I think we used Quansah in that role last season, actually.
I’m not sure we really have very clear distinctions between who plays on the right and left, except perhaps that we play Virgil almost exclusively on the left and Konaté on the right as much as possible. Gomez naturally wherever there’s a gap.
I don’t think there’s much room for a 5th choice to play more than a couple of games, especially now that Matip is gone. Apart from Quansah last season and that disastrous season, I think even the domestic cups rarely featured a 5th choice.
Yeah, this is the crux of it. Again, there are mitigating circumstances, like Euros affecting Slot’s assessment of the squad and the speed of implementation of his tactical ideas, Hughes coming in at the beginning of this summer and Euros having the work cut out for him.
But even having all that in mind, not dealing with the contracts of three key players is, in my opinion. a greater offence than not strengthening at DM (for third consecutive summer window) and at CB.
The announcement produced an artificial boost, the “do it for Jurgen”, but that sort of emotional arousal cannot be sustained and when it wears off it leaves everyone exhausted. I think performances like the Utd one show players unable to emotionally rouse themselves because of being emotionally drained.
I’ve always believed the Jurgen announcement was massively miss timed. There was no need to put extra pressure on a squad with the mantra do it for Jurgen.
In the end we all would like more as we have had seasons where injuries have hurt us, badly.
But from a squad point of view we aren’t in a bad place and as I have said before I like that we are cautious in our buys as I hate it when I see other clubs and ourselves make poor buys, but that might be the tight Yorkshireman in me.
I can’t check at the moment, but if I recall correctly, the United team had played pretty much the minimum number of games that season, owing to being absolutely shite, whereas we were coming off a game with extra time and actually being top of the league. I’d say that’s more likely to be a contributor rather than the whole idea of that emotional exhaustion.
Then again (although I can’t check at the moment), I also do think that we weren’t playing our best to begin with because we were trying to reintegrate the likes of Szoboszlai, Alexander-Arnold and Robertson after their injuries.
I don’t know what I necessarily believe the cause to be, but I feel as though this might just end up being the Rafa “facts” press conference all over again, where the supposed impact is simply overstated, and the real truth is just that we were a team in transition overachieving compared to expectations at the start of the season. I think most people were expecting top 4 to be a tough fight, not even talking about being top of the league deep into March.
Are you one of those lads who believes in unicorns, the Loch Ness monster, and scouse billionaires who want to tip all their money into a football club?
There are no perfect owners, but I believe FSG are about the best we could get. Most of my issues with them are down to various PR gaffes, and nothing to do with not spending money.
I don’t know about you, but I remember Moores, who was a decent bloke but strategically inept and allowed the club to stagnate. Or Hicks and Gillette, parasitic leeches plunging the club into the debt and asset stripping the squad. And look around the league and tell me who you’d prefer? Blood soaked wealth funds? Shady consortiums? Come on.
As for spending money, I never want to see this club throwing money away chasing success. With City around it’s like taking a knife to a gunfight. We have to be cleverer than that, and that sometimes means knowing when to to do nothing. It’s not about money - it’s about making sure you spend it properly. We have a lot of money compared to most clubs, but that means nothing if we’re pissing half of it away. I want to know when a Van Dijk, or Alisson, or Mo Salah, or Diaz is available we can move. I don’t want to miss out on the first choice signing because we have spaffed the money on second, third and fourth cabs off the rank who were no better than we already had.
You’re surely not suggesting we just happen to think “oh that lad is good and available, maybe worth chancing our arm” rather than us actively looking to address a need?
And the ones we’ve been after would have been amongst our most expensive transfers ever but we’re just being opportunistic? Seems far fetched.
Isn’t the fact we have elected to not pursue other options the very definition of us not believing it was a need but a want? An unusual level of interest in a specific player rather than a move to address an area of the squad we thought was presently inadequate?
Doesnt Endo bolster that interpretation? The position became a need after losing Hendo and Fab so we responded by bringing in an non-ideal solution for it. But since then we also brought in Gravenberch putting us in a position where we no longer NEED a move but were open to making one.
I totally understand disagreeing with the club’s position over a player or role in the squad or wanting to be more proctive about putting off future wants, but it seems we have an ongoing refusal from sections of our fans to understand what the transfer guys are trying to do.
