First of all it's rushed to say Brozovic is causing some kind of inbalance in a midfield that has played about 5 games together - he is clearly the one that is having to adapt to a new role the most.
He's caused an inbalance in a midfield since Spallo moved him into "DM" role. We have been playing a distorted, modified V shaped midfield for 2 years + this season.
Secondly it's rushed to move towards a conclusion that if there is a lack of balance, then Brozovic is the one who is the one that should be replaced - again it is someone who has played very well for us for 2 years and is far more proven at the highest level (Croatia for one) vs guys who have had a couple of strong months.
I never said brozo needs to be replaced. He needs to be put as a box-to-box CM. But keeping him in this 'kinda' DM role when he can't hold down the DM role solo means we will continue to run a distorted midfield.
Games at NT mean nothing. They're limited sample size. Opponents don't have enough time or body-of-work to tactically prepare for you. He's playing with absolute world class modric and world class rakitic. Nobody said he's a bad player.
Thirdly while some might say we need a better defensive player as the anchor, but this would also impact us going the other way - replacing Brozovic would also mean we would lose by a mile the best/most intelligent passing link in the team, Barella and Sensi are good in the passing game but don't have the same strengths as him in this area. If we talk about balance, then Brozovic is providing a lot of it in terms of being the calm element of the midfield and dictating which way we go in our attacks.
This doesn't make sense. I already listed quite a few players who are playing solo DM for their teams and are quite adept at being the passing link for their teams. You are creating this illusion that the only player who can dictate the tempo from the DM role is brozo when there are players who can, and who do do it for their teams, playing at a higher level than Inter, and doing it while being very solid defensively and can hold the DM role on their own.
I also think you're overstating brozo's role and understating particularly sensi's abilities. It is very clear from the opportunities sensi comes deep to collect, move the ball around and distribute, that he can do that very, very well. He can slow it down and speed it up. He can play the killer passes wide. He can play the killer through balls. I am almost 100000% certain that if we had to play sensi there permanently, our "flow" will not be missed or messed up at all. It may not be immediate, but keep in mind it took brozo some time to adapt to this role.
We've also seen barella come deep and make some great passes.
The point isn't to put them there. The point is to get somebody like partey or rodri or fabinho or fdj etc who can play that DM role solo. Then we can have brozo, sensi, barella battle for 2 CM spots in a V shaped trio midfield. That will be a far more balanced and uncompromised midfield. It will allow the CMs to contribute more to the attacking phase without worrying about going "out of position" to help out the DM because the DM can't hold it down on his own. The other alternative is to play a 2 DM set (4-2-3-1 etc).
And when some say that all the top teams have a more standard defensive midfielder - who of them plays with 3 central defenders?
How does this matter? This issue was also there with Spallo and 4 defenders. So not sure what you're getting at here.
Whatever problems we had against Barcelona, they started somewhere else. He was bad against Slavia, no doubt, but that underperformance actually came in the attacking department and has a lot to do with the rest of the team not stepping up/adapting to him being constantly closed down by 2-3 players. It was tactically amateurish how we allowed Slavia to get at him, it should've been an opportunity for others to take more ownership of the game.
For sure, I am not looking at any individual game. The reality is, you put brozo under some pressure and he struggles a lot in the only facet he's supposedly good at. So what you're saying is, you pressure brozo and he's out of the game? If others come back to collect and distribute, then what is brozo going to do to affect the game? He cannot and simply should not be that easy to "take out the game".