comment by GeminMallorca (U18318)
posted 5 hours, 23 minutes ago
I'm here mate but feeling really rough at the moment. Chemo is knocking me about. Lost the stream 10 minutes ago as well.
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I didn't know about this and am really sorry to hear it. Hope all is going well.

Good performance today and excellent 3 points. Lopegetui has made a huge difference and it's great to see new signings making an immediate impact. We haven't seen much of that for a long time under either Nuno or Bruno.

yeah, Have to say i was never really concerned about relegation and now i have zero fears about relegation.

Julen is clearly a very different level to those before him and I include Nuno in that. It still feels a little like he is giving players auditions before making decisions at the moment and think the team will settle down a lot soon but also seems clear he values the bench highly to maintain a good press later in games.

comment by Tamwolf (U17286)
posted about an hour ago
comment by GeminMallorca (U18318)
posted 5 hours, 23 minutes ago
I'm here mate but feeling really rough at the moment. Chemo is knocking me about. Lost the stream 10 minutes ago as well.
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I didn't know about this and am really sorry to hear it. Hope all is going well.
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Thanks Tam, very kind of you

Hey up boys


All the best gem lad, keep fighting the good fight

I thought the subs didn't quite have the impact they've had in previous games today, Ait Nouri does seem to wreak havoc when he comes on and did again today. Adama had a quiet one though and although Jimenez brought something different to Cunha he didn't link the play quite as well as the Brazilian did. Would like to see them playing together more personally but I'll maybe leave the tactics and team selection to Lopetegui, seems to know his stuff.

comment by GeminMallorca (U18318)
posted 7 hours, 15 minutes ago
I'm here mate but feeling really rough at the moment. Chemo is knocking me about. Lost the stream 10 minutes ago as well.
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Ah sh!t, been a rough year or so for you Gem. All the best brother.

Sorry to hear you are struggling gem, hopefully in 2023 out of darkness cometh light

Everton fans not happy with Coady.

https://www.grandoldteam.com/forum/threads/conor-coady.115825/page-73

He was excellent for Wolves in a back 3 but never thought he would fit the bill in a back 4. Seemed for a while that he was going to prove those views wrong at Everton but seems to be coming home to roost now. Maybe they won’t even pay the £5m to take him permanently

Even in a back three he was exposed at times and was probably the weak link in terms of defensive ability.

He was an excellent communicator in a low block team and key to the set up in Nuno's first three years. He was always one we needed to move away from eventually to have sustained success though.

I didn’t see Coady as a weak link at all in that set up. Played consistently well week in week out in a team that twice finished 7th. What made him superfluous was the move to a back 4. I always thought that change was a mistake with the players we had at that time. I predicted it would lead to us conceding more but not scoring more and that’s exactly what happened. But now we have the midfield to make it work and are developing the attack to turn better performances into positive results. And of course we have a much better manager now

Coady struggled every time a physical striker went up against him.

Especially if they ran the channels. Wood, Mitrovic, Antonio, Toney etc, all repeatedly got the better of him. It's rewriting history to pretend it was never a problem.

Coady is a Great man and a Great leader but he was always on the list of players to improve on

comment by Oldgoldilox (U17303)
posted 11 hours, 3 minutes ago
I thought the subs didn't quite have the impact they've had in previous games today, Ait Nouri does seem to wreak havoc when he comes on and did again today. Adama had a quiet one though and although Jimenez brought something different to Cunha he didn't link the play quite as well as the Brazilian did. Would like to see them playing together more personally but I'll maybe leave the tactics and team selection to Lopetegui, seems to know his stuff.
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I agree with that to some degree but in a way you expect the subs to be not quite as good as who they replace otherwise they’d be starting. But I do think there’s great benefit in having fresh legs in the last quarter of the match in the modern game, and to me that was a lesson Bruno never learned.

I thought there was real encouragement from Raul yesterday with some good headers, which we haven’t seen from him in 18 months, and good link up play. Lemina came on and won some tackles and made good passes. Although Adama was generally quiet, when West Ham were pressing us late on he twice carried the ball 50 yards before being fouled and that helped us get over the line. While Toti I think came on to help us when West Ham started launching high balls into our area

I agree subs will sometimes lower the quality but we’ve suffered many times in the past through the opposition pegging us back late on and a common thread in those games under Bruno was when they had 5 players with fresh legs on the field and we often had only one or two

Actually DJ, I think this is where the game is changing with five subs and Lopetegui recognises this, in the Everton, United and Liverpool games I thought the subs really improved the performance. Of course what JL has that Lage didn't is those options from the bench. Jimenez, Hodge, Bueno, Lemina, Lembikisa, Costa, Cunha were all options Lage didn't have access to for one reason or another