They haven't won the title for 26 years (a record I hope we never beat) before that 1992 title win. The bunch of "kids" grew up together, totally murdered everyone in the FA Youth Cup a few years before that and was promoted together. Thus, knowing each other well, in terms of playing style coupled with the guidance of the old heads in the players everyone mentioned, but a few that wasn't mentioned was a certain Bryan Robson and Mark hughes. Very similar to our position now, you have a club captain, an absolute legend that could and would guide the kids well and mould them into good players.

The difference between then and now is of course the money, Cantona was then the highest pay player in the English League with £4K a week, compare that to Raheem, who's on £30K a week, despite being an 18 year old. MOney will add distraction to the player and with them being young, it will always be bad as they will have unnecessary distractions, no matter how much the older heads try to coach or mould them, it's bound to be hard when you have scores of women trying to spread their legs for you everywhere you go.

I'm not blaming the money, but the fact that the game has changed so much, in terms of coverage, money, method etc etc, it will not be easy for a team to grow players, especially young ones. Because of the pressure on the managers and the coverage and website write ins, radio call ins in the UK and even out of UK.

These boys needs to be managed properly or they might just turn out to be flash in the pan and then stagnate there. A good example would be SWP or to a lesser extend Theo Walcott. I just hope that Rodgers is taking it easy with them and grow them into better players rather than overload them and kill their career off like that.

Err, Jamie has his moments in his younger days. There was a story doing the rounds that during one Christmas party he had a naked stripper sitting on his shoulder while he goes around the place "like a lunatic". But then again that was right after the Spice boys days and he has toned down greatly and is a role model now. COuld not and would not question his commitment to the club or how he can influenced the younger player these days.

We spoke about this the other day, do we need another number 10? Given Suarez is already a number 10, and this rumour is true, how will it pen out? Shoehorning Suarez into a Number 9? Or play with 2 number 10's that will create havoc, whatever it is, we shall wait and see, especially that I read just now that the betting for Sneijder to join us has been slashed to 1:2 (or was it 2:1, could never work it out), and these betting guys, they always know something, and most of the time, their info is very very accurate.

Where he plays is not much of a concern to me as we can rotate to players around, my question is whether he will fit into the English League? Where you get very little time on the ball and is often scythed down by big, burly midfielder / defender. He could turn out to be our Silva or another Joe Cole, we just have to wait and see what happens in the next 2 weeks.

This post has been edited by Jonno: Jan 17 2013, 05:52 PM

Lampard? WILL NEVER HAPPEN.

Reason:
1. He's Mr. Chelsea
2. He is on about £150K a week
3. He is on decline
4. Most importantly, we DON'T need him it'll just create the same problem with the England team whereby most managers don't know how to fit both of the into a system. AND we already have Gerrard who's a much all round player than Lampard, why you want to have 2 similar player who's both old in the same team? Not to mention we have Shelvey who's very much like Gerrard when he's younger.

On Terry and Cole, we would never be able to afford Cole's wages demand, he'll be going to PSG to wind down his career, sucking on about £200K a week. Terry would rather rot on the bench than joining us, he IS Mr. Chelsea X 1000 and their Jamie Carragher, so it would never happen.


On Sneijder, too much has been said about him joining us and many has expressed interest and excitement in the prospect of him joining, the debate tend to circle around whether we can afford his wages, the transfer fee etc etc.

I have a slightly different thought, do we need him?
What will he bring to a team?
Will he disrupt the team and most importantly the dressing room?
Will he improve the team? Does he bring about qualities that we do not have in the team?

Perhaps after all these questions were answered, then we should talk about whether we can afford his wages, the last thing I want was another Veron case. Everyone connected to Man Utd was excited about his signing and reckoned that the signing would start an era of dominance as he is the last piece in the jigsaw. We all know how that went.

I leave it to your own opinion and interpretations before going further with this.

She's great ain't she? Glad you like it, in fact, many commented to me that since I stopped posting regularly here, what they missed most wasn't my input to the discussion, but my avatar!

Always good to know that you contribute to the forum discussion in a positive way

By the way, you lived up to your reputation by that post

She ain't English if that's what you're talking about.

If you're talking about football, we tried that when Dalglish went out and sign pretty much every British footballer out there, a flawed and expensive affair that we are still trying to rectify.

This post has been edited by Jonno: Jan 18 2013, 11:51 AM

Nah, Stoke's play is totally different from us. By sending him there for loan, although he might / will get game time, it will not help his game one bit, as he will come back as a "hoof" type of a footballer, which is not our game play at all. Going to WBA makes sense, Clarke knows Coates from his time with us, and they try to play football from the back rather than just hoof it up the field. Maybe if he gets enough game time, it'll help develop his game as a proper passing defender.


Bit early to start dreaming isn't it? Plus we don't really need him.

With the rumours going around, we will be playing with false 2, 3, 4, 5, and 9 by lining up with 0 defenders and 0 strikers. 10 in the midfield, that'll be something

Correct, but just that apparently your hormones are a little more active and your blood is easily seduced

Nope Harry is the last person on earth that should coach him, form what I see, Harry doesn't have much tactical flexibility and is too old fashioned, although he is a fantastic man manager. If Coates is to learn from someone, the likes of Clarke at WBA, or Laudrup at Swansea or Arsene or even Hughton would help his game greatly.

I am not worried about that, as we are not strengthening them but sending one of our young player over to gain some much needed experience to improve. If we are thinking about such little things, then we have no right to compete in Europe as we ain't good enough anyway. On top of that, I truly believe WBA will fade away soon.

The amount of "prediction" (or what I call "thoughtless comments") here never cease to amuse me. Just because we bought a player, it doesn't mean we have to ship players out. Football is very much a squad game these days. I am pretty sure just not long ago everyone is screaming that we had a small squad and we need to buy more players. And now just because we signed Sturridge and Coutinho, we have to ship players out? And the names being bandied around here are just ridiculous!

Not because I like the look of Suso, Jonjo and Henderson and others, but in a season of 38 league games, 6 Europa League Games (if we qualify and minimum, and that doesn't include the qualifying games to Europa League, which makes it 10), and a minimum of 1 League Cup game and 1 FA Cup game, that's a 50 game season, I will even be a bit more arrogant that we will get past the firs round in FA and League which adds another 2 games in the calendar.

More than often we will be playing 2 games in a week, we will need all these players available for us to rest players, let youngsters get experience, try out new things etc etc. Factor in injury, suspension, rest, loss of form, picking specific players for specific game (my ideal situation, constantly rotate and have everyone fresh to come in and do the job, bring out their quality in games that requires their specific quality to counter the specific threat / create specific threat against that specific team), we need all the players we have. If the player is not suited to the team / league they will be out (Sahin & Oussaidi anyone? Although Oussaidi is still here, as he's still young).

Don't forget we have a lot of young players, most of them barely out of their teens and yet to hit 20, they need the rest as they're still growing up (physically), therefore it is only right to have other players in the squad that can step up. Chill fellas, we are not selling anyone yet, with the squad I see he is building, and whem everyone finally come to grip with Brendan's ideas, next season can be a very exciting one.

It's one thing to profess one's man love for a player, but to openly admit that you produce "love wee" when watching them pay just makes me wonder whether you love them for the football or their looks.

Sure mate, Sure.

I love watching Anne Hathaway in "The Dark Knight Rises" for her brilliant portrayal of Catwoman rathe than that catsuit. Also in "Love and Other drugs" for her brave acting rather than THAT nude scene. (I can see everyone rushing to check that scene out in google / download the movie now ).

Yeah, I love watching them because of their talents, not the fact that they're hot.