Kay Murray

I think Valverde stays on the right, although potentially quite narrow, potentially quite close to those players with the freedom then to either get behind the forwards or get wide.

I think we'll see him.

I think he wants, if he possibly can, to start Militao in midweek.

I was surprised tonight, Kay, if we're looking at clues from tonight, how little we saw of Mendy.

Mendy came on, I think, on 72 or 78 minutes, with kind of 10 or 20 minutes to go.

I thought that if he was going to play midweek, that Arbeloa would have wanted him on the pitch for a little bit longer than that, and it wasn't to be.

So I think tonight's conclusion is, probably in midweek, Bellingham and Kamavinga in the middle, Valverde alongside them, and one other midfielder, which I guess might well be Thiago Pitarch, although it could be Ardegula.

I think Cucurella has a point.

the ownership group with clear lake or blue coal whoever it is they've kind of um they have their approach and they've kind of set their stall out kukurela talks about it young players coming in um so from a business perspective maybe they can't be as criticized as as you would from a footballing perspective signing young players with a knife for the future and the salon putting them on relatively low wages but long contracts i guess from a business perspective makes sense

From a footballing perspective, it does not.

Footballers want to win things, no.

Fans want to see their club win things, no.

You can sell them a project a year or two in advance, you cannot sell fans seven or eight years time, we'll be all right.

And that's the balancing act, and that's...

The big clubs get that just right.

This new ownership group, again, has not.

Maybe following in the footsteps of Abramovich and how he did things and how quickly things changed.

But they certainly have not found that balance.

So I fully understand the frustration of Cucurella.

And as I say, I think it's a frustration felt that far wider than just the dressing room.