CL Atletico at home Wednesday 17th Sept 8pm

[SB]

I’ll be interested to see if Slot is a man of his word & we see a bit of rotation for this one. He said in PS it was his one mistake last season not rotating enough & overplaying certain players. Based on that & form Mo on the bench with Cody ( & Ekitike possibly ) . Bradley & Leoni to start also

[Exiled_red]

Leoni hasn't played a minute for us yet, no way he starts this one. Maybe change the full backs, start Robbo and Bradley, not sure about MacAllister's injury but I would imagine he doesn't start and Szoboszlai or Jones start in midfield, other than that I think it's the same team.

I think rotation will come later, forward line won't change Isak isn't fit to start and Chiesa and Rio I still don't think are viewed as starting options that means we stick

[Doc_Piptorious]

I’ll be interested to see if Slot is a man of his word & we see a bit of rotation for this one. He said in PS it was his one mistake last season not rotating enough & overplaying certain players. Based on that & form Mo on the bench with Cody ( & Ekitike possibly ) . Bradley & Leoni to start also

Think we may rotate (Jones getting injured is a blow on that front) but at the same time we really cannot risk to go too weak with who we rotate in imo.

Atletico may have had a poor start to their season, but they still have a lot of quality in their squad and will be coming to us off the back of their first win of the season.

Do think they are vunerable if we can go at them with a high tempo from the start but conversely think that if we go with sluggish play, as we have been prone to this season to date, that we could allow them to drag us into a war of attrition.

[peterbread]

If Mo was rested I would like to see Bradley at RB with Frimpong ahead of him and see how they go together.

Was Jones out for just today, I’m sure it was one game and he should be fine for the midweek game.

He said Isak will be involved and can play 45 minutes.

[Irishnev]

The game bs Burnley was good prep for this - Simeone will have them working like demons in a low block. They’ll have far more threat on the counter though, I don’t like playing these cheating ****houses though!

[BigChief]

The game bs Burnley was good prep for this - Simeone will have them working like demons in a low block. They’ll have far more threat on the counter though, I don’t like playing these cheating ****houses though!

I can't see us resting any key players for this other than Konate.

[Exiled_red]

The game bs Burnley was good prep for this - Simeone will have them working like demons in a low block. They’ll have far more threat on the counter though, I don’t like playing these cheating ****houses though!

[SB]

Mama
Bradley Leoni Virg Robbo
Szobo Gravenberch Jones
Frimpong Ekitike Rio

[Scratch]

If we were going all change, then I'd swap Gomez for Leoni maybe, and then if it's going well switch VVD out at half time.

TBH, can't see big changes tho, this is the first game of the league, against a trickier opponent, so we will go strong with a few small tweaks.

Ali
Frimpong Gomez VVD Kerkez
Szobo Grav Wirtz
Salah Ekitike Gakpo

Think Isak may get 45 minutes in this, but then will miss out again at the weekend, if I understood what Slot was saying prior to the match. The rest will be rotational changes based on fitness (ie Frimpong getting 45 mins only as he builds back up to fitness).

Mama will get the FA and League Cups, along with Robbo. Rio and Gio will probably get full games then as well.

[Angryred]

Yeah, Slot is likely to go strong against awkward opponents at home.

[memzey]

Why are we thinking that Atleti at home in the CL is an opportunity to rotate? This will be a very difficult game.

[Exiled_red]

If we were going all change, then I'd swap Gomez for Leoni maybe, and then if it's going well switch VVD out at half time.

TBH, can't see big changes tho, this is the first game of the league, against a trickier opponent, so we will go strong with a few small tweaks.

Ali
Frimpong Gomez VVD Kerkez
Szobo Grav Wirtz
Salah Ekitike Gakpo

Think Isak may get 45 minutes in this, but then will miss out again at the weekend, if I understood what Slot was saying prior to the match. The rest will be rotational changes based on fitness (ie Frimpong getting 45 mins only as he builds back up to fitness).

Mama will get the FA and League Cups, along with Robbo. Rio and Gio will probably get full games then as well.

I don't see Isak playing 45mins, he hasn't had a pre-season as such as he was training in isolation and he hasn't been able to spend much time with his teammates since joining us. I think the fact that he wasn't even on the bench at Burnley suggests we feel he is some way off match fitness. Maybe he'll be on the bench and get 20 mins but I would be surprised if he got much more than that.

I think Bradley is ahead of Frimpong in his fitness/recovery so would expect him to start, but if we want to manage his minutes maybe he only plays 45-60 and Frimpong gets 30-45mins.

It will be interesting to see what happens at LB, my thinking was when we had 2 games a week we might swap between Kerkez and Robertson, so had Kerkez played 70+mins at the weekend, I would have expected Robertson to start this one. but given Kerkez came off after ~37mins and Robbo played the rest that one is a little more unclear.

We won't rotate too much as it is the first game and we will want to make a good start, I think it is also a game for cool / experienced heads as I expect alot of ****housery from them so I would expect this to factor in to the selection which from me would see Robbo in ahead of Kerkez

[BigChief]

Why are we thinking that Atleti at home in the CL is an opportunity to rotate? This will be a very difficult game.

Agreed, but the reasoning could be you can squeak through the qualification stage by a bum hair and still win the CL trophy. Like PSG.

Or you can top qualification and face fecking PSG. So why try hard now, might as well rotate now and then win some easier games later.

[Doc_Piptorious]

Agreed, but the reasoning could be you can squeak through the qualification stage by a bum hair and still win the CL trophy. Like PSG.

Or you can top qualification and face fecking PSG. So why try hard now, might as well rotate now and then win some easier games later.

Get points on the board early so you have the option of heavy rotation when the supposed easier games roll around.

That way we get to rotate when the domestic cup games are kicking in on top of the PL games.

[memzey]

I think if we start dicking around with our team for CL games it will come back to bight us on the arse. A change here or there to protect a player or develop his condition, yes, but anything more than that is asking for trouble IMHO.