honeybradger

It feels like we had allocated around £10mil for a centreback this summer, we went through our list of targets and asked around and Atalanta snapped our hand off for the money offered. Then we went through with it as it was easy business and another position off the checklist. If he really is "one for the future" then we should have just stuck with Ben Nelson. As a club we need to be smarter with our transfers and actually put some thought into whether they are better than what we already have available.

I am sure there are quite a few people on here like me who were content with the Cooper appointment as we thought he had 2 qualities that would work well for us: 1. Youth development - It's fair to say now that Cooper is not pro youth development. Ben Nelson is further from the first team than he was last season, with Okoli who might as well be a youth prospect being in front of him. Alves is now also behind Reid (who also might as well be a youth prospect based on his performances), Alves looked good against league 2 opposition, Reid has looked terrible against PL opposition. Is Alves better than Reid? We haven't seen enough of Alves to conclude that as Cooper barely played him in pre season. I think he is better than Reid though. 2. Pragmatism - Enzo got plenty of criticism from our fans for his lack of tactical inflexibility but at least his tactics allowed for our best players to be on the pitch. I would argue that Cooper has been even more tactically inflexible so far than Maresca was. He has benched one of our best, if not our best player in Ricardo Pereira just because he is set on playing the RB as a centre back. If he wants to do well at this football club then he has to adjust his tactics to get Ricardo onto the pitch. Now that we have more of a clear picture of what Cooper at Leicester looks like some of us are not liking what we see and personally for me so far it hasn't been about the performances which can change on a dime but the transfer strategy and his approach to our key players

Sadly Leicester under Steve Cooper is not the place to develop or get chances for young players. Maybe under Maresca it would have been better for him to stay but he needs to go out on loan ASAP. It's a shame as i think he could have performed well for us already, even at this level and it's a risk sending him on loan where a medical team might not take as much care with him as we would have.

Whilst Okoli seems like a not so great signing, I think he's a similar level of player to Faes. At least if Faes goes we can get some value for our £13mil.

Experience is a very overrated aspect in football. I would feel more confident in staying up if we had Alves on the left wing than Cordova Reid.

I could understand the Buoananotte signing if he was genuinely an elite talent but currently i dont see it, he very much looks like a standard talented 19 year old who struggles to impose himself on the game at this age. I am not so sure he is any better than Alves.

If we had signed 1-2 genuinely good players this summer we would be set to avoid relegation. A little bit of quality can go a long way.

I think with teams coming at them instead of sitting back they will be a lot more entertaining.

Should be the other way around, the right back position should be locked down for Ricardo and Kristiansen and JJ should be competing for the left back position.

Too early to judge really. He didnt really do anything in his time on the pitch but didnt do much wrong either. Need to see what his defensive game looks like.

I do agree in some respects as the better approach is to come to an acceptance with how poorly the club is run and not to get too invested in the decision making at the club or the club in general at this point in time, whilst also being firm that change at the top has to be made. You cant blame people on here for being upset with how far the club has fallen and is continuing to fall, getting emotional doesnt personally do us any good but it's a natural response.

You could hear chants of "we want Rudkin out" at the match. If that message is consistent then it will be heard. That is where our issues lie, Rudkin simply isnt an actual DoF, he doesnt have a long term strategy on transfers and team building. Our transfer identity varies too much under each manager, we need consistency between managers to actually get back on track as a club and we also need a strong negotiator who doesnt overpay on transfer fees and wages like Rudkin.

It's quite shocking how far we've regressed as a team since Cooper has taken over. £40mil spent this summer and we are a weaker team than we were in the championship. It just feels like we've bought into the trap that many promoted teams buy into that mediocre players with PL experience are required to stay up. The best teams from the championship that stay up in recent years maintain the best players from the promotion side (I.e. Mavididi, Ricardo) and add foreign talent in the positions where they are weaker. Is there any team that has added the equivalent to Reid and Ayew and managed to stay up?

The most surprising thing here is that he completed 88% of his passes. During the game it felt like every time he got the ball he lost it.

We wouldn't have won the league as Liverpool were incredible in 19/20 but had we avoided injuries that season like we did in 15/16 we definitely could have finished on 80+ points. Also had we invested that 50 mil which we spent on Dennis Praet and Ayoze Perez on some actually good players we would almost certainly have gotten into the top 4 at least once. We were absolutely primed for success when Rodgers came in, our success under him was a miracle and actually there is a solid argument that he underperformed with us given the circumstances.

Rodgers inherited the best squad we've ever had, with the players available to him 8th was an expected position at minimum. On paper two fifth places an eighth place finish and an FA cup was great but at the end of the 21/22 season it was very clear how quickly we were declining as a team and a few of us were even frustrated at us going on a winning streak at the end of the season as it meant we weren't going to move him on despite it being needed.

Why are we even giving him two consecutive games to start? If an academy player was putting in these performances people would rightly say he's not ready for this level and needs a loan. The fact that this is an experienced player playing like this is shocking, the reason we brought him in is because he's supposed to be adjusted to the prem and ready to perform. If Cordova Reid is going to take a while to come good then why not play a youth player instead like Alves who could actually go on to be a good PL player.

For the fans trying to rationalise Bobby Reid starting because of his defensive work, BDR is yet to make a single tackle or interception for us. He was a free signing and yet he was still to expensive.

The damage was done but it was salvageable if we binned off Rudkin. We are feeling the impact of the transfer business we did under Rodgers even now, the business we have just done this summer will still be impacting 4 seasons later.

What i dislike the most about him is the way he evaluates players. How has he come in and decided to sit Ricardo Pereira of all players on the bench? Why have we signed BDR and Ayew? Skipp look OK (maybe?) but £20 million pounds for him is ludicrous. Okoli an unused option on the bench already. Ben Nelson and Will Alves not being given a sniff. It's all just so terrible.

Can't complain honestly. This is just what we are after half a decade of some of the worst management in english football. Rudkin out.

Ayew on the freekick I could have done better.

Chants of "we are going down". This season is going to be very messy.

Ayew with the touch of a trampoline. So called ball retention expert

Would rather a draw.