Draw best result then?

Chelsea, if you are waiting for my permission to push the game a bit and score, its given.

It is fair TG. It’s the game.

As my heroes would say: “It’s like that, and it’s the way it is”

But they also said “it’s tricky”

Playing with Aubameyang is playing with ten men these days.


Bloody chelsea

Kepa with some awful goalkeeping for the City goal. Chelsea are a mess. Potter really isn't doing a good job.

In fairness, Potter stuck him on the right wing, which is weird. He brought on a kid in the first half with Gallagher available.

City playing poorly, Pep makes 4 subs including £100m Grealish and £60m Mahrez and the two of them combine to put City in front. That is why City are favourites and should win the title this year.

It’s probably cartiledge formed under the skin around a bite or something. It’s quite common. Quick spray of numbing gel and cut it out two stitches job done.

EDIT: BY A DOCTOR, BY A DOCTOR!!

This thing with the US national team.

My goodness. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. Honestly they will destroy a man’s reputation if they feel slightly wronged without any conscience

Chelsea have such a rag bag of a squad.
Recent high profile, high cost, high wage older players past their best (Koulibaly, Sterling, Aubameyang) - none of these signings made sense.
Lukaku for £100m then shipped off on loan after 1 year
2 very good full backs (James and Chilwell) who can’t stay fit
Expensive signings not living up to expectations (Cucurella, Havertz, Pulisic, Ziyech)
Youngsters they talk a lot about a desire as a club to bring through but either not trusting them or not good enough.
No reliable gk, azpilicueta as captain going backwards rapidly

It is a hugely bloated squad without a clear identity. In theory Chelsea should have to suffer this for 3 or so years as we did when we built a similar awful squad. But they seem like they’ll throw £500m at it and probably ship a load of expensive players out on loan.

10 points off top 4 and we aren't even half-way through the season. They have no striker and too many players who look like they are not bothered.

With all the players they have, there are 11 or 13 decent ones in there.
It seems like a giant stew with too many ingredients and needs a lot of time to reduce it down to something workable. If they give Potter time and stop spending on every shiny thing they see I think he’ll do that, reduce it down to a team with a style of play. The problem might be the 7 or 8 players deemed surplus to requirements on big wages. But maybe as you say, they’ll just go out on loan.

I’m not sure how involved potter is in the signings. His comments this week seem to lend itself to an owner running off and doing anything he wants

That’s the way I see it. I think they need virtually an entire new attack to be contenders. They’re 10th and we’re going at over a point a game better than them

Pretty sure they’re going to buy one! They’ll stutter this season to somewhere between 9th and 6th, but Potter’s had 10 games or so and lots of people saying the job is too big for him or whatever. Judge how they’re going this time next season I reckon, course they might not even be in Europe by then… I’m very interested to see what Potter can do on a similar time frame to Arteta with that club. I mean his target on that basis is 8th this year.

Thanks for that Dr Ash ...although my internet prognosis leans towards cellulitis

I was thinking maybe a quick pass with a flap disc in the grinder might activate a cure .

Big drama with the US men's team. Claudio Reyna is a bit of a legend. One of the first US players to play in Europe in the '90s and 00s, (Leverkusen as well as the EPL if some of you might recall the name) and his experience helped give some solidity to the US men's team early on. He is a long time friend of current US men's coach, Gregg Berhalter.

Claudio's son, Gio is a young player currently with Dortmund.



Well, Berhalter wasnt going to start young Gio (20 y.o.) in the World Cup and Reyna, proud father and obviously thinks he knows football and what's best, was incensed about it. Since he and Berhalter are long time friends, saw it as a betrayal of their long friendship, Claudio and his wife know a lot about the family including some domestic abuse stuff.

The Reynas, (they have gone out and met as couples) the father threatened Berhalter with it if he didn't start his son and then subsequently wanted him removed as coach so his son will have a better chance of playing in the national team. While i understand your love for your son, and as much as it pains you, this is too far obviously.


