Can't see him doing it, it's a hard system to balance while maintaining numerical superiority in the middle of the park in possession (Guardiola's holy grail) as your fullbacks have to stay wide, your attacking mids can't drift too deep without isolating the strikers (might work with a Felix/Messi/Kane type SS but we don't have one) and it's difficult for the defenders and holding mids to link up with the front 6 in possession without leaving the team wide open to the counter, as we frequently were when Yaya joined attacks. There's a reason we used to bring on an extra CB when we wanted to push Yaya forward.
True.
It's just Rodri won't be dropped, Rice would command a high fee and wouldn't come just to sit on the bench while we wouldn't pay that to have him sat there either. Unless the club have seen something in him that make them think he can be an 8 (which I personally think he could be)?
All hypothetical obviously but his name is constantly cropping up. Whether it's just to make Chelsea panic and pay up, who knows.