goodrobotusses

Oh god, can only imagine Iraola try to implement his pressing game with that dressing room. "Lads, sorry, but you're gonna have to run a bit."

I'm kind of ambivalent on the move now. It's been in the offing so long that I've had time to resign myself to it. He has talents few players have, let alone academy products who grew up as reds. He can't be replaced one-for-one because he's unique, but he can be replaced with a combination of new players. As Épieur says, he has the right to leave, earn his money and win trophies elsewhere, even on a free and even if all that Ballon d'Or chat made him look like a b*****d. Him leaving for free at his peak stings, but as I've said elsewhere, I don't think anyone would have paid the sort of fee we'd have demanded, so this was his only realistic way out. And even if we had extracted maximum value, sold him for nigh-on 100m two years ago and reinvested the money in the squad, we'd have probably been livid at the club for cashing in on one of our best players and a potential future captain, so it's all for the birds really. Yeah, this is maybe where I feel a bit disappointed in him, but that's just because I have a personal distaste for footballers turning themselves into clothes horses and brands. He's free to do as he pleases, it's his life, just a bit lame.

Dibling is going to be a nice addition to the pile of confused and lost looking teenagers at Spurs.

Would be a massive help If he and Nyoni turn out as good as we hope.

Don't think anyone would have paid what we would have wanted for TAA, it was a free or nothing. Madrid offered a token fee in January but that wouldn't have been on the cards had he not run his deal down. The club has a no-release clause policy on contracts IIRC, that's the reason Emre Can wouldn't sign an extension.

With Trent going I think we're gonna need someone more creative than Szobo at No10. Dom still has a big role to play but his strengths are his running power, speed and ability to kick the ball really hard. We are now gonna need more than that in that zone, an Elliott+ if you will.

Pfft, daddy Huijsen just needs reacquainting with Ricky H’s multilingual skills. He’s gonna be like that lad in Love, Actually but with cards in every modern European language.

Apparently someone in The Athletic has said that, although LFC like Isak, spending £100m+ on one player would have a knock-on effect on our ability to rebuild other parts of the team. Truly might be this season's Bellingham, then.

Think Vinicius and Mbappe are gonna get a lot of chances to run at unset defences from his switches and Bellingham’s box crashing is gonna benefit from his deep passes and crosses.

Absolutely zero logic in the idea we'd sign soon-to-be-32-year-old Harry Kane, who earns more than Salah, for €50m-60m, when we're haggling to within an inch of our lives over a new contract for soon-to-be-33-year-old Salah, who'd cost us nothing beyond wages. Bayern just want his salary off the books and have realised no one will give them the transfer fee they want.

Have a feeling we'll sign a multifunctional AM who can also play in the front three. Links to Xavi Simons make sense in that regard. Cherki has been mentioned on and off because he'll be available for relative peanuts, but worry he'd (allegedly) fall foul of our old "no d****eads" rule. He also doesn't seem to be very quick. I think, more than anything though, we need someone to compete/rotate with Gravenberch and Mac Allister, so hope that's on the cards. I also wonder if we'll go for Frimpong in the event TAA leaves. Very different players, and as mentioned elsewhere, there's not much of a track record of him playing RB in a back four, but he would also be an option further forward, as he is at Leverkusen, has a release clause of €35m IIRC and could potentially cover RB along with Bradley, given Bradley's fairly ropey injury record thus far. So not much needed: just a LB, CB, RB, DM, AM/winger and a No9. No worries. At all.

Guardiola likes wingers who can retain and recycle possession high up the pitch, and if there's anything Diaz can do, to the point of being quite ineffective, it's that.

He's the one we can least afford to lose IMO, which I realise sounds mad in the context of Mo having the season of his life and Trent being unique and approaching his peak years.

Wonder if that's if they don't make the CL, If there is such a clause. If there is a clause it'll be from the contract he signed when he joined (don't think he's ever renewed), so if true 75m might have sounded like a good number at the time.

I'm probably watching the wrong games, but whenever I've seen Leao play he seems like a massive fraud.