Monday Jul 8:
Thiago is retiring. I’m kind of shocked, although I probably shouldn’t be. He missed virtually the whole of last season despite spending so much time rehabbing to try to get himself fit. Every time he got close, he broke down again. I don’t know if it was the same injury or a different one, but it doesn’t matter I guess. It must have been utterly demoralising for him. His body was breaking down, it just wasn’t up to the demands of professional footy anymore. He probably could have taken a big money deal in Saudi but big respect to him for deciding to bow out now.
It’s such a massive fucking shame as he’s one of the best players I’ve ever seen play for us. A brilliant technician who loved putting his foot in and working his nuts off too. Seems like a top fella as well and this has hit me quite hard. I’m surprised at how sad I feel about it actually as he wasn’t here that long and he missed more games than he played. What a player he was though when fit. An absolute joy to watch.
Meanwhile, Uruguay are in the semis of the Copa America after a penalty shoot out win over Brazil at the weekend. They’ll play Colombia, who romped through with a 5-0 win that saw Diaz get a goal. He’s still being linked with Barca who have somehow now apparently come into some money and can buy players again. I’ve said before that I don’t want him to go and I wouldn’t sell him, but it does kind of feel like there’s some fire to go with this smoke, especially with all the Anthony Gordon talk.
If we sold Diaz and brought in Gordon for a similar fee would that be an upgrade? Personally I don’t think so, but it wouldn’t be the end of the world either. We would be getting younger and it’s another homegrown player, which helps, and Gordon has developed into a really good player over the past 12 months. I just think we often under-rate some of our players and over-rate other team’s players. What on earth has Gordon done in his career to this point to be seen as being clearly better than Luis Diaz? Maybe I’m in the minority here, I don’t know. Don’t get me wrong, if it happens I’m ok with it, I’d just rather it didn’t.
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