honeybradger

I dont like this narrative at all. They dont need to be the class of 92, they just need to be as good or better than Vestergaard, Faes, Justin, Ayew, Daka, Soumare etc. It's not an impossible hurdle to jump, it feels like a large portion of our fanbase have developed Stockholm syndrome regarding these players despite all the times they have proven that theyre not very good. Our academy has produced Premier League players before, our players are championship quality now. It would make sense that the best talents our academy have produced in decades in Monga, Evans, Page, Nelson can reach those same levels as Premier League players and displace our Championship quality ones. Also Winks was one of our worst players last season, he hasnt proven outright that he is better than those around him. Have we ever had a player who has been consistently bad for us a for a year yet still get lauded by the fans like Winks does?

Aluko injured apparently, hopefully nothing serious as we will need him this season. Especially if Justin leaves.

He wasnt particularly good for us last time around and ended up being benched by Justin at the tail end of the season. Has he had a good season at Norwich or is he still the same player? If he hasnt improved then I dont think we should be in for him.

4-1 golding

Is there seriously nowhere to watch?

He's no one but claims that he was first on other stories that im not knowledgeable on.

It's hard to argue otherwise, based on the first two games we are one of the worst sides in the Championship and the only reason we dont have two losses is that we played Wednesday in one of those games. The only ray of light is that we have players like Monga, Page, Nelson, Aluko, Alves, Evans to come in a hopefully turn us around.

Looks class, sadly probably already too good for us. Could have done with the club looking at players like this last season rather than Skipp.

I think we have to agree to disagree. I think the momentum of the game changing against Wednesday was inevitable even if we didn't make any changes. They were completely dead on their legs in the second half. I wouldnt call Winks coming on at 1-0 up against Huddersfield changing the momentum of the game when we ended up drawing. Apart from his goal he was poor that game. El Khannouss on the other hand actually has a number of good games for us at PL level. Inconsistent or not, Winks was consistently terrible last season whereas at least El Khannouss showed he can help us win games for us at that level. He is our best midfielder and it's not actually close at all between him and Winks.

El Khannouss. Only midfielder we have who played to a decent level in the PL last season. When put into the context of Skipp, Soumare and Choudhury I would categorise him under 'least bad' rather than 'best' and in my opinion he belongs amongst those names rather than being a standout above them.

When I watched the game I honestly didn't think Winks was any better than Soumare but it's hard to keep track of players whilst watching. I just find it interesting to see the abuse Soumare receives in comparison to the 'Winks is still our best midfielder despite him actively disrespecting the club' mentality. I struggle to put my finger on what Winks actually does that makes him have better PR despite not tracking runners properly, strolling around, not making tackles etc. similar to what Soumare gets dogs abuse for. If I had to get rid of one of the two it would be Winks all day long (ideally both).

Is there somewhere to watch the match back in full? I remember Winks being anonymous but if he did actually do something worthwhile then I stand corrected. I think the fact that we were quite comfortably overran in midfield speaks for itself though and that wasnt just the fault of Soumare and El Khannouss.

All of this talk of 'best midfielder'. Rubbish. He was awful against Preston who finished 20th in the championship last season. He only played well coming on in the second half against a Sheffield Wednesday side that had zero match fitness after no pre season. Their first team were dropping like flies and cramping up and their bench had no quality. It was less Winks being good and more Wednesday putting in one of the worst second half performances we will face in the coming years. In the last year for us I can only remember two good games for us, when he came on as a substitute against Southampton and when he came on against Wednesday. He's genuinely not very good.

Fatawu surely has nothing to prove for us. Just came back from an ACL and clearly cares about the club. The only thing you can criticise him for is trying too hard and losing his head sometimes. Still he's one of the few that can keep his head held high.

How do we know this? Surely no youth player turns down first team minutes if offered them irrespective of the position. If he saw a pathway to the first team at centreback im sure he would have taken it. I think it was likely that he was unsettled by being moved to centreback in the u23s by Thomas but wouldnt have minded had it lead to him playing in the cups and ending up as 3rd choice centre back for us.

