Spuds,lol
The reason Spurs are not ahead of the chasing pack,and not in the title race have already been mentioned million times by Kylie and TBA:
-had their best players injured for best part of the season,in:Kane.Aldi,Son,Alli,Eriksen and Toby.The chasing pact ARE NOT GOING THROUGH A BAD PATCH!
Arse-terrific @ home,pants away!
United-simply a joke!
Chelsea-the most one-man team in the history of mankind!
And even the top2 teams would have struggled big-time had they had so many 1st team players injured:take the front 3 away from Liverpool and see what happens,take KDB,Aguero,Sterling away from City and see what happens._____________________________
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Spurs are the best positioned to threaten the top two Clubs next season they have a very good one to eleven in place a great Manager albeit he needs to start winning trophies soon and a fabulous new Stadium.
If Daniel backs Poch in the transfer market it will elevate them to title challengers just as it did Liverpool.
City and Liverpool are currently the two strongest Clubs in the PL but history tells us that football is cyclical and nothing lasts for ever.
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Nine Did you not see the names on the city bench. You are kidding yourself if you think others have the luxury of bringing in quality players like that to cover injuries, Itโs not like Iโm making it up.
Anyway hereโs to a C/L win for us or Spurs._____________________________
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Nine the city dominance wonโt last forever but itโll still be a couple more seasons of them winning the EPL, theyโre that far ahead & itโll take that long to catch up.
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Oz-It can be done skip,see??
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27-Who is this chap???
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Oz, I don’t think the Liverpool bench was that shabby on Friday night either
7Milner
12Gomez
21Oxlade-Chamberlain
22Mignolet
23Shaqiri
27Origi
32MatipI think we all agree that City have the strongest squad even so they don’t have replacements of the standard of KDB and Fernandinho.
At this point last season nobody was going to close the gap on City for years yet a season later with some sensible investment Liverpool are one point behind them with two games to go and two games away from consecutive CL Finals whilst City are still waiting for their first CL Final.
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Mav, nothing against Spurs at all mate. Would swap places with them, their squad and their stadium in a heartbeat. I merely mentioned they should count themselves lucky that none of the other 3 have capitalised on their own drop in form the last few weeks. Any other season and they’d have lost that 3rd spot with so many losses and their recent form. My lucky comment was simply about the fact that they are lucky to be competing with 3 really poor sides for a top 4 spot. That seems to have been interpreted as me saying Spurs are generally lucky which is something entirely different.
I called the 3 below Spurs “dross” so I’m not sure why my very mild comments about Spurs are seen as me having something against just them!
Massive, massive credit has to go to Poch for getting to the semis in the CL and they really should be going through now. I have my doubts as to his ability to get a side over the line but I could easily be proved wrong about him this season.
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Dunno Eddy, he has spent 300m… ๐
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He certainly has Chucky and spent almost 5 years in his job. Let me also remind you that he doesn’t think his players will know how to win trophies until the year 2029 ?. Even then he hopes they don’t win anything. Egoes and all that!
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I think the difference between Liverpool and City is Aguero. He is the definition of a match winner. You look at that finish in the game vs Liverpool at the Etihad and it was just incredible. He almost always finds a way, and no surprise yesterday he was the one who edged City to the win. Incredible player who, maybe itโs just my perception, doesnโt seem to get lauded in the same way other players do.
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