ohmelads

We've got to play for 3 points. Beresford made a good point in today's Chron, the fans will be more patient with Sam if we're seen to be trying to win games. We're not going to Old Trafford, we're going to play an in-form but beatable Blackburn side.

The fundamental differences between the two, and the reason fans were more patient with Bobby, were down to the fact we always went out to win games and he was prepared to change tack in order to put the club first. Bobby made some mistakes as all managers do and he had his decisions which frustrated us (very late subs being a contentious issue). He was stubborn the odd time too (eg Solano playing for Peru) but as Tron points out he recognised the need to work with what he had and buy himself the time. He wasn't dogmatic in his approach. Newcastle fans don't suffer fools kindly and when Souness put his ego in front of the job he lost the majority of the fans. If Sam is seen to be doing the same thing, by refusing to change and work with the current players, then he will be in big trouble. The club must come first. Sam obviously likes his public image as "his own man" but he needs to learn quickly that he won't get far unless he works with the current players. If fans detect his ego is part of the problem they will quickly lose patience with him. I'm sure the board will be keen to see how he works with the current players before they release big transfer funds. Mort seems to have chosen his words carefully in recent times, and with Ashley taking such an interest in the team he is certainly under a lot of scrutiny. The ball is very much in Sam's court. This isn't the time to be experimenting with team selections and formations, these are Premier League games, not friendlies, and we're more than a third of the way through the season now. I think Sam might be capable of bringing us success and I think there is more talent in this side than we're seeing, but the way he is behaving, the excuses he's making and the stubborn refusal to do the obvious is making me wonder. I think the pressure is getting to him, I just hope he can take a step back from it all and accept that some of his decisions have been absolutely mental.

I always find it strange why people talk about the bigger picture and then point to the current league table. It's a bit hypocritical, isn't it? If 13 games isn't enough to condemn him then it isn't enough to vindicate him either. A sense perspective is key here, although I'm not about to preach as to what is the right perspective to take. It's difficult to say what is a knee-jerk reaction because for every Moyes, Redknapp, or O'Neill there's a Souness who ultimately fails. And sometimes the writing is on the wall early on, as it was with Souness. I don't believe our problems are so serious, but I am concerned that the man in charge doesn't know what he's doing and might be letting his ego get in the way of the job. It's the only way I can explain some of his awful decision-making. I do believe he needs time, but I don't believe you necessarily need two full seasons to get a good perspective on things. After Souness's first season, most of us could see he wasn't worth sticking with but he was backed financially, given another season and he blew it and set the club back a long way. A lot of people are talking as if there is nothing to lose by giving any manager time, but that's simply not true. The Premier League is more competitive than ever with clubs like West Ham and Man City now loaded with money. There is plenty to lose if we back the wrong man through thick and thin, as we saw with Souness.

Just Carr and Babayaro. Noone would notice if they were gone. With 4 of our players potentially missing about 6 games for the African Cup of Nations and the fitness concerns over Viduka and Owen (we need to see how Emre and Cacapa's fitness holds up too) then we can't afford to be losing anyone else.

Things won't start going right for us until we go back to basics. It sounds like a meaningless cliche but I'm talking about tactics and team selections which make any sense at all. Every week we're left confused by the team Sam has picked, we watch them go out and lack any sort of gameplan, and you wonder just what on earth he's trying to do. I'm not sure the players know either, and there's where the problems start. I don't know if the praise at Bolton went to his head or his tactics have simply been found out (I remember reading that his post-christmas run last season was worse than Roeder's). But there seems a genuine reluctance by Sam to go back to the common sense approach which many fans are screaming for. He likes to think he's his own man and that could be a weakness if he lets his ego get in the way of the job. Considering we only have two full backs and two wingers, it's quite remarkable to think that they've only started one league game together (Everton, h). And when you consider that was arguably our best performance of the season, you can see why fans are getting restless. Half of this team picks itself, but Sam's his own man. If he goes down this road too long I fear he'll lose the respect of the players as well. When players are getting hammered for their performances playing (needlessly) out of position, they inevitably turn to the manager for answers. The players look just as confused as we are and now more than ever we must go back to basics. Wide players in wide positions, central players in central positions, and some continuity of team selection to give the players a chance to gel. If he carries on with what he's doing he will get heavily criticised and rightly so, because right now I'm not convinced even he knows what he's trying to do.

