Will just be happy to see him play again. I still think he’ll sign a new deal, but it will be interesting to see how this midfield works out with both he and Bruno. It’s not the most natural pair I still think, both or one would have to surrender something. But the fact is, you wouldn’t actually want either to surrender anything!
He looks in good spirits and I just hope he’s given a fair chance to get going. It’s almost inevitable that there will be people watching with pen and paper to count every turnover of possession l, or every quiet spell (I went back through old performance threads and it was remarkable how often I saw things like ‘he was good for the first half hour, then rubbish for the next 15 minutes, better in the second’ etc in MOTM games of his. We get minute-by-minute breakdowns of form!). That said, I think the media will take it easier at the moment, for a number of reasons, and give him room to breathe.
For his part, he absolutely needs to deliver now, going forward, or I think consigning his time here to failure will become fairer than I think it has been. Football is very much a team game, and any player would look better in a good team - but that looks to be exactly what we are now. With his talent, he needs to come in and make us even better. Anything less, once he’s at least shaken off any rust, isn’t really good enough. He needs to find a role in the side that works with the rest of the side, because now the issue of having nobody else in midfield of similar quality to play with is gone, and touch wood, the issue of poor or static forwards ahead is gone too. Perhaps a slight question of the defensive midfielder, but as a team, we have been defensively solid, so even then, he needs to come in and help ha maintain that. As is well known, I have faith in him to do all of that, as I think he’s a far better player than he gets credit for - but he needs to do his bit now and fit into this exciting direction we are heading in. If that happens, I think we are real title challengers.