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Keep/Sell - who?

Sell

Gollini
Doherty
Rodon
Sanchez
Winks
Alli
Ndombele
Lo Celso
Bergjwin
Kane

Squad players
Dier
Davies
Sessy
Hojberg
Lucas
Royale

Starters
Lloris
Romero
Skill
Son
 
The disappointing thing for me is that we’ve actually spent a fair old wedge in the last 7/8 seasons. Despite this, there’s a fairly strong case for writing half the squad off as deadwood.

I won’t do the full list as it’ll be very similar to others on here, it’s just mad how much money (not to mention time!!!) we put in to N’Dombele and GLC. Neither seem to be able to knit the play together as you’d hope a playmaker could, as well as neither being a safe bet for the 2 CM spots in the 3-4-3 with wide forwards...Anyone who would’ve predicted how poorly both big money signings have gone so far probably would’ve come across as glass well and truly empty.

We’ll never get answers but different departments of the club must have come together to make the decision, I don’t want to lay blame at all but I would like to understand Poch’s teams thinking, of how they were going to get those two players in the first XI, especially as Dele could play football back then..
 
GK - Lloris, Gollini. I am worried about the strength behind those two. I would sell none.

CB - Dier, Romero, Sanchez, Rodon, Tanganga. I would sell none. If I was forced to sell, bye bye Rodon.

RB - Doherty, Emerson Royal. I would sell Doherty.

LB - Davies, Sessegnon, Reguilon. I would sell Sessegnon.

DM - Skipp, Hojberg, Winks. I would previously have sold Winks but I have seen something to grant him more time.

CM - Ndombele, Lo Celso, Dele Alli. I would sell Dele Alli.

Wingers - Moura, Bergwijn, Clarke, Bryan Gil. I would sell Clarke and loan out Bryan Gil. Gil is not physically ready for this league.

Forwards - Kane, Scarlett, Son. I would loan out Scarlett. We need another forward. Perhaps recall Parrott from loan. Tempted to sell Kane but we need bodies in this position.
 
An interesting way to assess individual players' ability is, for each of them, to go down the league table and work out where they'd be happily welcomed to become a part of their 1st XI. Totally subjective and I'm ignoring whether the other club would actually need them (which makes this something of a pointless exercise)

Hugo - West Ham
Doherty - Burnley
Reguilon - Woolwich
Romero - West Ham
Hojbjerg - Brighton
Sanchez - Everton
Son - Emirates Marketing Project
Winks - Southampton
Kane - Chelsea
Gil - Southampton
Royale - Woolwich
Rodon - Aston Villa
Dier - Crystal Palace
Lo Celso - Brighton
Sessegnon - Everton
Dele - Aston Villa
Gollini - Norwich
Bergwijn - Southampton
Tanganga - Southampton
Lucas Moura - Wolves
Ndombele - Brighton
Skipp - West Ham
Davies - Everton

Essentially what I'm saying is that only Kane and Son (both mostly judged historically) would get into a top 3 team and only a couple are good enough for a team in and around the 4th place race.

Some of these are temporary and several still have the jury out.
Chelsea would not be interested in 2021 Kane especially the version that refuses to stay in the box. Son is the most likely to be picked by Chelsea if they had a choice. Kane's stock has fallen.
 
The disappointing thing for me is that we’ve actually spent a fair old wedge in the last 7/8 seasons. Despite this, there’s a fairly strong case for writing half the squad off as deadwood.

I won’t do the full list as it’ll be very similar to others on here, it’s just mad how much money (not to mention time!!!) we put in to N’Dombele and GLC. Neither seem to be able to knit the play together as you’d hope a playmaker could, as well as neither being a safe bet for the 2 CM spots in the 3-4-3 with wide forwards...Anyone who would’ve predicted how poorly both big money signings have gone so far probably would’ve come across as glass well and truly empty.

We’ll never get answers but different departments of the club must have come together to make the decision, I don’t want to lay blame at all but I would like to understand Poch’s teams thinking, of how they were going to get those two players in the first XI, especially as Dele could play football back then..

I guess the answer is probably that they knew the Eriksen situation and had the best intentions to build squad depth. There was also an argument that GLC was a bit more attacking and could plug that gap wide right of the 3 behind Kane.

There was an interesting thread on Twitter earlier about how Brighton for example can’t afford to pay the money we do, so what they’ve done is work with different means (proper scouting, data etc) to identify players that play in a certain way and can play together. What they’ve ended up with is a group of players that play very nicely together, but ultimately lack any cutting edge, which is probably why they were where they were prior.

