Kouyate crossed the ball for the goal against Villa, something Olise couldn’t do all game.
Benteke is the most successful Premier striker, we have ever had, one goal away from 100 Premier goals. Bad players don’t score that many goals in the Premier and you want to sell him.

Agree with a lot of this. The problem with playing LM and CK is that it makes it very easy for teams to defend against us. They can cede possession and let us have the ball 70% of the time knowing that we're not a threat because we have no one in the middle of the park except Gallagher who can unlock them and they can pretty much assign two men to worry about him because there's no other threat. Yes, I think it's high time we saw what Hughes has to offer but even more, I think it's time we saw what Olise has to offer in his preferred (and correct) position in central midfield. Whether starting or off the bench, I'd like to see both given chances in that role over the next few games.

You raised another point that I think is important about Olise but it applies more generally: "The boy is unstoppable on the counter when he has space to run into." I noticed both at Burnley and on Saturday, and it's a small detail, but our playing of the simple pass is, more often than not, absolutely f***ing horrible. Even though in both games we've had an enormous amount of possession (which far too often we've used to crab the ball sideways across the back four rather than forwards into attack), our crab-passing is way below standard. Far too often we play the ball either to someone's feet or, worse, slightly behind them so they're either forced to take the ball facing our own goal or to control it, turn and then having to look up to see who's available. It's a mystery to me why these simple passes can't be played into space ahead of the player so he can run onto the ball and is moving in the right direction when gets it. There's no point playing possession football if you don't know what to do with the ball. It's a small but important detail.

I don't have a conundrum about Benteke. As with Ayew, I think he gets an unreasonable amount of stick here. He's playing well (by his own recent standards), scoring goals, and seems to have his confidence back. The biggest problem I have him with at the moment is at the other end of the pitch; his defending of set-pieces is absolutely f***ing terrible. He doesn't seem to realise that marking doesn't involve just standing next to someone when the ball is played; you actually have to track them and defend the ball when it comes in.

More importantly, I also think we still don't use Benteke properly. Even if he's a bit of a statue, in the air he's an extremely dangerous one and we seem not make it a priority to play whipped crosses into the six yard box when we've got one of the best headers of the ball in the PL waiting there. That mystifies me. If I see another floaty cross, I think I'm going to self-immolate and while I'm on the subject, what's with the short-corners? I've never understood why you'd f*** around with "clever" movement and short passes before you cross the ball (yes, I know the idea is to pull defenders out of position but the risk of doing so is that you never get the cross in at all) when you have a Benteke in the middle who's capable of getting onto anything. When we have a corner, just fizz the bloody ball towards the penalty spot and Benteke will get onto his fair share. And if he doesn't, at least it'll create some danger in the box. I'd rather lose the ball there than out by the corner flag where there's no chance of scoring.

Agree with a lot of this. The problem with playing LM and CK is that it makes it very easy for teams to defend against us. They can cede possession and let us have the ball 70% of the time knowing that we're not a threat because we have no one in the middle of the park except Gallagher who can unlock them and they can pretty much assign two men to worry about him because there's no other threat. Yes, I think it's high time we saw what Hughes has to offer but even more, I think it's time we saw what Olise has to offer in his preferred (and correct) position in central midfield. Whether starting or off the bench, I'd like to see both given chances in that role over the next few games.

You raised another point that I think is important about Olise but it applies more generally: "The boy is unstoppable on the counter when he has space to run into." I noticed both at Burnley and on Saturday, and it's a small detail, but our playing of the simple pass is, more often than not, absolutely f***ing horrible. Even though in both games we've had an enormous amount of possession (which far too often we've used to crab the ball sideways across the back four rather than forwards into attack), our crab-passing is way below standard. Far too often we play the ball either to someone's feet or, worse, slightly behind them so they're either forced to take the ball facing our own goal or to control it, turn and then having to look up to see who's available. It's a mystery to me why these simple passes can't be played into space ahead of the player so he can run onto the ball and is moving in the right direction when gets it. There's no point playing possession football if you don't know what to do with the ball. It's a small but important detail.

I don't have a conundrum about Benteke. As with Ayew, I think he gets an unreasonable amount of stick here. He's playing well (by his own recent standards), scoring goals, and seems to have his confidence back. The biggest problem I have him with at the moment is at the other end of the pitch; his defending of set-pieces is absolutely f***ing terrible. He doesn't seem to realise that marking doesn't involve just standing next to someone when the ball is played; you actually have to track them and defend the ball when it comes in.

More importantly, I also think we still don't use Benteke properly. Even if he's a bit of a statue, in the air he's an extremely dangerous one and we seem not make it a priority to play whipped crosses into the six yard box when we've got one of the best headers of the ball in the PL waiting there. That mystifies me. If I see another floaty cross, I think I'm going to self-immolate and while I'm on the subject, what's with the short-corners? I've never understood why you'd f*** around with "clever" movement and short passes before you cross the ball (yes, I know the idea is to pull defenders out of position but the risk of doing so is that you never get the cross in at all) when you have a Benteke in the middle who's capable of getting onto anything. When we have a corner, just fizz the bloody ball towards the penalty spot and Benteke will get onto his fair share. And if he doesn't, at least it'll create some danger in the box. I'd rather lose the ball there than out by the corner flag where there's no chance of scoring.

Kouyate crossed the ball for the goal against Villa, something Olise couldn’t do all game.
Benteke is the most successful Premier striker, we have ever had, one goal away from 100 Premier goals. Bad players don’t score that many goals in the Premier and you want to sell him.