One huge mess.

https://sports.yahoo.com/gio-reynas-par ... 56786.html

If the facts are even close to those alleged, I don't know why Soccer US is investigating, case of blackmail or extortion isn't it? Police or FBI should be looking at it.

Man Utd have won 4 straight. I'm casting a wary eye at them. Throughout this season they have not won convincingly often and relied on late goals, possibly prejudicial refereeing and such but at the end of the day they are winning.

....and we are getting them while they are winning and after the NLD which is always mentally and physically draining. It also seems with very few exceptions, no matter how well we are playing and how bad their form is they seem to step it up for us or am I imagining things?

I'm not worried about them catching us more than us losing. We are home so in theory a draw at worse but its effen Man Utd and you really never know with them.

Chelsea actually gave City a decent game. City were not quite the dominant force we've seen in recent years and infact their goal came from an inexplicable piece of goalkeeping from Kapa and poor defending from Cucurella at the far post.

I rate Potter quite high. His teams have punched above their weight and played attacking technical football with a high degree of tactical nuance. The question is whether Chelsea will give him the length of time Arteta has had - and whether Potter is having much say in the recruitment.

It is interesting to see so many managers now using the loyalty Arteta has been shown as a message to the media and their bosses. Just in the last week I've seen Moyes and Lampard overly praise Arteta and Arsenal for their own agenda of trying to stay in a job when they're under pressure. There is obviously the small factor that you have to be a talented manager as well! (which to be fair I do have a lot of time for Moyes and West Ham should stick by him - Lampard not so much)

Mudryk is looking like a time-consuming wild goose chase. He may want to join us but is we are £20m+ apart on valuations its hard to see a compromise. They feel he's every bit as good as Anthony and deserves to be valued the same, we feel that's an absurd valuation for an unproven player from the Ukrainian league. I can see both points of view and Chelsea's supposed interest is probably not helping to bring down the price.

Joao Felix feels like a very expensive gamble but the Newcastle game showed our lack of attacking options. It makes no sense financially unless we win the league especially if there is no buy option.

This is the problem with clubs with virtually infinite resources rocking up and paying way over the odds for average players. It massively distorts the market and I don't blame Shaktar for wanting Anthony money if they think (as would be quite fair) than Mudryk is better than Anthony.

A player is only worth what a club are willing to buy him for, so really we have to set a limit and then walk away. If Chelsea meet the value then the player needs to decide whether he wants to go to Chelsea in 10th with little likelihood of CL football next year, or dig his heels in for Arsenal the club he's clearly set his heart on. Then Shaktar have to decide if they go with our lower bid, because they can't force the player to move to Chelsea, with the knowledge that might be the best they can do in this or another window.

We need to put some kind of timescale on it. I saw Ornstein mention we're still keen on Felix and getting him in may put the pressure back on Shaktar in the Mudryk deal, we've also got Emile Smith Rowe coming back who can cover every position Mudryk plays in.

Either way, it needs to be as full a reserve team as we can at Oxford - we play 2 days later than Spurs in the FA Cup - of course we've been given the Monday night in front of the cameras game as those with the power will be desperate for an upset.

Feels like a goose chase doesn’t it. They seem intent on an auction and we never win these.

Surely just signing felix outright permanently makes more sense. His daft fee hasn’t helped him but he’s a good player and the type that Arteta could revitalise like Jesus

The club made a massive mistake not signing a wide man in the summer. You need to strengthen at moments of strength

Also the club needs to cut its losses on some of the players who frequent our subs bench who frankly can’t be trusted to play 15 minutes againest Newcastle

I'd be slightly concerned at the lack of action in the transfer market. As you say boosting the squad when we are ahead increases our chances of winning the title and if that doesn't happen finishing top 4. A couple of injuries and we could struggle. We are not even half way through the season and the EUROPA and FA cups in the mix to come.

I can only go by youtube videos but I like the look of Mudryk. My spiderman senses say he'll be good. It will be a shame if we can't get him.

On a related note, its seeming like if you want to win the league, fairly consistently, especially the bigger leagues and win the CL you will need an uber rich sugar daddy. It's a matter of when not if City wins the CL. They have the deepest of pockets. Newcastle will be the same within a decade at worst.

