feltmonkey

Harvey Barnes is the jewel in that Leicester squad if you ask me. Much more so than Maddison or Tielemans who both have flaws that undermine their usefulness to the team - Maddison's frequent inability to release the ball quickly, and Tielemans' work-rate. Barnes does the simple things very well, and is effective in a way that doesn't necessarily catch the eye. Put him in a top team (not Spurs or Chelsea though) and he would fit in very nicely and probably score a bunch of goals.

I think Mount would be good for us. He plays about four positions/roles and he's an excellent, intelligent presser. He does a lot of useful stuff that often goes unnoticed on the TV. He's thought of as an attacking midfielder, but he's excellent defensively. Defensive midfielders these days don't just sit in front of the defence and make tackles and interceptions. I think he'd play in Eriksen's position rather than Bruno's. If we swapped Bruno out for him the change in styles would be jarring for the team. I think this is why we look so bad when Bruno doesn't play, and why Van De Beek has flopped. The team are used to Bruno's style, but he's such a unique player nobody does things the same way as him. I'm getting a bit worried that we're going to fuck up the transfer window. Striker should be the priority position, but that's the one that looks the shakiest. I genuinely think that Kane is impossible. Spurs would rather run his contract down, get another year out of him, and let him leave on a free next year than strengthen a rival. I think they're right, frankly. The £100m they might get for him wouldn't buy a replacement for him anyway. Omishen's price is too high for us (£150m!!!) and Napoli are notoriously difficult to negotiate with. Plus we're going to piss them off by activating the release clause on Kim Min-Jae. The other options are distinctly underwhelming. I'm not convinced by Vlahovic. Ramos is pretty raw and a huge gamble considering they want £100m for him. I think our striker signing is likely to be Marcus Thuram, who I don't really think is an upgrade on Martial. He's 25 and he's only had one season in his career where he's scored more than 15 goals, playing in leagues that are significantly weaker than the Premier League. I can see us getting embroiled in another fruitless transfer saga over Kane. Spurs will see the benefit to them in stringing us along all summer, pretending they're ready to do business, and leaving us no time to go for anyone else.

I'm chuckling to myself about it, but I was trying to maintain a dignified silence in the thread. Edit - I didn't see that it was 4-4 now! That's a proper last weekend of the season game.

Everton are the turd that will not flush. They've floated back up to 17th again.

Sancho is hitting a bit of form just in time to win the FA Cup against his old club.

Talk about a dream crossover... https://youtu.be/akVqZ6FSOv0

He might as well have posted a cartoon of himself holding hands with Paddington.

It's crazy how Chelsea have signed so many players for so much money and yet the only one who looks like a top Premier League player is the one they got on loan with no option to buy.

That was great. We battered them in the second half. Could have easily had more goals.

What is the cameraman doing during this interview with Bruno?

Leicester got £160m for Maguire and Fofana.

Great feet from Rashy. This is why you don't pick a super-young team. When heads collectively drop, things can get really ugly.

That was a bit of a collectors item! Only our third penalty of the season.

Martial has been pretty bad. He looks like his confidence is in the dirt, and he doesn't fully trust his body. Sancho has looked like he's trying to get involved, although that was pretty much the first time he got it right in the final third, I agree. I don't have huge expectations of him at the moment, and I'm pleased to see him trying to get on the ball.

Great goal. The Casemiro no-look pass was absolutely filthy. Brilliant from Sancho to keep cool and play that perfect pass too. He's played pretty well.

That looked awful. Heartbreaking for Antony.

Casemiro!

Our biannual 1-1 draw with Chelsea would do nicely tonight.

That's a very young Chelsea team. Were either going to beat them with experience, or they might run us off the park.

Jamie Redknapp just described Spurs as a social experiment in how far you can push your fans.

I think one reason why this perspective is so common (and not necessarily wrong) is that Southgate has the habit of calling players up to the squad, and looking at them in training a few times rather than playing them in matches. We see someone like Toney get called up and not playing, and we think "what was the point of that?" From Southgate's perspective he is judging them against the other squad members in training, and getting to know them as players and people a bit more. I think he tends to ease players into the squad rather than throwing players straight into the first team, which brings a level of scrutiny and expectation they wouldn't be used to. He lets them start to feel like they belong there before starting to fit them into the team itself. I don't know if this is what he's doing, what it would be based on, and whether it is a good idea. But I'm here to waffle on with baseless speculation and there's nothing you can do to stop me. I'm not sure who has been egregiously ignored for this squad. Darling of the Southgate sceptics, Lewis Dunk, is in there. So is Eze. Tomori isn't, but to be honest he's not been playing well for Milan this season. He's been making a lot of mistakes.

The cold hard fact here is that since Newcastle were taken over, they are second in the Premier League spending table, behind only Chelsea. Chelsea have spent a comical £483m, Newcastle £255m, then it's Man Utd on £199m. The money Man Utd have spent in the last 18 months feels like a massive splurge and they're nearly £60m ahead of that, so I have no idea where this idea that they've done it without spending, and it's all down to Eddie Howe's training methods comes from. Eddie Howe is a factor, definitely. He's a good manager, has improved many players (notably Loelinton and Almiron) and has given them a way of playing that is a bit more effective than Bruce's tactic of giving it to Saint-Maximin and see if he can do anything. However, the money is the thing that kept them up last season. Guimeres and Trippier transformed their season, and I don't buy the idea that Trippier was coming anyway. He was sold the "project" that the Saudi money represented. They then loaned Chris Wood out in order for him to damage a rival at the top of the table by scoring a dramatic late equaliser for Forest against Man City. They really are playing 4D chess.

Have you guys seen what happened in the Valencia Vs Real Madrid match? Vinicious Jr was racially abused by large sections of the Valencia fans. He was visibly upset, and confronted some of the fans. He was then later sent off. He and Carlo Ancelotti spoke out about the abuse after the game. Now the chairman of Valencia and some sections of the Spanish media are attacking Vini Jr and Ancelotti. Vinicious Jr is being blamed for the racist abuse he received.

The women's team have beaten Man City 2-1 to keep the possibility of a title won alive. They scored in the second minute, were pegged back by City despite them having a player sent off, and then scored an injury time winner, proving that doing things in the hardest, most dramatic fashion is just part of the club's DNA, and not confined to the men's team. The WSL is nuts this year. United have dropped just ten points all season, but look likely to finish second, as Chelsea have only dropped eight.

Jeff Stelling is a national treasure. He used his second to last show to speak out about the poor level of care given to people who suffer from eating disorders.