FosseSpark

I'm still holding out hope that Man City get pinged biblically in January for their FFP breaches and it's them Saints and Ipswich or Wolves that go down. I'm also not seeing West Ham as out of the Woods with Antonio and Bowen out long term - being responsible for over 50% of their goals in previous seasons. Perhaps we could compound their issues by selling Daka to them...

funny running gait, wouldn't be a shoe in for the starting XI and is already 26. It's a hard no from me...

We are going to see more of this general sale availability at different points in the season. With ticket prices being north of £50 and sometimes much higher, there will be times in the season where demand just won't be there due to other financial or time commitments. Particularly for teams between 8th and 20th in the league who are not in the greatest of form. It's been the same at other premier league clubs where pricing has gone up over the past five years and form hasn't been stable. Fulham, Man Utd, Villa, Chelsea. It's only places Like Newcastle where the support is super rabid, or Bournemouth / Palace where the stadium size is low that are seemingly immune. The genie is out of the bottle now aswell. Clubs won't lower prices significantly and go for higher crowd sizes / stadium sizes as it costs A LOT and the real risk is that less watch your match on TV which can only damage the longer term potential for TV revenue. I'd love it if lower ticket prices and safe standing all came together (starting in the EFL) and increased the crowd sizes across the board. If this were coupled with doubleheader days where you get to see Women's and Men's Premier League together like the hundred i think that'll be much healthier for the overall game in England in the long run.

Maybe we would let them have Hamza and we can tap Chelsea up for Alfie Gilchrist who is on loan at Sheff U playing right back or right of a three.

Either Lamptey or WP would be a decent

didnt know Rogers was out

or a feather pillar

It goes back as far for me to the misuse of the title and champs league monies and a series of events since that have compounded those first seasons issues. 16/17: Slimani, Musa, Ndidi, Mendy bought in with Kante going out. Only Ndidi would remain the following season. The squad quality and cohesion starts to dilute. 17/18: Iheanacho, Iborra, Silva, Maguire bought in for a net £50m outlay once Drinkwater had gone. We made the money back by selling Maguire but none of those signings went on to be a regular starter. The identity and connection with the fans starts to change. 18/19: We let Mahrez go, who wouldnt be replaced. We bought in great players like Maddison, Ricardo Evans, Soyuncu who improved the first XI and delivered stability in top 8 but also farted away £52m(!!!) on benkovic, ward and ghezzal. The sort of wastage a mid ranking club cant afford that bloats the squad and prevents you growing long term. We move to being a posession based side who look to dominate games, but retain 1 up top with Vardy meaning we are always a bit of a hybrid between the counter punching side that sits deep and the high line side that tries to play through a low blocking opposition. This identity crisis is hidden by the sheer quality for a while but rears its head when we get injuries that take out ndidi and our stronger defenders. 19/20/21: Tielemans, Perez, Castagne, Fofana, Vestergaard, Soumare, Bertrand come in. We have reached peak post success bloat where the excellence of Maddison, Tielemans, Vardy, Barnes masks the rotten core of shit overplayed players that make up the other 50% of the squad. The FA Cup is amazing but the team cant sustain injuries to key players despite having 2 or 3 for every position. 22/23: when it becomes apparent we cant sustain spending or contracts due to ffp the whole jig is up. rodgers, schmeichel, tielemans, soyuncu, evans, bertrand, vestergaard all start to act up or disappear. A core of.quality is still there but the rest is a shallow husk and the crowd is lost. At the first sign of adversity the players crumble and so does the confidence of a crowd STILL just happy to have seen us achieve such great things but not behind a squad they know has a lot of players overpaid and underperforming. RELEGATION A great punt on Enzo gives us back an identity almost by accident and his force of personality and some great / fortutious recruitment of Hermansen, Mavididi, Winks and Fatawu turns us into a Man City of the championship. PROMOTION we jettison ALL of that style of play after promotion and after losing Enzo making some truly baffling signings like Skipp, Okoli, BDR and Ayew - almost like we dont remember why we got promoted or what kind of side we want to be. We sign a baller in el khannous but decide not to play him, mavididi, fatawu or ricardo much in the first 19 games in favour of some kind of self hating pragmatism that ensures low scoring defeats or draws. We still havent succession planned for Vardy even with a nominal £1m on an up and coming lower league protegee and so he manfully plugs away. We are unlucky to see Fatawu get injured (the only player who has ever looked vaguely capable of replacing Mahrez) and so are back to square one on that front with a thin glimmer that our brighton loanee can play off the right while we wait his return. All this leaves us with only Hermansen, El Khannous, Buonanotte and Vardy that most fans truly believe have the quality to play high end premier league football, and Vardy is clinging on. Unless we luck out in jan with two defenders, a midfielder and a forward we will be RVNs threadbare army in the championship to celebrate the 10year anniversary of the title win and the subsequent mismanagement and misfortune that has stopped us cementing a place at the top table. But i still wouldnt swap it to be forest who will similarly be robbed of gibbs white, elanga, odoi, aina, milenkovic and murillo over the next 18mths with wood succumbing to being 34.

Mavi can be a card to play off the bench. we dont have many. Id give Alves a run on the left.

Hermansen New Okoli Vestergaard Kristiansen Winks Soumare Bounanotte El Khannous Alves Vardy Mavi, Justin, Daka, Coady on the bench if needed.

it felt high

also. its a game of.inches. vardy guides that chance in for 1-1 and we go on to win. shots that hit the woodwork go in its a different game.

I expect for Villa or our next league game after that to have 2new defenders and a new forward then maybe bring someone else in to play wide toward the end of the window. Dont think we will bring in any midfielders as we have a surfeit, particularly when Ndidi is back. We have known we are short since the start of the season and so no excuse for a slow window. its shit or bust.

one thing is for sure. if Pep doesnt get a win today against an out of form, injury depleted Leicester then there will be calls for his head by Man City Fans and media. Going in to the new year potentially in the bottom half and out of the champs league just isnt good enough for a club that have invested what Man City has.

Stolarczyk Choud'ry Coady Vest'gaard Kristiansen Winks El Khannous Soumare Bounanotte Vardy Mavididi Alves Daka Skipp BDR Iversen Okoli Thomas Monga Cartwright

Daka then

Stolarzcyk Hamza Coady Vestegaard Kristiansen Winks El Khannous Soumare Bounanotte Ayew Vardy

4 or 5 in Jan and we can do this.

Stola is a quality keeper.

Andys tactics truck was a cracking bit of sky innovation back in the day

whats up with mcateer?

we cant park the bus whatwever happens. it just doesnt work.

bollocks is he

And give a special Liverpool welcome to todays lube sponsor: P Diddy....

the league is so bad we will hang on for grim death. it all depends on what happens in Jan whether we can buy in a set of bollocks and a bit of recovery pace.