I'd go with: -----------------Given--------------- Beye-----Faye--Taylor---Enrique Milner----Butt----Emre---N'Zogbia ------------Smith---Martins--------

Viduka is part of the problem IMO and it's been really apparent in the last few games. If your strikers aren't pressing from the front then defenders have loads of time to pass it in triangles, amble up to the halfway line and outnumber your midfield. Emre and Butt were completely outnumbered, even though Liverpool were playing a 4-4-2. Torres and Kuyt showed what it's all about. Every time we were in possession they were onto us straight away, we couldn't keep the ball under pressure in our own half, and in desperation we launched it long. It was the same at the mackems. Owen and Viduka spent much of the game as spectators, but their opposite numbers were covering a lot of ground, making sure we couldn't play it out of defence with any ease. Apart from Derby, I doubt Liverpool will have an easier away game all season. Our team has been carrying Viduka for a while IMO. Watch him closely, when we're not in possession he does nothing for the team. Butt and Emre didn't play well yesterday but in fairness to them they were often outnumbered and Liverpool had the run of the middle of the park. Unbelievable given that Sissoko was so poor. Smith is a poor midfielder, and he's not a good goalscorer. But for a team trying to alleviate the pressure on our midfield, he will do a pressing job up front. Then maybe we'll see opposition defenders rushed into the kind of mistakes our lot are making. With Viduka strolling about up front that's just not going to happen.

You have to remember that Sam was appointed when we were skint, and a club who can't promise a transfer kitty will probably not attract a highly successful manager. The situation has changed with a billionaire in charge and next summer, if Ashley is willing to open the purse strings, you can bet our pulling power will be much greater. Go to the top managers and tell them they'll have plenty of money to implement their ideas and they'll listen. Money talks. I'll be surprised if Sam's still here next season but he should be given until next summer.

Viduka has been pretty poor himself since he came here and on current form I think a Martins-Smith partnership would benefit the team more. Viduka is painfully slow and he gets beaten to most aeriel balls, so he's actually contributing very little to the team. He rarely presses defenders either, so when we don't have possession it feels like we're playing with 10 men. It's just too easy to defend someone so immobile, we had this problem when Shearer's legs had well and truly gone. He'll produce the odd bit of magic but entire games are passing him by. Smith to his credit does plenty of pressing for the team and if he can do that up front he'll be contributing more than Viduka is at the moment. Even when Bellamy had poor games he would press from the front and this rushed the opposition to play the ball quickly and forced them into mistakes, and took some of the pressure off our midfield. Liverpool had it way too easy yesterday, their defenders were strolling out of defence unchallenged and our midfield found themselves quickly outnumbered. Torres and Kuyt on the other hand pressed our defenders in our own half, giving them no time to find a teammate and we struggled to pass our way out of our own half, punting it long instead. The way things are at the moment it's got to be Smith and Martins for me.

Croatia are coming for us again!!

the defence.............................who can tell if the defending throughout the team is woeful. after a while lack of confidence will show itself in individual mistakes. I agree there.

Torres turned him inside out on several occasions, he turns like the titanic. He'd get run ragged left in one-on-ones against a tricky winger.

He started well but today he was outshone by an out of position Beye. Beye carried him. As Faye did at sunderland, and as Cacapa did before that, and as Taylor did before that. Whoever plays alongside Roz is in for a busy afternoon. Getting back to Enrique, I think he's coped well in a poor defence and a poor team. Faye hasn't been anything special on the face of it, but he's got all the praise he has because he's coped well. As someone already mentioned, when Enrique plays we are rarely dominated down that side. It's the measure of a full back defensively. Notice how Liverpool targetted our right side today, for instance.

I'm amazed nobody has started a similar thread about Rozehnal tbh. He's been our poorest defender this season IMO.

It sounds ridiculous but a lot of people have been saying that. When we were losing at Derby he brought on two defenders, I've never seen anything like it.

He was poor today, but generally he and Faye have been the pick of the defenders for me.

I think our pulling power will be greatly improved next summer if there is money to spend. When we appointed Allardyce we were skint and most managers would have seen it as a difficult job to take on, so our options were limited. If we can go to some of the top managers in Europe and promise them a big kitty they'll be a lot more inclined to listen.

I don't think we should have to wait a couple of seasons, if he's not looking like doing anything come May then he should go. Surely it's naive to expect any manager to turn a club in our state, thats been left to rot for so long in a season. What happens if the next manager comes in and can't turn it round in a season do we sack him, then the next and the next? Perhaps the problem is this vicious circle that starts with the fans being far too impatient. It's about time people woke up and realized it isn't our divine right to be finishing a European position and began to accept we may need to endure a couple more seasons of mediocrity before we turn it around... You're discussing scenarios for one action and not the other. You could easily throw some more what if's in there to balance it up. What if we stick by the wrong manager and he blows a large chunk of money before being belatedly sacked, only for another manager to come in and try to pick up the pieces with a limited transfer budget? We did that with Souness, we backed him, gave him another season and loads of money to spend. It was a big mistake. He should have been sacked after finishing 14th and falling out with two of the club's most influential players, but many said what you are saying now and they were wrong. I'm not sure what you mean by "turn it around", all I want to see are signs of progress, signs that the we are moving in the right direction. Forget the results, the performances have been absolutely awful, and the negativity of the manager has been something extraordinary. Some of the football we've seen in recent weeks has been as bas as anything we produced under Souness or Roeder and that's a bit worrying, isn't it?

