"and can slot in at right-back if required" - close season transfer banter 2014

I'm taking the most pessimistic view possible there tbf

but when you look at it another way we've gotten rid of our best technical winger - yes, but serially underperforming and frustrating as fuck - he's had 7 years to sort himself out and he only really clicked for about a season and a half

sold a young homegrown striker to a direct rival who desperately need reinforcements - yeah, I would have kept him

while replacing him with an aging, potential crock - well, he's still in his 20s and if he is crocked, at least he's only on loan for now

turned Antonio Valencia and Ashley Young into integral members of the team (in defence ffs) - hopefully not for long. If we're persisting with the 3-5-2 thing, then hopefully Shaw and Rafael will replace them when they're not injured. Or we might go 4-3-3 and not use either of them.

and made Wayne Rooney captain and undroppable - yeah, I really don't get this

Falcao and Welbeck not signed off yet

Jim White shouting in every cunt's face.
Wee neds with blow up dolls and dildos.
Fucking totaliser graphic that makes Children in Need look like a collection plate.

I hate this shite.

why have man city gotten rid of negredo?

'The plot thickens surrounding the collapse of Tom Cleverley’s move from Everton to Manchester United.

'Old Trafford sources claim that Cleverley travelled to Merseyside after Everton had a £7.5m bid accepted but the club then made an unsuccessful attempt to knock United down to £5m.'

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BweyA3LIQAAOzSx.png

xp woodward tearfully screaming no no u won't get me this year u cunts, stifled sniggering and shushes audible down the line from everton boardroom

If you want a laugh I'd recommend looking at the official Leeds United twitter feed right now.

https://twitter.com/LUFC/status/506544392480780290
...
22:52

Fulham confirm the signing of Leeds striker Matt Smith on a three-year deal for an undisclosed fee.

22:59

Oldham sign Dominic Poleon from Leeds for an undisclosed fee.

https://twitter.com/LUFC/statuses/506562215357722624

Priceless

:D

I love how the responses to the 1st tweet are all 'ooh you tease' and by the last it's all 'THE HAVE GOT TO BE FUCKING KIDDING ME YOU CUNTS!'

rumours that Falcao has failed a medical

wish we had a more committed leeds fan on ilx than michael white

though, logically, if he'd failed the medical, the deal would already be off and we'd already know about it

Where is Michael White anyway? He still around? #milkcarton

maybe we decided to do the medical at five to eleven for the craic

lol phil neville doesn't think rojo gets in the squad

(but phil jones is in)

Both PNev and Danny Murphy had Valencia in the right wing-back role. God knows why. He can't defend and he can't cross.

Ferguson, Moyes, and now van Gaal all seem to love him. At least he was good at one time under Fergie, fuck knows what the others see in him

23:55

BBC Sport's Simon Stone: "No truth in rumours Falcao has failed a medical. United have been given an extra hour to complete deal."

An extra hour from 11pm or from now? I need to go to bed.

good luck to qpr setting out their team to meet utd after the break

also get rafael fit, stick januzaj on the right wing and drop this wing back malarkey and goodnight valencia right?

        de gea
rafael jones rojo shaw
         blind
    herrera di maria
         mata
     rooney falcao

amirite

yeah that's the stuff

still a wee bit on the slow side up top though

its fuckin nonsense and I don't even mean as lol no put Rooney rb lol

Welbeck confirmed

into the church of Satan

tune in this time next january when hull sign januzaj on loan

what of Jonny Evsns? I haven't watched the last few Utd games but I gather from a quick google that he's not been any good. People were floating Ron Vlaar's name quite a bit this summer and I rolled my eyes at my United supporting mate when he mentioned it last month but it is pretty lol that Villa have got a centre-back better than anything United can field

rly wanna hit the sack but if i miss the falcao deal falling thru i'll never forgive myself

i selected jones purely because lvg gave him a hug or w/e in preseason that time tbf

also i'm probably showing myself to be massively behind the times here, but what's with the growing prevalence of big name loan signings? Is this a consequence of Financial Fair Play, teams trying desperately to get talent in on the cheap & other teams trying desperately to sort out their wage budget? Because I don't really gt a transfer like Michu on loan to Napoli for any other reason, surely from Swansea's perspective if you're happy to soldier on without him then you wanna take the payday and reinvest?

