Are you happy with our squad?

bubble07 said:

Almost very happy

Barkley Di Maria, Balde in and N'Koudou Sissoko, Janssen out would have been realistically ideal

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Di Maria.. At one point I was dreaming of this signing, thinking our free kicks and corners conversion rate perhaps will improve.. But think he is not suited in this league.

Balde can f off, personally for me... Glad the club walk off and move forward from him, I hope..

Our remit for this window was to maintain first XI quality and improve the quality of our back up players. I think we've pretty much nailed it. It was always going to be hard to get cover that was good enough that wouldn't rock the boat with our very settled starting XI. In that respect, Llorente is a brilliant signing. With Lamela and Rose back fit we will be in incredibly good shape and I think Barkley is nailed for Jan. Edwards and Oakley-Booth will be on the fringes as well and I hope they get a chance here and there. I'm not too bothered about the 'pace merchant' either to be honest. I've always maintained that the ball travels way faster than any player and knowing where your team mates should be and the ability to pick them out is what creates in-defendable speed.

The way I look at it am I happy with the whole squad? No.

Am I happy with the first 11 if they get no injuries? Yes.

Think we now have to rely on Winks have a great 6 months, or Tashan Oakley Booth making a step up when needed in some games to add something different. N'Koudou and Marcus Edwards also may need to come on leaps and bounds suddenly.

If you break the squad down

Goalkeepers
Vorm,Gazzinga,Lloris

Centre Backs
Alderweireld,Vertonghen,Foyth,Sanchez

Wing Backs
Aurier,Rose

Full backs
Trippier,Davies

Defensive Midfield/Water Carrier
Wanyama,Dier,Dembele

Strikers : Kane (Plan a the softly approach), Llorente (Plan B the battering ram). Janssen (The water boy).



Creative Attackers (midfielders) you would expect to change a game or make things happen
Eriksen,Alli,Son,(Winks at a push), Lamela if he's ever going to play again in our colours. (thats 5 in the first team squad) 1 of which is super quick.

Maybe if given time they may prove a force : N'koudou,Edwards,Oakley Booth,Sissoko 9 Potentially if we were counting unproven quantities

is that enough for a top team?

If we compare our creative force to most of our rivals?

Liverpool have Salah,Mane,Coutinho (if he stays),Firmino,Lallana,Wjandulum (6 first team players without including Woodburn & Markovic).4 of who are super quick.

United have Pogba,Mkhitaryan,Rashford,Lingaard,Martial,Herrera,Mata. (7 gamechangers or creative players) 3 of which are super quick.

City have Bernadro Silva,Silva,Sterling,Sane,De Bruyne,Gundogan,Yaya. (7 Creative Players) 2 of which are super quick.

Chelsea have Hazard,Willian,Pedro,Fabregas (4 creative players 5 if you add Musonda) 3 of which are super quick.

Arsenal have Walcott,Ozil,Sanchez,Iwobi,Ramsey,WIlshire? (6 at a push) 3 of which are super quick again.

As you can above each and every team has something that we do not have a minium almost of pacey creative sparks, although it would have been nice to have one more at least I guess it was not meant to be, so overall if you compare the squad with that of all our rivals ask yourself these questions?

Do we have the best defence? Yes.

Best Full Backs who play as wingers with pace? Yes.

Overall midfield? are we the best? probably not 3rd to only Man united and City I would say.

Best Strikers? I would argue Yes.

Do we have the best starting 11? hmm its a hard one but if we line up like this who has better? City or United maybe?

Lloris

Sanchez Toby Vertonghen

Aurier Rose
Wanyama Dembele

Eriksen Alli
Kane


Bench : Vorm,Dier,Davies,Son,Lamela,Winks,Llorente

(Sissoko and N'koudou are spare men along with Trippier & Janssen)

So overall am I happy I will go yes I am happy weve strengethed the squad in a crucial period for our club without doing anything silly to jeopardise the future of the club. We have also managed to keep Alli,Kane,Toby,Eriksen,Rose. We've lost walker but probably have arguably replaced him with a player with a much better experience of big matches and with a trophy cabinet already bigger than half of our squad.

We have also signed if not one of the best young centre halfs on the planet one of the most highly rated. We've also added that vital experienced plan b option in Llorente sometimes in life you dont get everything you want all of us on this forum wanted another creative number 10 or a pacey wide player but if they are not available what is the point of signing another N'jie or another Paulinho as a panic signing we may as well wait for the right player to come along.

You know what the most frustrating part is the one player that would probably be perfect in this 5-3-2 formation is Erik bloody Lamela and he really has not had a chance to ever feature in it once!

I personally always have one eye on the new stadium finance and realistic expectations, and think it fully explains our NET spend over the last 5 years being zero or potentially a small profit. As was the case again this year.

