Finnegan

ffs

Can't watch the game at the moment but looking at this looks like just normal 433? Is that correct? Mads Ricardo Coady Okoli Justin Ndidi Winks Soumare Fatawu Daka Mavididi?

Leicester's 25 man squad: 2 x GK 3 x FB 3 x CB 3 x CM 1 x LW 2 x ST 11 x RW

What kind of contract length do we have Thomas on and how well regarded is he in the academy? Wigan is not a bad move for a first proper loan.

Sorry hun xx

I dont doubt we want him, he seems to be someone we've watched for a while which is usually how you know interest is genuine. But he's probably outgrown us, especially given our relegation. I'd be surprised if he ends up here personally. I think we'd have moved straight away after KDH had gone if this was the case and Percy would have already been reporting him as our top target. I'd like to be wrong, his signing would give me a lot more confidence for this season.

He's got a book value of about 6.8m. 14m euros is about 11.8m gbp. That gives us 5m profit in this year's balance (as well as 3.4m off next year's) Should easily be enough to sign another ~20m player this window.

Can't wait til we sign neither and swoop late to pick up Jakub Moder for 20m on deadline day.

What

Well why don't you just **** off to Leeds then. ... wait

"According to the Italian press"

West Ham

Well sure but then by the same token Bukayo Saka, Arsenal are capable of producing good and bad players just like every club. I'm not suggesting Nelson is alright purely because he's from Arsenal. I'm suggesting writing him off as a signing for a newly promoted team (or even an aspiring top half team) just because he couldn't make it at a Champions League chasing side that famously has had a lot of good options in his position is a bit harsh. Oh and lets not forget Stephy Mavididi is an Arsenal youth reject too.

I think Arsenal have clung on to Nelson for too long and it's probably stunted his progress a little but I think he's a really solid top flight quality player and would be a good signing as long as it's a sensible price. It's Arsenal, ffs, it's not really a sign of a shit player that he can't get in their first team. They've always been flush with excellent attacking midfielders haven't they.

We conceded the least goals in the league last year, conceded the second least xG and had clean sheets in almost a third of our games. I'm not really sure how exposed you think we were. We played essentially 5 up, 5 back last year and this year is the same. But the defensive shape isn't my problem, the offensive one is. It's just not conducive to good progressive football and it's taking two of our most productive attacking threats (including a 19 year old that racked up 13 assists in his first full campaign of senior football) and forcing them out of position. If this turns out to be a decision of necessity whilst we build a squad in pre-season then fair enough but given the shape is consistent with Cooper's previous clubs I'm not expecting that to be the case and it'll leave Mavididi and Fatawu significantly wasted after we've spent about five or six years desperate to actually sign some quality wingers and we've barely had either a full year yet. I'm a long way from hysterical and if that's the vibe you get from my posts then I assure you that's largely just down to my natural propensity for hyperbole but if the early signs over the last couple of weeks don't give you any cause for concern at all then I suspect you're being less the voice of reason and more Big Nige's flightless bird.

Maresca was a relative unknown, he could have been anything, he could have been garbage, I was happy for us to take that risk. Steve Cooper has been in professional football management for five years. We've all had a look at the football his teams have offered up and nothing at all in that time has hinted that he's of the ability we should have been seeking when we recruited and his tactical decision making in the opening friendlies has legitimately set off warning alarms given his use of some of our best players last year. I'm not writing him off but I have lost any and all enthusiasm I might have had. I'm far more apprehensive about the coming season than I am excited.

You won the world cup in a home kit that was a plain white shirt emblazoned with the three lions, navy shorts and white socks. That's your traditional home colours? It didn't have a St George's cross or the colour red anywhere on it, except maybe some tiny detailing on the badge if you want to be pedantic. The vast majority of international football teams play with the badge of the association on the shirt, not the national flag. In fact if anyone was waving flags back when you won the world cup they were probably waving the Union Jack, given that widespread use of St George's flag at English sporting events is a pretty new phenomenon from about the turn of the millennium.

That might be the most tacky, Americanised piece of shit I've ever seen. Whoever mocked that up should have to hand over their British passport and go in to exile.

We don't know what we're going to pay for Reiss Nelson yet...

Can only assume that the years they've done not really spending has given them enough FFP flex to go nuts this window. Be nice if we could eventually get to a point like that.

I'll be honest, I thought Potter was an uninspired choice and I wasn't incredibly keen. Again, I don't feel he played a system that really suited the squad. I really hoped, after Enzo, we'd have the confidence to do something similar again and take a chance on someone with a higher potential ceiling that was less of an obvious choice. I'm genuinely envious of Brighton and their managerial recruitment. Cooper is just going back to the Puel well again which was a shit show last time. Tbf was that not a bit of both though? As in, we told him he had to make his mind up and he clearly wanted to wait til after the Euros just in case?

He's a much better fit for them than Donnarumma tbh. Although I think that rumour was more agent than Man City.

I became reasonably at peace with Cooper over the idea we were painfully skint and had little other choice. But if we're trying to throw 30m at just one twenty year old from Juve that does kinda shit on that narrative. It really was just another massively uninspired bit of Leicester managerial recruitment.

Fab has said Roma and Juve are close to agreeing terms.

Go back through history and look at how many progressive, passing based teams won things using wing backs and a back three. Pep has experimented with it once or twice for a couple of games at a time and sacked it off. That's about as close as you'll get unless people start clutching at straws talking about non-CBs being played in slightly hybrid CB-esque roles. There's two glaring problems with it. Firstly, with honourable exceptions like John Stones (and maybe Vestergaard, I'll grant you) by and large centre backs aren't amongst your better technical footballers and playmakers. By over committing at the back you're just denying yourself more outfield players that could be helping progress the ball up the pitch. But secondly, nearly every successful passing system utilises as much width as possible to expand the playing area and move and stretch opponents, especially in the attacking third. Playing with a narrow front two/three and relying on wing backs with obvious defensive duties to provide that width for you is never, ever going to be preferable to just having actual wide attacking players. The brilliance of an inverted full back system as we played it last year is that you get the same wide overloads but with underlapping attacking "mezzalas" instead of overlapping full backs because 9/10 the attacking midfielders in your team are much better footballers to have hitting the final third than the likes of Viktor Kristensen or James Justin who in turn are generally better defenders than the likes of Dewsbury Hall. It was perfect. To throw in an extra centre back we've either got to sacrifice a centre midfielder or we're sacrificing width in the attacking third. Neither of those things are productive and intelligent ways to play the type of football the club wants to play and that's why there's so very few examples in history of winning teams playing 3atb.