Blind as a dm is a terrible idea rtc tbh

Jones has been our best defender so far but that's not saying much. Evans has been horrible in the first few games but most fans would consider him our most capable CB and he is just coming back from injury. Rojo is a total wildcard. In summary, idk

uh, I thought he was a DM?

that's where he's been signed to play anyway

Blind's a left back, left midfielder. He ain't no dm vacuum cleaner, not by a long shot.

did he not play all of last season in central midfield for Ajax though? I've been reading a lot misleading articles if not

I mean

His familiarity in the role and Ajax’s modern interpretation of totaalvoetbal (modified by Johan Cruyff and Louis van Gaal, which De Boer has gradually re-implemented) has made his assimilation smooth. His energy and discipline has become the kernel around which the rest of the side’s panache is constructed. In the role Blind is essentially a ‘third centre-back’ – dropping between the central defenders – and conductor rolled into one. He’s tasked with retaining and recycling possession: averaging 68.6 passes, 2.1 tackles and 2 interceptions per game (according to WhoScored.com).

Blind, who often operates as single-minded man-marker – normally designated to do a job on the opposition’s playmaker – shuttles across the pitch following the ball once with it his impeccable metronomic passing and grandiose football intelligence triggers their positional game/ Ajax in possession morph into a 2-3-2-3, one-touch combination football is second nature to them. In the Eredivisie their pass accuracy (86.8%) and average possession (62.9%) is ranked first (stats from WhoScored.com). He dictates the tempo: whether Ajax needs to slow things down or raise it. This also depends how high up the pitch they are.

The controller, or in De Boer’s system ‘third centre-back’, is the most important position. Sergio Busquets – a revelation under Pep Guardiola and easily Barça’s second most important player – plays a similar role and has long fascinated the former Oranje captain. Guardiola, now managing Bayern Munich, played alongside De Boer for three seasons at Barça and has been a silent influence. As teammates they enjoyed lengthy conversations about the game. De Boer noted how Guardiola back then was effectively a coach. Guardiola equally saw the same.

Always on the left. And he prefers playing on the left. I dunno, you could perhaps say he's a left dm, but it's stretching it. Blind's no Nigel de Jong. He's not got the fysique or power to be a dm. He's a technical player (and therefore quite shit at pure defending).

Xp don't know where you got that article from, but 50% is right off the bat bollocks. "Ajax morph into a 2-3-2-3" in possession? Totaalvoetbal? Get the fuck outta here. It all sounds very nostalgically romantic and nice and stuff but that quote, sorry, is half wishful thinking and half bollocks. It's say too much a theoretical interpretation of the chaos that is football.

Dutch Football @football_oranje
Blind's agent Rob Jansen told Fox Sports that Louis van Gaal plans to use Blind in midfield, in a "controlling" role.

"Morph into 2-3-2-3"... In don't know whether to laugh or cry.

Sure, Van Gaal can use him that way, but it's not where his strength lies, nor is it his natural position.

there are loads more that I can't be bothered c&p'ing. They all say he played at the base of the midfield

He's not Nigel de Jong but he's a decent simulacrum of Busquets. He played that role excellently when Ajax beat Barcelona 2-1 in the CL group stages last year - only for the first 30' or so, until the starting LB was injured and Blind had to move there, replaced by Christian Poulsen - but I'm certain I've seen him do it on a number of occasions. Didn't he play there for NED for at least part of this World Cup as well?

Personally I always thought a deep-lying midfield role might suit Vertonghen better than CB or LB too, and that he'd get a chance to prove himself there when he moved to Spurs, but that never happened.