We’ve essentially got the opposite of that imo. A bunch of individuals who have very good skill sets but ultimately it seems we cannot develop a system that gets the best out of them. When we did eventually up the tempo against Leeds last week it still wasn’t pretty but we did get the job done, whereas Brighton couldn’t against the same opposition.

You obviously can’t judge both clubs on a pair of games over the course of one week but it does ring true for both imo.

This is why the next 2 windows are so important (January don’t solve everything). The manager simply has to have a strategy that identifies certain players that he knows will carry out his demands.
 
Chelsea would not be interested in 2021 Kane especially the version that refuses to stay in the box. Son is the most likely to be picked by Chelsea if they had a choice. Kane's stock has fallen.

You really think Kane would drop deep at Chelsea? He’s dropping deep because we are playing a 7-0-3. Chelsea are camped on the box of the opposition most of the time, he wouldn’t be dropping deep for them.
 
We’ve essentially got the opposite of that imo. A bunch of individuals who have very good skill sets but ultimately it seems we cannot develop a system that gets the best out of them. When we did eventually up the tempo against Leeds last week it still wasn’t pretty but we did get the job done, whereas Brighton couldn’t against the same opposition.

Setting aside the general low level of quality (beyond the first 11 in particular) I think our main problem is simply that we lack creativity i.e. the connection between defensive (and defensive players) and the attackers. The main three players who should provide this are Ndombele, GLC and Dele...all not performing for different reasons, but its concentrated in the same area of the pitch.

We have other problems obviously, but I feel that is our main one
 
Setting aside the general low level of quality (beyond the first 11 in particular) I think our main problem is simply that we lack creativity i.e. the connection between defensive (and defensive players) and the attackers. The main three players who should provide this are Ndombele, GLC and Dele...all not performing for different reasons, but its concentrated in the same area of the pitch.

We have other problems obviously, but I feel that is our main one
Correct. See my post above re: Kane dropping deep. I don’t even think any of those 3 knit play together that well. Need a proper connector that can score also.
 
Also Lo Celso and Ndombele were bought for a particular style of possession football. 3 months later we sacked that manager and bought in an anti-football long ball merchant.

It's was a sliding doors moment, but I think both would have had very different careers with us if we'd kept Poch, or brought in a continuity progressive coach like Naglesman or Ten Hag in 2019, like we should have done
 
Also Lo Celso and Ndombele were bought for a particular style of possession football. 3 months later we sacked that manager and bought in an anti-football long ball merchant.

It's was a sliding doors moment, but I think both would have had very different careers with us if we'd kept Poch, or brought in a continuity progressive coach like Naglesman or Ten Hag in 2019, like we should have done

Lo Celso and Ndombele are on their third manager since Poch (not counting Mason).
2.5 seasons later its getting to the stage where maybe we need to stop imagining what they might have looked like under Poch and instead take the evidence at face value. They’re not good enough.
 
Lo Celso and Ndombele are on their third manager since Poch (not counting Mason).
2.5 seasons later its getting to the stage where maybe we need to stop imagining what they might have looked like under Poch and instead take the evidence at face value. They’re not good enough.

Said everyone about Dembele and Rose in 2014. If Conte decides to bin them off, then fair enough. But the zigzaging in direction and having two very poor coaches are extenuating circumstances, which might still be remedied (though we'll need to see progress in the next 6 or so weeks)
 
They are doing well in the league and in CL, why would he come here.

FFTPkMfWUAkmCC8
 
Impossible for fans to pick the winners and losers in the squad from so far away from the coalface
now is not the time to pick.
 
a few of them have regressed considerably since even last season.

What have we actually done to enhance the squad since he left? Romero is definitely an upgrade but currently injured and so suspect we wont see best of him until next season. Gil is a long-term project but looks nowhere near 1st team. Royale is a modest upgrade. Gollini is worse than Hart.

Bale and Vinicius were limited but the 20 odd-goals they contributed haven't even been replaced.

Mourinho contributed to some of that was undoubtedly a negative impact on the club - that said he was not 100% of the problem but equally was very evidently 0% of the solution.

Meanwhile Woolwich and West Ham have improved and Wolves, Brighton and Palace look to have a more balanced (if not talented) squad than us. I know I'm very glass half empty this week!

Hopefully we can at least snap up another competent CF so Kane isn’t run into the ground.

 
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