madras

He was out wide first half too...when we dominated the game, took a 2 goal lead and Cisse himself was one of the scorers. Must have been watching a different game to me, mate. Did we not dominate the first half? We did. Cisse played as the central striker first half though. Aye. Went out wide when Shola came on. So he played wide for 20 minutes.....20 minutes where we had one man in their half most the time anyway. Tactical blunder to be sacked for...after a win. Right. If that was the only blunder he made it may have been forgivable. Can't disagree with either of the new 2 going off after barely being involved second half, or that the other new lad came on. So the complaints are Perch came off or Shola/Anita came on. There was no-one else on the bench I particularly fancied coming on. They were less involved due to the way he had us setup to play. Far better to change the way we were playing to allow them to get on the ball then remove them from the pitch and replace them with worse players. Why not leave Perch in midfield and take Jonas off and replace him with Obertan. You get rid of our worst player in the game (as much as I like Gutierrez he was miss controlling everything, giving away dangerous freekicks, he was a liability) and then have some pace to hit them on the break. But instead he takes off Perch for Shola and puts Cisse on the wing with Gutierrez still there f***ing everything up. What f***ing good was that? Not to mention he then brings on a central defender into defensive midfield when he's only just taken Perch out of that position, he's nuts man! i've been defending pardew against people slagging off what they see as his tactics in the second half. i can't defend him for picking or keeping jonas on though.

tactics probably the same as the first but they never responded from the whistle in the second half. the players never responded to the higher pressure and tempo. Probably the same? Or looking at all of our other performances under Pardew, were they probably different? Given that we almost always concede initiative if we're winning. looking at today we didn't have the ball enough to see if we'd changed tactics. one thing for definite, cabaye and sissoko had nowhere near the movement looking for the ball and working in the second half, or was that pardews tactic, stand still 35yds out and don't even trail back ? I don't know what his exact instructions are, but we can all see the effect of them, can't we? and if the instructions were "just keep it going, more of the same" but we couldn't live with the tempo ?, we were without an effective central midfield for the last 35mins.

i've a feeling they could be very complimentary. i'm moving from getting rid of tiote to trying him behind sissoko/cabaye.

going to be a huge star....but needs to get used to the pace and stamina of the premier league. no fear he'll do it.

not a strike partner but he needs support breaking from midfield.

It's alright, you know the result now. doesn't matter, i've a mate who still expects a leicester fan to kick steve walsh's own goal off the line at filbert street in THAT game.

don't know what agbonlahor's been like recently bit i was pleased when i saw he wasn't starting.

it sounds so easy "keep possession", do you not think we were actually trying that but failing at it and thats where the pressure came from ? it's like saying "try not to shoot wide"

tactics probably the same as the first but they never responded from the whistle in the second half. the players never responded to the higher pressure and tempo. Probably the same? Or looking at all of our other performances under Pardew, were they probably different? Given that we almost always concede initiative if we're winning. looking at today we didn't have the ball enough to see if we'd changed tactics. one thing for definite, cabaye and sissoko had nowhere near the movement looking for the ball and working in the second half, or was that pardews tactic, stand still 35yds out and don't even trail back ? I think this is a point that needs to be understood. Obviously Pardew didn't manage to shore things up at all, but the game fragmented and turned into a situation where almost no gameplan was going to be implementable. Yeah, I don't think it's worth criticising the substitutions. They didn't improve things, but we were in trouble before and he needed to try to make some changes. In the first half, our pressing game looked better than it had all season. In the second half, it disappeared, right from the start. We backed off and let them pick a pass / long ball at their leisure. And when we recovered the ball, the man in possession seemed to have no options. Yep, combined with the soft pen and the crowd/Villa getting lifted led to a terminal turnaround in the momentum of the game. Not necessarily Pardew's fault, he just didn't manage to stop it very well. thing is, perch should've stayed on, shola could still have came on but at that point either sissoko or cabaye should have went off, both looked shot.

