McTominay is young and hasn't been around long, but it looks to me he has a winner mindset.
Won broadly a 1 horse league in Italy and the played very well for about 4 games of the last World Cup where he happened to play for the favourites to win the tournament.
I agree but fear that Pogba will come back and Fred or McT will be injured and Pogba will slot in as one of the 2 DMs. And then we are stuck with Andreas/Mata/Lingard as AM. I really hope we buy an AM or DM in January that can contribute from day one.
You can only beat the opponents you have. A WC winner is still a WC winner no matter how many asterisks you want to add. More importantly, Pogba was not a virus in the clubhouse for Juventus and France. In fact, most reports say his teammates really liked him....and they won. I also think he was a goal from being picked player of the WC. I think if he scored that last late chance in the final he might have been chosen as player of the tournament. Certainly, he was in top 4 for consideration.
Of course, I don't think he was a virus for any of those teams. The view of "he's a winner" is watered down when you put it into context is all. One is for France, where players have a different mindset and it's broadly based on form rather than consistency over 38 games like it is for a club. The other was in a stage of his career where Serie A was just an all round shite league, and Juventus had an open goal at the title year after year. They won it by double digits pretty much every year if I'm not mistaken. One season by 17 points!
There is a chance Fred could work out and the Brighton performance was great. I'm just not convinced he has that exquisite first touch that all really good midfielders need to have.
Mct is injured now so yeah it's bound to happen. Matic or pogba at CM!
Juventus made CL final while Pogba was there. That was a good side regardless of the strength of the league.
His contract ran out, there wasn't a choice.
I'm pretty fecking sure a midfield of Gundogan-Rodri-Bernardo Silva or even Gundogan or Bernardo Silva or Foden as a 10 in front of a double pivot of Rodri-Fernandinho would look a whole lot more competent than even our first choice midfield, especially with the space Guardiola creates for that midfield with his tactics. Also Zinchenko has looked like a very good midfielder for Ukraine the few times I've seen him and he's got good mobility and technique so chuck him in as a possibility too. Any of those above 6 names would walk into our midfield with Pogba and McTominay, even with Fred improving this last little while.
It was. I'm not sure what relevance that has to anything. That Pogba is a winner? That he was part of a very good side? What exactly?
It certainly has a shout out to be our worst centre mid combo since the day we fielded O Shea and Rafael (was it?) that day we punished Rooney and Gibson by leaving them out...only to then lose at home to Blackburn.
Same match Pogba made his decision to leave on a free.
Yeah, there's a terrible memory
. Fifty million for Fred? Someone is having a laugh, and it certainly isn't us. He is garbage.Can't really blame him if those two are ahead of you!
Whoever was behind that one should have been booted out.Yeah, there's a terrible memory
He was a key part of that Juve team and he scored big goals in big moments. That's why it is relevant. To downplay his accomplishments because of the quality of the league is a pretty ridiculous when that same team made a CL final.
He wasn't outstanding in the CL against many big teams. He himself had a poor performance in the final if I remember correctly.
He played well away to Bayern en route to the final (and the previous season IIRC). Let's not pretend Pogba was just a passenger on those Juve teams.
I thought when are we going to replace Keane for years. I really wanted Essien and the Kante came along and Chelsea the lucky so and so's got them. I've virtually given up on finding Keane replacement, then same thing happened with Scholes. They players are so unique virtually impossible to replace. I've realised we have to move on and hope we find players in mould but they were so great it is hard to find players near that level with mentality as well.
Jesus. What about Fernadinho, Rodri, Gundogan, Foden, the other Silva?
Crazy how the people running the club could let this happen. It seemed obvious to most people besides them that if we had injuries to Pogba or McTominay that we needed another midfielder or we would be in the sh!te.
I'm not saying he was a passenger, but your argument of him being a winner has been reduced to naming one or two games where he played well against decent oppositions.
I get the impression Ed overruled Ole on Longstaff over the price. Could be wrong. It was a crazy risk.
Did you watch the World Cup final
Although I don't like Woodward I could see why me might not want to sign a player who I think had played 9 games at the time, I might be wrong. Don't know much about Longstaff myself but I think it was negligent to not bring in another midfielder.
We basically do only have 2, and even then Pogba is the most infuriatingly inconsistent player I think I've ever seen at the club, and also I'm not convinced that he will ever pull on the shirt again.
I think that the quality of midfielders we have compared to the ones you mentioned is embarrassing. This issue needs addressing as soon as possible and we need to bring in some quality but the way we are at the moment, I think this is going to take a long time to sort out.
