We have too many great midfielders next season but we lack that one extra solid thinking central defender. We need a player who can distribute from the back in order to complete this set of jewels. We surely need to offload Sforza, Thiam and Niko Kovac and get a defender with the return of their money. But for the meantime, and if all players are healthy by the start of this coming season my prefered lineup would be:
---------------------------Kahn
Hargreaves------Kuffour-------R. Kovac-----Liza
Salihmidzic------Jeremies-------------Ze Roberto
-----------------------------Ballack-----
-------------------Scholl-----------Elber
Deisler, Santa Cruz, Pizarro and Sagnol can rotate with some of the players up there. As Rotation will be enforced with the wealth of talent in hand, I believe that we won't have a problem replacing players when injured like last season. This team does not depend on one or two players anymore. Every player, with the exception of Oli Kahn, has an adequete replacement at least. Scholl, when fit, is a must for this team. Brazzo defensively is not as good as when played as a winger while Hargreaves proved he can player anywhere in the backline. The good thing about this formation is that it contains three or 4 players who can switch positions. Scholl can always go back and support the midfield. Brazzo and Hargreaves complement eachother and can cover up for the overlapping runs. Ze Roberto and Liza will have lots of fun on the left. Ze Roberto is purely a left winger while last season we had Sergio play out of position because he was orginally a forward. We still need a class defender with a brain back there. Kovac can only get better but he still lacks the brain while Kuffour, when not commiting silly stupid tackles, is as solid as a rock. Deisler is not fit enough to play 90 minutes and I doubt Bayern will risk him playing at the start of this coming season. I predict he will come back by December or so. As For Santa Cruz, well the guy must be playedm ore often than Elber because I believe he can only get better with time. Elber is amazing when in form but if he gets one of his bad runs, we need to give Santa Cruz a run for his talent. I predict Santa will flourish in this coming world cup.