Colonel Bumcunt

Yep, pure shite. But wait, Klopps solution is to put the equally redundant Elliott on. Again. For the 50th time, as if one day he turns into Pedri.

I'm actually not arsed now, quite looking forward to being shit actually, taking joy from small moments game to game rather than having an unrealistic trophy expectation to find joy. It's not even joy at that point, it's relief. I'm looking forward to some big changes in players, I'm so devoid of excitement looking at our squad. It's criminal really. Gravenberch, Gakpo, Szoboszlai, Endo, Nunez, Jota, Elliott, Jones, Salah, Tsimikas, I'm falling asleep just thinking about them. It doesn't .after who comes in, they've been lobbed a hand grenade. Maybe Slot is a controlled explosion, a cheap and expendable fall-guy to oversee a year of churn. This summer he loses experienced dressing figures in Thiago, Matip and Adrian. We possibly sell Salah. Next summer we lose Van Dijk and Trent on frees. We're also down to the final year for Robbie and Konate, we may sell. By all means, paint me a brighter picture.

It's Arsenal, of course he's fucking injured. Of course he is.

If we had a player like Odegaard we'd win everything. I'm betting that City go big for him.

If Arsenal had signed Artur Melo and Aquilani they'd have both played 40 games this season.

Unreal luck for Arsenal this season. Hard to take them seriously if they don't win the league, they'll never ever be given such a set of fortuitous circumstances to win a title again.

P 278 W 109 D 78 L 83 40% win Shite from Gerrard. Hold on, sorry that's Klopp at Mainz.

Fuuuuck that nonsense. He's a Liverpool legend, the Villa fans were singing songs about him slipping on his arse 5 years earlier, there was never a chance of it working for him at any other PL club. It's like us appointing John Terry as manager.

I'm starting to think big decisions are being affected by the TV series. Eg, if there was no TV series being made then I don't think Klopp announces his retirement early. They couldn't make a series and then the end credits say 'Klopp announced his retirement the following month'. Juggling potential names for new manager seems to be part of the plotline. Mourinho in the stands is a classic twist.

I'm 100% in. I suggest people take it a bit more seriously.

Alonso is the type of mate who you love being around but one day you stumble into the bogs at a festival and he's fingering your missus. I've got no real affinity for the bloke, this I didn't want him as manager. I'm still on the Gerrard train. This isn't a paper exercise, and at the same age Klopp wasn't a great manager, he was making mistakes and learning. Some of you wouldn't have looked twice at Klopp back when we appointed Rodgers. I mean, look at Kenny, considering where we were in our status what the fuck were we doing appointing a player manager? All I know is that Gerrard would slam a door on his cock to win things with us, and that's good enough for me.

I use that Real Madrid performance this week as the benchmark to compare us against. The ability to defend and not make dumb mistakes is key. The ability of the forwards to receive the ball at pace and under pressure and yet still beat 1 or 2 men and get on the counter is amazing. The pure energy, skill and power in midfield to adapt to any opposition and beat them in a number of different ways is essential. Across the board, we're failing in all 3 areas. So is it a coaching deficit we have, or a player deficit? In attack, it's a player deficit. The closest we have to a Vinicius Jr or Rodrygo is probably Diaz, but he's a mile off them. We don't have enough pace in wide areas and they lose too many battles. When they get near the opposition area they aren't creative thinkers, and they lack the pace to hit the byline or sell a dummy. They all want to score the same goal, from the edge of the area, and they usually don't even get that shot off. I'd gladly sell every forward bar Nunez, who I think still has the pace and power and confidence to be part of an elite team. The rest can go, for various reasons, especially the injury prone. In midfield it's also a player deficit. You look at physical specimens like Camavinga, Tchouameni, Bellingham, Valverde, and it's like they're from another planet. All at least 6 foot tall, and all are quick, strong, and have stamina. Obviously it helps that they score goals as well. Modric and Kroos are different types of player but we know their level, it's elite. Of all our midfielders, only MacAllister would get a contract at Madrid. Defenders. I think it's a problem causes by the failures in midfield and attack primarily, but also a coaching and tactical failing. We have great individual defenders, more than capable of stepping in at a team like Madrid.

We've basically retired Thiago now, I mean, it's not as if he had his knee hanging off, it was a muscle injury wasn't it? And what about Doak and Gordon and Bajcetic? Insane lay-offs, still ongoing. Saw Kyle Walker limp off a couple of weeks ago, he's back playing. KDB back for City and looking fitter than ever. Could be that Klopp has had one hand tied behind his back due to fucking incompetence from medical staff, in which case I'd revise my thinking about the state of the squad.

The first thing I want to know is have we been let down by our fitness/rehab team. I heard Edwards sacked them, is this true?

Looking forward to a new manager at this point. Team seems in mourning.

Not scoring from open play is becoming really fucking tedious. Should have sold Salah last summer, depreciation is always rapid. Nunez might have scored 3 in this half.

City are still massively reliant on KDB doing amazing things. That's our next step, having a midfielder like that. The best thing our new manager can do is give Trent a go in that role. If it doesn't work, fine, at least we tried it.

I have Trent in my team but I think it's clear he needs reinvigorating under a new manager, with a new purpose. If he wants to stay. If he doesn't then I have no issue with us selling. It'd be a shame, but his unhappiness would be on Klopp, and it is what it is. Otherwise, we take the money, £60m+, and we be smart.

Nothing wrong with that. It's patently absurd to think we're only looking at a very thin slice of managerial candidates for a role that is perhaps 90% about psychology. Edwards is now my idol. I don't think we'll miss Klopp from a footballing perspective, and I think that's been the case since he had whatever health scare he had that he has never been honest about.

Enough with the excuses already. Enough. We had a crucial run in and a couple of our players didn't eat or drink in the run up to a game. Fucking nonsense. You are welcome to do it lads, but there's no way you should be getting near an evening game at this level without drinking water.

That being the case, and I share your pessimism, I propose we simply buy the nastiest players on Earth and kick the fucking shit out of them twice a season.

City aren't THAT good, but they're consistently good, interspersed with occasional games of brilliance from KDB and Foden. Chances are KDB may wane a bit next season, but I wouldn't be surprised to see Doku kick on, and probably Bobb. We thought Szobo was going to bring some of that to our team but it's not worked. We're really short of inspiration in attack, we really need match winners, even if they're rough diamonds.

We're fucking shit. We're not winning the league and we we're lucky to be this far ahead of 4th.

Yeah the inverted fullback thing has come with far more problems than solutions. For all the world, I don't see why we don't used 352 or a variant thereof. Trent is the world's most fucking obvious defensive right midfielder, and Robertson the left sided equivalent, and TBF Tsimikas is much more suited to that. If we left 3 CBs at the back when we attacked then we'd have no problems. Perhaps the problem lies in the injuries, we can't play 3 cb's if we only ever have 3 or 4 fit cb's. Ditto 3 in midfield needs a pool of 6 or 7 to rotate in and out.