We had Raphinha as the No.1 wide man target in the summer and bid somewhere in the region of £50-60m for him. Of course we could say where were the 2nd, 3rd, 4th targets to ensure we got someone in, perhaps all those players had long contracts and sky high prices from their clubs also.

It is difficult, do you sign someone, anyone - or do you stick to the plan that has bought you a long way in a short space of time by walking away from bad deals and not accepting 2nd best?

Here are the lists of all the top right and left wingers who moved clubs in the summer. Who on there should Arsenal have signed at the price they moved for?
https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/transfe ... se=&leihe=
https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/transfe ... se=&leihe=

RIP Gianluca Vialli.

Always came across as a class act.

Don't Athletico want over £100m for him though?

He hasn't set the world alight in La Liga, albeit playing for a very defensively orientated side. He's talented no doubt but he's not the biggest or strongest. Can he cope with the physicality and frenetic pace of the PL, especially as we would need him to hit the ground running.

I hope we have a plan B. I would like to get a starter and someone for the bench. Someone like that Dutch beanpole who came on and scored two against Argentina.

We’re being charged for failing to control our players v Newcastle

Honestly that’s *%^@*** scandalous and an absolute disgrace

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/footb ... astle.html

Newcastle had its bench interfering with play.

That is now Arsenal, Man U and Spurs who have all been charged for failing to control their players in matches against Newcastle this season. The punishment is fair enough, we can't have players crowd a referee in the manner that happened, but it must be consistent - not just for the high profile teams in high profile televised games. I cant believe every instance of crowding the ref has been dealt with this way.

It would be good to see the FA/Premier League put some effort in to correcting the things that lead to such sanctions - of course the clubs need to control their players as well - but perhaps the authorities should look at why these things happen and decide whether the actions were unjustified or maybe start taking things like time wasting and terrible var reviews seriously.

I've read so many times this week that 'time wasting is part of the game'.....well tackles from behind were part of the game once and people didn't like it as it was incredibly dangerous, now those tackles are suitably punished and quite rare.
The proper added time at the world cup saw the ball in play on average for 6-8 minutes more than your average prem match.

https://twitter.com/afcDW/status/1611399927141400576
Someone put this video up where just as many Newcastle players are surrounding the ref in the incident for the penalty call. So it seems it is ok to surround the ref to harass him to stick with his original decision but not to harass him to try to change his mind? .....I'm being facetious....

Hi Rich, yeah I think that’s fair. Obviously I want Chelsea to be a such a circus, actual circuses marvel at the chaos going on there. But from a football point of view I’m curious if Potter can apply his Brighton philosophy to a bigger club. In theory if you - intelligently- pumped £500M over two windows into Brighton, who were envied by most in the premier league, what could you achieve?

But Chelsea aren’t Brighton and I think, and hope, that it’ll just take too long. I think the owners are prepared to be patient, but because they’re novices at this, the new players are coming in too fast, and as you say it seems as if it’s being done over Potters head, I think it’ll be a bit dysfunctional for a while and it’ll take more like 5 years to really settle and I don’t think potter has that much time.

Ffs. That’s infuriating.

Just pay up ignore it and move on. How much is the fine? Throw the money down and walk away.

Based on this season's form, we have to consider ourselves of having a decent chance of winning the FA Cup.

Runner up and an FA Cup would be a fantastic season. If Chelsea knocks out City (not likely but they are very capable of it), it leaves the door open to us. We have at least an even chance or better against everyone else. A few lucky draws and who knows.

Seeing the late penalty given to Man U tonight reminds me that is the exact sort of penalty I’ve seen not given to us countless times. For us it’s written off as a coming together, or our player going down easily. There was absolutely no doubt for the ref or var on that one tonight.

Honestly I do wonder if the best thing for us would be to chuck out a load of kids for the game and exit the competition as soon as possible.

I agree. No first eleven should be selected or in the squad. If we can’t win the tie with a team of seconds then we have a lot of squad work to do.