In:
Davinson Sánchez £42m
Serge Aurier £23m
Fernando Llorente £12m
Juan Foyth £8m
Paulo Gazzaniga £2m
-----------------------------
£87M

Out:
Kyle Walker £50m
Kevin Wimmer £18m
Nabil Bentaleb £16.8m
Clinton N’Jie £6.1m
Federico Fazio £2.8m
-----------------------------
£93M

This window I think we have strengthened overall. I think this example team below is incredibly powerful, probably the best defence in the league, and we have incredible strength in CM and lots of guile up top.


And, as opposed to last year, we really do have genuine strength in depth from the bench and a Plan B. If we're chasing a game we can always take off one of the CMs or CBs and play Llorente up top and Kane tucked in behind him. We have good options. Barkley would be the missing piece of that bench and complete the squad, and it does sound like Barkley is holding out for us in January.

And that's leaving the following out of the match day squad - Trippier, Davies, Foyth, Sissoko, Nkoudou, Jannsen, KWP, Edwards etc. I'd have happily given up a lot of them (Sissoko, Jannsen, Nkoudou) to have got one new pacey forward player to freshen up the attacking side of the team.

Keeping our crown jewel assets was a major success of this window, and it is now essential that Levy rewards them with improved contracts.

My only criticism is the fact we leave this until the very end of the window every year instead of getting business down early and getting them a solid month with Pochettino before the first game. I do understand that some deals need to be done late, but the pattern strongly suggests Levy does not care too much about us starting as strongly as possible which is disappointing, but forgivable when the bigger picture is taken into consideration.

Overall I am very happy with the squad and think that we can compete on all fronts despite a slow start. COYS!!!

I think had Barkley not gotten himself injured, he would have signed. Question for everyone...if we get a good bid for Sissoko or Janssen today do we sell?

We'll be able to challenge for top 4 this year with that squad, especially when Rose and Lamela return. Not sure we've got enough attacking guile for the title though.

However...

If we can keep this squad together, it sets us up nicely for next season in our brand new shiny stadium. Barkley will (hopefully) be an addition for free, or at least a low cost fee, which would leave us a whole summer to just sign a pacy forward and perhaps a CM.

In my mind this period of 4 or 5 seasons was always going to be transitory, while we were getting the stadium built. So to be challenging for the title and CL during this time is incredible.

I guess what I'm saying is that we have to put things into perspective and overall we're doing very well, in an ultra competitive league.

SpursDave88 said:

I think had Barkley not gotten himself injured, he would have signed. Question for everyone...if we get a good bid for Sissoko or Janssen today do we sell?

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I think we'd have to

It's not exactly going to leave us short, is it?

Really happy providing Rose gets back healthy in good time, really don't see pace THAT much of an issue providing we get Rose and Aurier on the pitch at the same time. Barkley can wait until January, absolutely pointless signing him now if he's crocked, let's just hope Eriksen doesn't pick up an injury or loses some serious form in the next few months either.

Apart from that I'm good.

hellava_tough said:

I think we'd have to

It's not exactly going to leave us short, is it?

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Sissoko can stay, Janssen is surplus for me, he's definitely not going to get any games now.

Not sure if this has been mentioned elsewhere, but I like the prospect of keeping Janssen whilst getting hold of Llorente. For starters, having three first team strikers is just common sense, but also the experience of Llorente can only benefit Janssen (and Kane); he's played at the highest level in arguably the three biggest leagues in Europe, and our current crop should be itching at the chance to learn from him. He's also very beautiful.

talkshowhost86 said:

It's a great squad but probably not good enough to compete for the title.

We just lack that depth in terms of attacking threat that the moneybags teams have and I think that has been clear in the first three games.

Barkley will help in January and I think a fit Lamela makes a big difference but I'm not sure we're ever going to see that.

So overall it's a fantastic squad. But if our ambitions are winning the title it's still a bit short.

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Is this actually true?

I haven't done a full on breakdown of the other teams so was interested. I've not included the players I think play predominantly in central midfield rather than attacking positions, and only included first team options. I'd say we stack up pretty favourably to be honest.

Spurs
Kane, Llorente, Janssen
Eriksen, Alli, Son, Lamela, Sissoko, N'Koudou

United
Lukaku, Ibrahimovic, Rashford
Mkhitaryan, Mata, Martial, Lingard

City
Aguero, Jesus
D. Silva, B. Silva, Sterling, De Bruyne, Sané

Chelsea
Morata, Batshuayi, Costa
Willian, Pedro, Hazard, Kenedy

Liverpool
Firmino, Sturridge, Solanke, Ings
Mané, Salah, Coutinho, Lallana

Arsenal
Lacazete, Giroud, Wellbeck
Sanchez, Ozil, Walcott, Iwobi

With Aurier replacing Walker the basic squad is the one that came second last year. So with the addition of another potentially world class defender and a proven PL goalscorer as back up we are even stronger then last season .
The only missing link is another pacy forward. We managed without one last season and who knows George if he ever gets fit might come good.
Added to that we will get Barkley in January for a song so all in all a very good window. Certainly better then Arsenals or the Chelsea and therefore a very strong squad that will challenge on all fronts.
COYS

nicdic said:

Is this actually true?

