Recent content by deleon

I wouldn't write him off yet. We've been cutting down on the number of procrastinating passes from centrebacks to fullbacks the past couple of matches. Wan-Bissaka's decision-making on the receiving end of those passes has been his weakness in my opinion, so he could be less exposed during...

What's AVB up to? He might be up for something non-committal if he's still waiting for that national team job. Even with his flaws he should be good enough as an interim manager.

Thanks for reading everyone. I appreciate those who tried to let me down gently. I'd like to try defending it at least once before moving on. I should clarify that I'm not going to argue against the consensus that AWB would not make a good defending midfielder. So if you think that should be...

TL;DR: In the time-honoured tradition of armchair tacticians with fanciful ideas, here is mine. There is no easy solution to our midfield problems, but I think they can be mitigated in the short term. (Spoilers are added for readability if you just want to get the gist, not because they...

It won't hurt to start bidding in January. Protracted sagas are how we do things.

We're not going to take off Fernandes when we are chasing a goal, so not bringing on Lingard (or anyone else) there is hardly scandalous. Similarly, I see his primary role as backup for Sancho, but I wouldn't make that replacement either when losing, unless he's individually having an off day...

The reason why Fernandes played so much last season was because we were over-reliant on him. It sounds like circuitous logic, but the truth is we couldn't afford to rest him. Now that we have another game-changing attacker, we don't have to place as much creative burdens on Fernandes' backup. Of...

It's something I've been thinking about since last season, but mainly because of our lack of a proper right winger then. ---RB---CB---CB---LB--- ------------Poba------------ --McTominay--Fred-- --------Fernandes------- Sancho------Rashford Having Sancho now allows this to become a genuine...

The alternative isn't necessarily losing him for free. He could be offered an extension with the tacit understanding that he will be allowed to leave the following summer. So it then becomes whether one season of Pogba is worth the (presumed) pay rise but higher eventual transfer fee (also...

Okay, time to reassess (I hope this doesn't break rules on old threads): Maguire - He's proved himself, if not yet his pricetag. This isn't as obvious now as it was in October. Lindelof - I don't think he settled the debate one way or another. He had an okay season when next to Maguire, but...

Pogba has actually surprised me on the left. I thought for sure if we can't play him as a midfielder his position would be on the right, and that he'd be too trigger happy on the left. But turns out defenders are usually good at closing down the shooting option, and he's had to resort to more...

I wasn't too crazy about him signing, but we've seen too often that players sometimes only come into their own after a season or two. If we can sign someone like Sancho this summer, we would probably be able to rest Fernandes more and van de Beek would get his chance. On the other hand, if...

Sven-Goran Eriksson, with Daniel Levy embarking on a Home Alone-esque escapade to secure his signature. "Come on, you Super Whites!"

I fear this might end up being one of our most disappointing summers. The club is still feeling the effects of Covid, so money would have been tight anyway. This will be Woodward's last summer, and he has little reason to want to leave a legacy. In fact, he seems like someone who only uses the...

"It's like a game of chess", when a lack of ideas is more likely the cause of inaction than managers being overly cerebral.