He left because he wasn't getting game time. If we had played him at centre back in the cups he would have likely accepted, it would be silly for him not to. At the time we were playing Fuchs and Morgan at centrebacks in the cups instead of him who were on their last legs here. He was also around when Luke Thomas broke into the first XI at left back, at the time I rated Bassey higher but was pleasantly surprised with how Thomas performed. So he wasnt competing with Chilwell, he was competing with Thomas at left back at the end of the season. Not to forget that disastrous Ryan Bennett loan where we could have used Bassey instead. So there were plenty of opportunities to give Bassey gametime, we just never did it.

Danny ward has 40 caps for Wales and 40 PL games yet you wouldnt say he was ever a PL level goalie. I just dont think Vestergaard ever had a season where he was a solid Premier League player. He might have played at that level 100 times but he never belonged there.

I'll be honest I respect that you like Vestergaard and it's hard to argue with the appearance stats but he's shite im sorry to say. The fact that Southampton managed to turn their season around in 19/20 from the 9-0 by dropping him shows how tragic of a player he really is. Him and Faes are two of the worst defenders to ever play at Premier league level and that's not a hyperbole, definitely not PL level and never was.

Im not hinging my hopes on Monga. He could start next week and have a poor game and my opinion of him would not change. Im just saying that he is part of our best XI and by Cifuentes not starting him he's not giving us the best chance of winning games. 'Sensible' decisions have been killing this club for years now, it was 'sensible' last summer to bring in PL experience, it was 'sensible' the summer before that to bring in Coady and Winks on PL wages as not getting promotion would cost more, it was 'sensible' the year before that to play Ward over Iversen because of experience, it was 'sensible' to let the rot continue under Rodgers as he delivered two top 5 finishes and an FA cup. Im tired of mind numbing 'sensible' decisions being made at this club, we need to start making decisions that actually put the club on the right path again, decisions that actually make sense. A good start would be to commit to a proper rebuild around the youth and start giving minutes on merit rather than seniority.

Actually watch the game. Monga is the only player we have who is performing in our current situation. Fatawu on the other hand who everyone would undeniably start lost his head the other day, which he does regularly. Writing Monga off because of his age is silly to me, he's clearly ready right now and might actually already be too good for us. I prefer to evaluate players on how they perform on the pitch rather than their age, Monga is the most mature player we have out of the lot of them. The way he went to pick up the ball after scoring speaks volumes. I am not Monga so no i wouldnt have done well under the pressure at 16, but if we had a big game i would back Monga to perform more than I would petulant senior players like Winks, Vestergaard, Faes. I think you wouldnt start Lamine Yamal if he was here to be honest simply because of his age.

I agree with your statement, Bassey and Faes are in the same bracket, players who couldnt break through but went and made a career for themselves elsewhere. Bassey obviously doing so much more successfully than Faes as he has actually done well at multiple clubs. Monga, Nelson, Evans, Alves, Aluko are talent wise in the tier above Bassey. If Bassey can be successful at Rangers and at Fulham in the PL then the aforementioned can be PL level players if backed properly. Backing Faes, Ayew, Mcateer, Vestergaard ahead of PL level talents doesnt make sense to me, they will only ever be championship level players and the crop of talents we have now can be so much more. Why not play them?

He has 2 assists in 1.5 championship games for us. The decision to take him off the other day and keep Ayew on was very strange. He's still one of our best players so should have stayed on unless he has fully had his head turned.

It's just football. I can absolutely expect our best player to be starting in the league for us, it's not like Monga would combust just because he's 16. Should have started vs Wednesday, gotten 20-30 mins against Huddersfield then started yesterday. I was also just refuting your claim that's he's given time to youth players, he hasnt really.

Needs to be starting in the league as he's currently our best player. It's more than development and 'giving time' with Monga it's also about promotion, we are reducing our chances of going up by not starting him in the championship. If he cant play 90 minutes twice a week (he hasnt played 90 minutes once in his senior career) then he should be playing in the league not the cup. Apart from Monga we haven't seen any youth players play in the championship.

Probably would go Aluko and Choudhury/Justin 🤷‍♂️, you dont need to be comfortable in possession as a midfielder to help out defensively. I think we need to accept that we dont have a functional starting XI no matter how you set it up, i would just personally like to see as many good players in the starting XI that also have a desire to be here.