Paulo Dybala scores for Juventus in 1-1 draw vs. Inter

1. The content and outcome of the OM-PSG was totally expected. Pochettino was totally destroyed tactically. I don’t know many coaches on the earth who would sacrifice Messi for the rubbish player Neymar so that the Brazilian could play as 10 and Di Maria on the left. The guy doesn’t know how to use Messi, how to play his fullbacks, the pressing was not inline, when 1 player does the pressing, the players behind just moved back instead of helping. I have feeling that Pochettino plays his team like district teams, just send the ball to Messi and Mbappe and let them do the work. So basically his job was to put the most prestigious or the most expensive names together without any foundation or tactics. I mean even me I can do the job. I really think it’s impossible to do worse. Maybe Ole Solskjaer. How can a club spending hundreds of millions on players can choose that kind of coach.

   • Even though it takes time to get players accustomed to each other. Poch so far has failed to create the chemistry between the three. More importantly he hasn’t been able to manage the egos. Poch has been unable to impose his authority on Mbappe, as he doens’t seem to want to pass to Neymar, whatsoever. Both of their ego’s are clashing. Next season PSG will most likely lose Mbappe as Neymar is not going anywhere. In regards to Messi not getting adequate opportunity in front of goal, Mbappe is the main man in PSG and Leonardo wants to retain him . So everyone in the team have clearly been instructed to prioritize Mbappe over everyone else. Second reason is Poch and his management team’s incompetence. You have best creative player in the world and you confine him to one particular position. If you noticed yesterday’s match , the front three were swapping their positions . First it was Mbappe in the front and during the last stages of the match he moved to the flank and Messi to the centre. Messi is kind of player that needs to touch the ball every time his team attacks but PSG has restricted him so far.

     I clearly don’t think Poch will be able to field a balanced team with these three starting. You could see Neymar’s reaction when he was subbed. Poch and PSG don’t want to be the centre of the fans and media backlash by subbing Messi again and Mbappe needs to be kept happy inorder for him to sign a new deal. If they want to keep starting these three together then the only way out is playing double pivot which means they need to buy a world class defensive mids like Kante. Only with two proper defensive mids, PSG will be able make the best use of their MMN. Which also means other star players like Verrati , Dimaria, Icardi will have to share the playing time.

2. Notes on some of the Argentina seleccion players this weekend:
   1. Nico Tagliafico. He seems to be losing his spot permanently to Blind. Was on the bench again. Licha Martinez, though, continues to impress.

   2. Lucas Alario. He lost his starting spot in Leverkusen. Hope it is not permanent.

   3. Cuti Romero. Looks better and better, next week its him (dubbed as the Cristiano Ronaldo of defending by his agent) against CR7. I do think Cuti has what it takes to be a good DM. His passing, tackling, marking, aerial ability, composure, vision are all excellent. I am sure he can play multiple positions for us in the future.

   Positive comment on him from the football insider expert:

   “It is ridiculous how Romero was booked for that,” Wenham told Football Insider correspondent Ben Wild

   “I thought he was very, very good yesterday. I like his ultra-aggressive front foot style he has in his game.

   “To me, it just shows how confident he is in a Tottenham shirt. To have a go at one of their players in front of 60,00 West Ham fans, that’s passion.

   “He was our best player on the day. It was another performance that shows me he is becoming a star player for us already.

   “He will only continue to grow and he did reasonably well against Michail Antonio.

   “Most Premier League defenders won’t challenge him in the air, they will let him take it down and try and do him on the ground.

   “Romero was well up for it yesterday, he was happy to take him on. There were a couple of times he was bullied off the ball but which defender hasn’t lost out to Antonio?

   “We are seeing how good this player is and his performance was probably the one shining light from the game.

   “I still don’t understand why he was booked though

   So for the back up 9, Alario and Icardi stock are going down. Julian Alvarez and Dybala stock are up.

   • I respect Ndombele but don’t see why Lo Celso wasn’t in the starting 11. Ndobmele is a predictable player, his pass always on his team-mates feet and so the game, like yesterday one, was slow down a lot with him. I actually hate this kind of player who takes no risk in their pass but just want to have a good stat on the whoscored.com.

3. […] player went to the right of the goalkeeper and scored a goal to get Juventus drawn. According to OptaPaolo, Dybala is the first Juventus player to score in three consecutive Serie A matches against Inter […]

4. Good to see pretty girl Christina and his team go down……

   • If PSG lost narrowly or draw, everybody freakout and criticizes Messi. MU get thrashed by Liverpool with CR scoring zero, avoided to take penalty against Emi whe losing to Villa , no European journo criticizing cristina.

     • Unfortunately for Messi, his coach at club is as shit as Ole Solskjaer

     • It’s not surprising they got thrashed. Ronaldo unbalances them and they have no DM so they are easy to play through. They pretty much have 3-4 players who defend and can defend decently. Their pressing is unbalanced and their attack is one dimensional. CR does not make them significantly better and if they wanted to compete they’d have bought a good DM because that would improve them a lot more. Both Messi and CR’s clubs have problems. I don’t necessarily want to criticize poch too much because the team is not ideal for him or for almost any manager. For example Neymar getting mad at being subbed when he was playing horribly, and of course the squad he was given (not world class actual DM, unbalanced attack, etc etc). Maybe Paredes and Sergio Ramos will improve them when they come back but the attack has too many names in it.

       • When Messi was at Barca, he had no problem teaming up with whoever played at the time. From Etoo, Ronaldinho, Henry, Ibra, Villa, Pedro, Suarez, Neymar…even when Xavi’s gone, Messi had no problem connecting with his replacement Rakitic. So obviously Poch deserve the blame here, but this is Messi first season and he only played full minutes in the league maybe twice? I wont fully judge Poch yet, he still has time to sort it out but he doesnt seems like someone with enough experience to control starstudded team. Players like Neymar and Mbappe has super huge ego.

         Pep was a different case back then because he coached Barca youth team and Barca at their prime were built upon their youth system.

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