How long is a "fair crack at the whip"? That is the crucial question really. I'd wait until next summer and take stock of where we stand, see whether or not we should put our long term future (and transfer funds) in this man's hands. If we carry on like this then we'd be mad to keep him on beyond next summer IMO. After what Souness and Roeder did here we can't really afford to be giving loads of time and money to the wrong man. I'm just hoping he stops playing clever bugger and puts faith in his players, something he hasn't done so far. They're shuffled every week to try and contain the opposition, they're dropped after one poor game, then played out of position. Is it any wonder they don't look a happy bunch? If he goes back to basics I think we can turn it around, but he seems reluctant to change his philosophy. He's "his own man" and that could turn out to be his biggest weakness.

Enrique and Faye look like good signings, even if they haven't set the world alight. Beye has looked rusty at times but I think he'll get better with games. Start those three with Taylor/Cacapa every week and give that four a chance to gel, then we might see an organised defence. The jury is out on the rest of the signings though.

Rozehnal has been poor since his first game IMO. Many people were too busy hammering Taylor back then that I think they couldn't see the wood for the trees. Whoever plays alongside Rozehnal, be it Taylor, Cacapa, Faye or Beye, is in for a very busy afternoon.

Might as well back him until the summer. I don't see Mourinho or anyone like that coming here in the meantime, we'd just end up with some chancer or a caretaker. I don't see him getting beyond next summer though. It's all well and good saying give him a couple of seasons but if he loses the respect of the players and fans by way of excessive negativity then it may not be a productive partnership. Mort may have talked about success being connected with longevity, but he neglected to point out that the two are mutually reinforcing.

That would be too sensible and straight forward. A master tactician has to have a master plan.

I didn't think Butt or Emre were any worse than the rest, they were victims (or to blame?) for the whole team sitting in our own half at times. They simply had nowhere to play the ball, no options, no movement, nothing. It was naive to think we could camp in our own half and get away with it, but we've been doing it a lot lately. Reading and Sunderland wasted plenty of opportunities to hurt us, Portsmouth and Liverpool put themselves out of sight. We have to be positive at Blackburn if we are to have any hope of coming away with anything IMO. In our last 4 games we have scored courtesy of two OGs and a fluky cross, and have barely created any other chances. We're playing games in our own half and there almost seems to be a "clean sheet at all costs" mentality, as shown by the manager's comments and team selections. Liverpool were always going to play a possession game and frustrate the home players and crowd. People predicted it in the pre-match thread, so it's not hindsight talking. We would need to give Liverpool something to think about and relieve the pressure on ourselves. Smith is hardly an attacking outlet for Butt or Emre is he? Milner, while not great, would have been a significantly better option and would have maintained the balance of the team playing in his natural position. But this is all common sense anyway. Why Milner didn't start is something for Allardyce to answer, or preferably put right. He has only had 4 naturally wide players at his disposal, and yet they've only started 2 games together this season. That's why we lack width, it's not rocket science. As for the substitutions, I'm not convinced they were designed to get anything from the game. I said a few days back that I almost felt that Allardyce would take a 'dignified defeat' if you offered it to him, and it looked like we were playing for that in the second half. One or two Liverpool fans were surprised by our negativity going into this game, but I think they can see why now.

I think we've got to give Allardyce until next summer, but it's going to be harder to say that if we start flirting with relegation at the business end of the season. On the back of recent performances (outplayed in our last 4 games) you have to say that it's a real possibility. Fulham created far more at Anfield than we today, to put things in some perspective. We still have to play Arsenal, Man Utd and Chelsea as well, and you can't see us getting much change there. It's a case of blind faith at the moment, you just hope that somehow things will improve. Allardyce is making himself almost indefensible with his team selections and eccentric decisions, most of which have not been forced upon him. With only two fit full backs and two fit wingers you would have thought at least half of the team picks itself (within reason), but he seems to have other ideas and I'm yet to meet a fan who can work out what he's trying to do. Without overanalysing the situation, it seems like he's trying to be a clever bugger when what we really need right now is to go back to basics. Get players in their correct positions and get some continuity going. I don't like to pick on individuals on the back of a poor team performance, but my concerns about Rozehnal grow with every game. When Taylor was alongside him he had his work cut out. Similarly Cacapa at Derby, Faye against sunderland and today it was Beye's turn. Despite our poor performances I can at least see some positives in Enrique, Beye, Faye and Cacapa, but Rozehnal just hasn't convinced me at all.