Men's Soccer (Football) Thread [ARCHIVED] Soccer • Page 226

I mean I feel like on a different day City put like 5 or 6 past you guys, they created a number of huge chances in dangerous positions

 

imagine watching that goal and telling me something happened that should require the goal to be called off

 

No it was coming in before then and from a practical perspective referees were already calling it if there was an attacking advantage gained anyway.

The difference of it being in writing now is that VAR is now checking it properly. Very harsh.

 

XG was 3.29 to .19 lololol

 

The rule stinks, but Llorente's goal is what makes this disallowance really hard to swallow for me.

 

I mean, there was luck in getting that point. They’re clearly a better team. But what I’ll say is, dominating on one end of the pitch doesn’t matter as much when you’re making huge mistakes on the other end. Both Spurs goals were mental lapses by City. You can’t give up two easy goals like that against a team like Spurs and then be mad when you only get one point.

 

I mean maybe but you can still feel unlucky to have only put 2 of the boatload of chances you created away.

 

City really should only be upset with themselves. Can't blame Spurs. I don't think they should feel unlucky. They did enough to win the game, but made two huge costly mistakes. If Ederson is positioned properly, he doesn't give up the first goal.

 

The best news of today.....Son's suspension is over!

 

City were pretty wasteful. On MoTD I think they were shown to have 30 attempts on goal, but only 3 expected or something like that. Seems they were pretty wasteful.

I don't really get all the rage about the new handball rule. Laporte passes the ball with his arm and someone scores directly from it. It's not like the ball was blasted at him from close range and dropped down on the floor or something. Although, Shearer made a good point in that a defender would not be punished for the same thing.

In other news, Newcastle looked absolutely shite at Norwich. Dubravka seemed to spend a lot of the match screaming at his back 3, who appeared to be unable to see Pukki. We looked like absolute trash going forward too. This is going to boil over very soon. Hide your horses.

 

Di Marzio staff saying Alexis joining Inter on loan with an option to buy, United paying some of his wages

 

Conte, what a guy. Suppose losing Lukaku is a small price to pay for them taking Sanchez off us too.

 

even if you have to pay half his wages its a good deal, especially if Inter take up the buy option (apparently its 15 or so million)

 

People online are moaning and saying United would be silly to accept this as we'd be losing the depth in the squad. I don't get that at all. Have these people been oblivious to the last couple of seasons? Sanchez is basically only useful to us as a warm body, and even then he's basically constantly injured so is barely even that. This might be our last chance to shift his >£300k a week wages. He offers us nothing. Get rid and move on surely.

 

I see the squad depth argument but my counter would be to that, Alexis Sanchez at his age is not going to be happy with being a squad player, you aren't going to get the best of him if he starts 1 out of every 5 games and comes off the bench from time to time. plus, you can't afford a player on that kind of wages not to be a regular starter.

 

Sometimes you've got to take the hit. Yes it might leave us a little short of bodies at certain points, but if the option is that for 6 months or a year and filling the squad with youngsters, or keeping his wages on the books for another couple of years despite him offering nothing, I'd take the hit.

Plus maybe he'll rediscover himself in Italy. Players often age better there. I hope he does.

 

yeah I agree, he'll do fine in Italy im sure, different league with different physical requirements

 

I would rather be rid of him than pay him to play elsewhere

 

This Chelsea team leave SO much space open. It's bizarre.

 

So much space behind their midfield. Didn't seem to know how to play after the first 15-20 minutes. Lucky to get a point in the end.

 

Exact same as the match against us. They blitzed at the start and then just stopped playing. I guess they’re going for the Liverpool style of football, press high and fast and exploit space at the back. But Liverpool have a steady and good defensive midfield. I wonder if dropping amount/whatever other attacking midfielder they play and going with three workhorse centre mods would work better for them.

As it is, they just completely open up defensively whenever the opposing team has the ball. Mount is good but is he worth destabilising the team over?

 

Problem is they need goals. We have Salah, Mane and Firmino so even starting the season sloppily - and actually ceding space behind the midfield a bit like Chelsea are - we're a constant potential threat.

They've sold Hazard and Morata with no one coming in. If they go for a workhorse three in midfield, their chance of making up those goals further deteriorates.

If they are going for the early blitz and then trying to manage the game after that I think Lampard might find himself in trouble after a few months, maybe earlier.

 

IDEC if CFC end up 10th place in the league and go out of CL/domestic cups at the first hurdle, as long as this is the team at the end of the season:

Kepa
Reece James, Zouma, Christensen, Emerson
Kante, Jorginho, RLC
CHO, Abraham, Pulisic

If he gets them playing competitively at PL level then Frank has achieved what no other manager has since Abramovic took over - fully integrating youth into the first XI. If the board has a problem with poor performances perhaps they should look at their practices regarding youth transfers that put the club in the situation it's in now.
Then when we buy Marcus Rashford and Jason Sancho in the summer with the £300million we've saved up it's game over for everyone lol.