‘Liverpool lack a cocky, arrogant striker needed for title wins’
Arsenal fans discuss whether getting rid of Wenger could be a bad thing, while Liverpool fans want a new striker and Chelsea supporters plan for life without Diego Costa.
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Wenger’s future unclear
The board will have looked at Liverpool since their first Yank owners and the utter shambles of Man Utd since Ferguson retired. Too much risk.
When Wenger leaves there will definitely be a dip. It always happens when a long term manager leaves. They will worry that they may spend years without CL income. Sadly like Liverpool and Man Utd, it’s all about profits, not about being a successful football club.
I don’t know if the board can afford to keep Wenger on.
The players don’t seem to be responding to him and a squad like Arsenal’s, although should probably lose to Bayern, shouldn’t be taking a 5-1 hammering and being made to look like amateurs. If Koscielny is injured for a long period of time there’s a very real chance that Arsenal could drop out of the CL places as none of the other CB’s bring his composure and command to the back line.
The team is woefully lacking leaders, as Roy Keane said, ‘if you see Gibbs wearing the (captain’s armband), you’re in trouble.’ There’s no bite or aggressiveness, Wenger seems to have gone for style over substance and it’s costing him now.
Despite Wenger WANTING to stay on, he has to be wondering if he SHOULD stay on.
Job done for Mourinho?
The first half was sloppy mainly because of Fellaini, Herrera and Pogba not working well together. It all changed in 2nd half with a bit more pace added. I think the 2 players in our team that are difficult to replace are Pogba and Miki. We have decent replacements for the rest but not for these 2. Hopefully jose looks after them and other players step up. Looks like Martial is finding his form so we can give Zlatan and Pogba rest until the cup final.
Look we need to seriously get real gents, the time of playing pretty on the eye football and absolutely bashing teams is well and truly over. Results are all that matter at this stage even more so considering were where we find ourselves. Europa ties are 2 legged and I would take an ugly 3-0 win over an impressive 1-0 win in this competition any day. We’ve all seen the huge difference in this team from the dog sh**e of the last 4 years so lets just rally behind the lads and I couldn’t care less that Ibra was shocking, fact is his treble have us in the driving seat. We all can see and know that we need reinforcements but bloody hell some on here repeating that each game as if we can get people in right now is a tad hilarious really…
Diego causing dilemma
I fully accept that over the years we have seen the good and the bad side of Costa. When he is good he is one of the best strikers in the UK (not sure where he would fit in in Europe..?) but when he is off form then the difference is clear to see
I have said before that I am prepared to give Costa the benefit of the doubt as it seems, in hindsight, that his issues all revolved around Jose. He returned to pre season overweight, he wanted to fight players rather than play and he threw his shirt at Jose. Now under Conte, we see a completely different player
Assuming that Conte is going to stay then I have no issues with a new contract for Costa regardless of the money as we as a Club stick to the FFP rules and therefore know exactly what we are doing and how that may affect other players as well
I also agree that to date, Michy has not given any indication that he is a capable deputy for Costa and I could not imagine a run in the EPL where Michy was playing yielding many goals and certainly not in the CL. That being said, I have not seen enough of him to be able to fully validate that statement but assume that as Conte does not play him as often as he could (false no. 9 twice), he also has concerns
One way or another we require a decent back up so that is something that Conte and the board will need to address before the start of next season. If it could be Michy that would be great as it would save the Club a great deal of money in the transfer market.
I’m not convinced a 5 year contract for Costa is a great idea but he is in his prime and one of the best strikers in world football. The Chinese would have happily paid £80m for him and Atletico and others would have signed him for circa £40m in the summer in 3 or 4 years time when he’s 31 or 32 you won’t get a big fee for him and getting someone to match his wages might be a problem but maybe going back to Spain then might be attractive to him even at less money or indeed there might be an opportunity of another move to China who knows.
What we do know is that if we let Costa go in the summer to replace him it would cost us circa £80m for Lukaku and he would probably want around £200k a week too.
Strengthening Liverpool
Centre-back is an area Liverpool could do with strengthening, but even more so in my opinion we need a striker.
It’s likely Sturridge will be on the way out, I don’t think Origi will become a leading player for us and Ings is arguably in the same boat. That leaves us only with Firmino who isn’t the cocky powerful sort of striker you usually associate with title winning teams.
Who would I recommend? I won’t list any obviously unrealistic options, so Dries Mertens, Aubameyang, Lacazette, Andrea Belotti. Those are all guys who I think would fit our style of play, and provide a major goal threat, far more potent than what we have right now.
the big money centre backs we brought have not been great for whatever reason. But a solid base would give us the best chance of winning the league. Take Leicester`s example last year Kante was key to their defensive solidness he made Morgan & Huth look good!
If we could get anyone it would be Kante (he’s a very nice lad outside of football very down to earth)
Realistically a centre back with some pace to compliment Matip i cant think of who but would prefer someone with prem experience yes Van Djyk looks like the obvious option but i don’t think we will match the price tag