I haven't done a full on breakdown of the other teams so was interested. I've not included the players I think play predominantly in central midfield rather than attacking positions, and only included first team options. I'd say we stack up pretty favourably to be honest.

Spurs
Kane, Llorente, Janssen
Eriksen, Alli, Son, Lamela, Sissoko, N'Koudou

United
Lukaku, Ibrahimovic, Rashford
Mkhitaryan, Mata, Martial, Lingard

City
Aguero, Jesus
D. Silva, B. Silva, Sterling, De Bruyne, Sané

Chelsea
Morata, Batshuayi, Costa
Willian, Pedro, Hazard, Kenedy

Liverpool
Firmino, Sturridge, Solanke, Ings
Mané, Salah, Coutinho, Lallana

Arsenal
Lacazete, Giroud, Wellbeck
Sanchez, Ozil, Walcott, Iwobi

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I think United and City certainly have the edge and are far less reliant than we are on one player (Eriksen).

I'm also not including Lamela in our list at the moment as I think it remains to be seen what sort of role he'll be able to play this season.

We're certainly not far off though.

Llorente, Kane, Sanchez, Alderweireld, Wanyama, Dier - surely we have to get some joy from set pieces this season, with the land of the giants to aim at???

spids said:

I personally always have one eye on the new stadium finance and realistic expectations, and think it fully explains our NET spend over the last 5 years being zero or potentially a small profit. As was the case again this year.

In:
Davinson Sánchez £42m
Serge Aurier £23m
Fernando Llorente £12m
Juan Foyth £8m
Paulo Gazzaniga £2m
-----------------------------
£87M

Out:
Kyle Walker £50m
Kevin Wimmer £18m
Nabil Bentaleb £16.8m
Clinton N’Jie £6.1m
Federico Fazio £2.8m
-----------------------------
£93M

This window I think we have strengthened overall. I think this example team below is incredibly powerful, probably the best defence in the league, and we have incredible strength in CM and lots of guile up top.

Lloris
Sanchez Alderweireld Vertonghen
Aurier Wanyama Dembele Rose
Eriksen Delle
Kane

Subs: Vorm, Dier, Winks, Lamela, *AM*, Son (14 EPL goals last year), Llorente (15 EPL goals last year)​

And, as opposed to last year, we really do have genuine strength in depth from the bench and a Plan B. If we're chasing a game we can always take off one of the CMs or CBs and play Llorente up top and Kane tucked in behind him. We have good options. Barkley would be the missing piece of that bench and complete the squad, and it does sound like Barkley is holding out for us in January.

And that's leaving the following out of the match day squad - Trippier, Davies, Foyth, Sissoko, Nkoudou, Jannsen, KWP, Edwards etc. I'd have happily given up a lot of them (Sissoko, Jannsen, Nkoudou) to have got one new pacey forward player to freshen up the attacking side of the team.

Keeping our crown jewel assets was a major success of this window, and it is now essential that Levy rewards them with improved contracts.

My only criticism is the fact we leave this until the very end of the window every year instead of getting business down early and getting them a solid month with Pochettino before the first game. I do understand that some deals need to be done late, but the pattern strongly suggests Levy does not care too much about us starting as strongly as possible which is disappointing, but forgivable when the bigger picture is taken into consideration.

Overall I am very happy with the squad and think that we can compete on all fronts despite a slow start. COYS!!!

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Remember we also got money for siggy and Paulinho

Rogmeister said:

Remember we also got money for siggy and Paulinho

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good point ... anyone know how much?

EDIT - looks like Siggy was £4.5M

Happy with squad but I worry if we lose Eriksen to injury. Our signings in the window are good, but not brilliant. We needed to spend to stay still and maintain a top 4 challenge. We needed to spend big to challenge for the title and we didn't.

Very much so. And I hope Poch acts a little bit more swiftly and ruthlessly when a player - any player - is having an off day. There are no excuses now. We should be able to field a bench that offers quality options in all positions, which will hopefully keep everyone on their toes. You could argue we only have one real concern: that the love-in between manager and players leads to a little bit of complacency.

danielneeds said:

Llorente, Kane, Sanchez, Alderweireld, Wanyama, Dier - surely we have to get some joy from set pieces this season, with the land of the giants to aim at???

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If Eriksen can ever clear the first defender...