My article for @BBCSport on the rise of inverted full-backs. With the help of a special guest: Philipp Lahm. It was an honour to tap into the mind of the greatest full-back I’ve seen play the sport 🐐 Read here 👉 https://t.co/FetOZcpOP2

Nuno Mendes is now even creating from static situations and not because of his dynamism

Elite creator Gundo profile Player with 7/10 defensive nous + 7/10 build-up Even NOR looks more like a small space technician who can crash the box. You’re missing a power athlete who can do one of these jobs at the same time after missing out on Jude & Rice & KDB leaving.

Winning the ball in isolation is overrated. Man Utd signing Ugarte because of ball-winning syndrome. Midfielder defensive ability should be broken down into: 1. Spatial recognition within your defensive shape - when to leave your man and press in high pressing, tracking runs in

If you look at football history I think midfield is the most important area for complementary dynamics. I think you can get away with attack & defence dynamics being slightly off, but in midfield you need everything covered in terms of defensive nous, physicality, press

The main reason for Man City’s league dominance was their midfield recruitment. Silva, Fernandinho, Yaya, Gundogan, KDB, Bernardo, Rodri is the craziest run of midfield buys.

The crazy fact that many don’t know about Scholes is that he has a 14 non-penalty goal PL season when he was given the luxury of playing as an attacking midfielder in 2002/03. That’s actually a higher tally than any Lampard season. Scholes was a top goalscorer when used in that

Ruben Neves, top guy top player

Good to see Gerrard give Scholes’ quality a special mention, it’s beyond doubt that he should’ve been starting regularly in England’s midfield alongside him. For the same reason, any England XI without one of Anderson or Wharton starting is automatically void.

Ironically very similar to how Southgate shoehorned Foden into the starting XI at the Euros which made Jude and Kane perform worse. It’s great that Tuchel is now picking balanced XIs with Anderson as a progressive passer and using a proper LW instead of Foden.

2 best English midfielders producing the best England record. No surprise. People talk about systems & all of that but simply using a Scholes-Gerrard partnership was the lowest hanging fruit. But it was interrupted for a CM who did not contribute enough to all phases of the game.

My strongest take about the England golden gen is that they win at least one major tournament if this Gerrard-Scholes partnership had played the next 3 major tournaments together. Smacked Germany 5-1 in their own ground then Gerrard missed WC 2002 thru injury & Sven plays Lampard

Tuchel has got a really strong 3-2-5 going here. It was the same attacking structure vs Serbia and it’s flowing beautifully. Jude got a tailor-made role for him in this system too in the right half-space of the front 5.

Barca are running dry on squad resources. Flick-ball doesn’t provide rest with the ball or rest without the ball & I think that impacts the ability to keep players fit. That’s the edge Alonso has on them to keep guys fit despite Barca having a higher ceiling when everyone is fit.

Right yet again @rajsinghchohan

I’ll explain properly later but there is some misalignment between the coach’s style of play and the current profile of players available to him now Trent has gone. Very similar to what happened to Conte when Matić & Costa left the starting XI in the second season.

5 months later… Slot hooks Bradley and Konaté within 60 minutes of a match for two midfielders. That build-up combination is horrible.

@SlmonLFC Konaté Bradley is a buildup black hole, so bad. 3 of the back 4 can’t pass

A Champions League team who needs an attacking 8 have got to be moving for Kang-in Lee soon. His feet move so quick and he has a ping of a shot on him. Can slide passes in-behind defences too.