nyblue23

I don't think so. Look at Tottenham's purchase of Janssen. Do you think he was told he'd have an equal chance of starting as Harry Kane? Or that he legitimately thought he had a chance of usurping his starting role? No. He comes in, knows he'll be played as a sub, hopes he performs and gets a chance to play alongside him or gets a good run of matches if Kane misses out due to injury. And that from a highly coveted striker. Players understand when they come in to a big club that they'll have to fight hard to earn a starting role unless told otherwise. Some are content with that because of age (young or old), ability, return from injury or a bad spell at another club. It's basic logic. A squad must be bigger than 11 players; therefore, not everyone will start. Players understand that, too.

I agree with that completely. But 15 or 16 egos are easier to satisfy than 30. Those extra 4 or 5 players are players who still start regularly in a squad with European competition.

No team in the Prem is stocked with starters on their bench. Even Barcelona, Bayern, Real Madrid and Napoli have guys who fill roles. We're talking about professional footballer egos here. And the two guys you mention concede my point. They're not happy to sit on the bench, therefore don't play well and don't fulfill their roles when they come on as subs. Team chemistry matters. People fulfill the roles that they've been assigned. You can't buy a bunch of top players, tell them they're all going to start, sit half of them and still win games. That is decisively not how it works.

Ok so we'll have either 11 players, then, or a bunch of players who aren't happy here because they know they should be starting somewhere else. That's not how it works.

Those penalty takers weren't great, but they all at least hit with power. Rui Patricio was godlike for a minute. I know he's been at Sporting almost his entire career, but I wouldn't be surprised if that performance gets him a move.

Sorry to interrupt all the serious talk, but thought this was pretty funny: http://www.101greatgoals.com/101ggvideos/cristiano-ronaldo-wishes-leo-messi-happy-30th-whatsapp-spoof-video/

https://royalbluemersey.sbnation.com/2017/6/28/15888348/malaga-holding-up-sandro-move-to-everton-transfer-news-la-liga This is the first thing I've read that makes sense re:this transfer.

http://www.101greatgoals.com/news/romelu-lukaku-learns-from-his-chelsea-mistake-trolls-everton-fans/ Alright I'm officially done with this dude.

Looks like the fuss will continue through Friday at least.

Do think we can do better with the kinds of players we've been after so far.

ESPN and BBC reporting it seems a goer to me.

Not different than Fox News, which I also find far more disturbing than comedic. I definitely have some nihilistic tendencies, but damn Mark, you really do want to watch the world burn.

It might be comedic if it wasn't so idiotic and dangerous, i.e. shit like this: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/12/opinion/livin-bernie-sanderss-danish-dream.html Utter piece of shit that Brooks. Hope we swerve that one just because I don't think I could tolerate cheering for someone with the same name.

Think Kenny's good enough. Just needs another year or two.

Sure but only if we feel like selling.

Meh. So was Michael Jordan. Sometimes it just correlates with an obsession with winning.

That'd make no sense at all. Don't need more players who don't want to be here.

http://www.hitc.com/en-gb/2017/06/22/everton-move-makes-sense-for-premier-league-linked-norwich-city/ This author doesn't seem to realize that there are two of them. But apparently we're re-interested in Jacob or Josh Murphy.

This gives me infinitely more hope than the Echo.

http://readbundesliga.com/2017/06/21/dortmund-interested-sandro-ramirez/ And here we go...

About 1/3 of these comments have anything to do with Markelo. I for one am just happy he sounds like a long lost ninja turtle.

I wondered about this too. Deulofeu hasn't exactly been quiet about how happy he is away from us.

Ableist.

It was on ESPN3... watched a good portion of it on the watchespn app. He looked solid if uninspiring. Crosses were finding other teammates well but not him as much. Still had some good possession, pressed well and made some lively runs.

It's almost like I'm fulfilling my dreams of running a professional sports team.