comment by Cinciwolf---so glad I wasn't careful what... (U11551)
posted 22 minutes ago
Loving how Liverpool are playing on the reserve team bit

Trying to make out they played a load of kids when in fact we both had 3 players under 23 years old.
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To be fair it's equally funny to read headlines like "Ruben Neves’ bullet strike from 25-yards was enough to seal Wolves’ place in the fourth round of the FA Cup at the expense of Premier League leaders Liverpool."
Liverpool may be Premier League leaders but they wouldn't be anywhere near there if they fielded that starting 11 every game.

Although Nuno made 4 changes to the side that lost to Palace, it should be noted that Will Norris was the only player in the squad last night that is not in the 18 man squad that plays in every league game.

Was at the game last night.

OK, first the Liverpool team. Yes there were a lot of changes from their first 11, 9 changes I believe. On the other hand the team they started with should easily hold their own in the premier league, and would probably finish mid table. The fact is they did not perform well enough, and that was largely down to the way we played.

Our performance was good but not great, the first half was quite dodgy at times. The point I would like to make, however, is that for the first time I'm beginning to realise we already have a pretty good squad, not just a dozen or so players. The best performance of the night was before KO when Nuno picked the starting 11. I had wanted at least 8 or 9 of the best available players and that is pretty much what Nuno picked - masterstroke in my opinion.

Ruddy was totally dependable without being spectacular, his distribution was different but maybe that was planned.

Bennett and Coady were both solid and I thought Boly was magnificent.

Jonny on the right was good enough to tell me we do have a backup if Doherty was to become unavailable. I thought Vinagre had a very good game, possibly his best for the club and will become even better with experience and coaching.

Moutinho was as good as ever and Neves, regardless of his great goal, had a good game after the first 20 minutes or so - not quite up to last season's standard but certainly getting there. Dendoncker was completely reliable and not only shows we have strength in depth in the midfield, along with MGW and Saiss, but also that we can set up in a slightly different way and still play entertaining and winning football.

I thought Jiminez was excellent last night and works tremendously hard and well on his way to double figures for the season, maybe about 15 or so which for someone playing the role he is asked to do is superb.

In the 50 minutes that Jota was on the field he showed that he had picked up from his return to form from before his injury.

Let's not play it down, we performed very well for most of the game and won on merit against a team that should, even allowing for their lesser experience, have done much better.

We will probably continue to have our Huddersfields, Cardiffs and Crystal Palaces, but overall we can be totally satisfied with the way things are going. A good transfer window, hopefully Abrahams, and we are in place for a top 10 finish which I would have snatched everyone's hands off for in August.

Bring on those other Mancs.

Gary Rowett sacked. Wonder who will be The Potters boss when we play them?

Jota and eally did look sharp last night

comment by Cinciwolf---so glad I wasn't careful what I wished for!! (U11551)
posted less than a minute ago
Jota and eally did look sharp last night
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Jota really did look sharp last night

Looking forward to seeing him at his best against City

comment by Cinciwolf---so glad I wasn't careful what I wished for!! (U11551)
posted about an hour ago
Jota and eally did look sharp last night
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Eally a new signing?

Not sure about Ruddy doing nothing spectacular wulfrun. His effort to fingertip Shakiri’s free kick on to the post was surely one of the saves of the season.

And I thought Dendoncker had a really good game. Covers a lot of ground, wins lots of tackles and uses the ball sensibly

Only disappointments last night were Cavaleiro and Costa again. Cavaleiro to me just isn’t quite good enough for this level. Costa I’m sure could be but he is having a number of ineffective performances

comment by Spangles (U17289)
posted about 2 hours ago
Only disappointments last night were Cavaleiro and Costa again. Cavaleiro to me just isn’t quite good enough for this level. Costa I’m sure could be but he is having a number of ineffective performances
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Cavaleiro literally gave the ball away once last night with that bizarre cross thing he did and held the ball up and relieved pressure very well.

I thought Cav was pretty ineffective if I’m honest.

I was disappointed with Cavaeiro when he came on, to be honest, as I thought he'd do something to excite the UK audience watching, as I think he is capable of doing (remembering his goal of a couple of weeks ago). I seem to remember that he did get the ball a few times, but wasn't able to make anything happen.

I can see Costa, Cavaleiro and Traore having to settle for sub appearances for most of the second half of the season and I would see Cav as the third choice from those three.

The midfield we started with last night looks our strongest team now with Dendoncker, Neves and Moutinho in the centre of a midfield 5. And I have been saying all season we need Jota to be playing closer to Jiminez and a 352 set up will bring out the best in both of them.

But then we have to see who else comes in during January and the Abraham deal is evidently still possible