Ah Lanzo, these things were predictable from the beginning of the season, most notably: paper thin midfield only one player of genuine quality brought in to replace those going out, no real defensive cover in case of injuries, not a lot of quality beyond the first 11, tough opening set of matches etc.
Now we are here, what is the board going to do about it in the window?

I think there was genuine hope Gallagher would become available. That clearly didn't come to pass and now the best thing to happen would probably be that he becomes a Chelsea regular to put the matter to bed and we can fully move onto other targets.

It's going to be strange next window with the WC before it and then one game before it officially opens again. Hopefully Dougie will have a couple of things lined up. The AWB rumours will obviously continue if he fails to feature for United.

I think some of the reason that the paper thin midfield was left was because we tried to leave a space open in case CG came back & the lack of availability of another affordable Decoure type player with similar strengths & engine.

I know some people are critical of the last window ( & maybe I am just older & more tolerant) but I still think we did OK & will build on the gaps if not in January definitely in the summer.

Utter s*** show of a window has left us paper think and trying square pegs, doucoure the only signing that starts, lack of Gallagher replacement has us dropping 20 yards deeper. Vieira making subs for the sake of it, next batch of fixtures really are make or break for big pat and our season.

Not convinced Zaha, Eze, Olise can all start. Let's put it another way: one great player and two good ones. Have we ever won when all three started a match (Willo, where are you)?
We need a bit more grit? too many 'flair' players?

No need to unnecessarily wet pants.

Of our seven games we've already played 4 of the 'big 6' which are games we expect to lose. In addition, we've played Newcastle away which is a tough fixture. Of our two realistically winnable games (Villa & Brentford at home), we've taken 4 points, which is a good return.

for me, the only real disappointment so far was PV's negative tactics when try to see out the win against Brentford.

From what I've seen so far, which is pretty much all of it, we look a solid team with exciting young attacking players. With all their riches, we matched Chelsea yesterday and it took a late wonder goal to beat us.

We can only really judge how good we are at the halfway point of the season when everyone has played each other. I'm extremely confident we'll be between 10th-13th by that point.

The next 7 league fixtures on paper look far easier than the previous 7. If we're near the bottom then, perhaps its time to start getting a bit edgy.