I can see us playing the game we should have played today against Chelsea, when we're expected to lose we're like a cornered rabid dog going for the jugular, the irony being if we play like that in all our games we wouldn't be in this mess. We only fear the s*** teams cuz we know what will happen if we lose against them. Thoroughly expect a sterling performance against them. When have we turned it on this season? I'm feeling surprisingly down beat after our first away victory. Wish those two halves had been reversed, we'd all be buzzing right now Arsenal, Manyoo, both games we really attacked and kept the ball at feet, fair enough we got nothing but if we played like that consistently we wouldn't be in this predicament. in both games we ran out of steam. fitness more of an issue than tactics ?

tactics probably the same as the first but they never responded from the whistle in the second half. the players never responded to the higher pressure and tempo. Probably the same? Or looking at all of our other performances under Pardew, were they probably different? Given that we almost always concede initiative if we're winning. looking at today we didn't have the ball enough to see if we'd changed tactics. one thing for definite, cabaye and sissoko had nowhere near the movement looking for the ball and working in the second half, or was that pardews tactic, stand still 35yds out and don't even trail back ? I think this is a point that needs to be understood. Obviously Pardew didn't manage to shore things up at all, but the game fragmented and turned into a situation where almost no gameplan was going to be implementable. If you remove Gutierrez from the pitch at some point that could have gone a long way to sorting things out. honestly think the main difference was sissokonand cabaye lookiong fucked.

tactics probably the same as the first but they never responded from the whistle in the second half. the players never responded to the higher pressure and tempo. Probably the same? Or looking at all of our other performances under Pardew, were they probably different? Given that we almost always concede initiative if we're winning. looking at today we didn't have the ball enough to see if we'd changed tactics. one thing for definite, cabaye and sissoko had nowhere near the movement looking for the ball and working in the second half, or was that pardews tactic, stand still 35yds out and don't even trail back ? Our holding players failed to control the tempo of the game, Cabaye in particular, just got away from them. They needed to be the ones to slow it down. Nonsense, team went right into hoof-mode. So apparent, Krul gets ball and team instantly moves up. Team is drilled to respond to pressure with long balls. Half a season of games to support this so, afetr the first half they got the ball and thought, "hey i've got options to pass to but the manager said lump it 40yds"...bollocks man, at the start of the second half we tried to play it out and got caught through their higher tempo and cabaye and sissoko disappeared offensivly and defensivly (pretty sure thats a fitness thing)

tactics probably the same as the first but they never responded from the whistle in the second half. the players never responded to the higher pressure and tempo. Probably the same? Or looking at all of our other performances under Pardew, were they probably different? Given that we almost always concede initiative if we're winning. looking at today we didn't have the ball enough to see if we'd changed tactics. one thing for definite, cabaye and sissoko had nowhere near the movement looking for the ball and working in the second half, or was that pardews tactic, stand still 35yds out and don't even trail back ?

I sort of agree with you about Debuchy, but it's a very hard instinct to fight (the need to close down). It just doesn't enter your head that the guy is going to flop to the ground, even though it probably should. Debuchy was put under severe pressure by Gabby's pace though. Agbonlahor for Bent was the sub that changed the game. Their attack had a lot more pace and movement after that. I thought the Debuchy tackle was rank amateurish. His opponent was running away from the area, there was no immediate danger and he only had a 50-50 chance of getting the ball. It was a ridiculous chance to take, like a park footballer with a rush of blood to the head. Debuchy has looked vulnerable defensively ever since he came here. It's a different game and his positioning looks dodgy. enough people said he wasn't the best defensivly. he;s always going to need a defensive mid to drop to help or to allow a centre half to come over as he can leave big gaps there, it's trade off with his attacking play which is still worth it imo.

jonas blocked the header, mapou the follow up.

it happens with losing games, it loses confidence and that is huge in sport.

Seems to be lacking a bit of fitness - quite laboured when running as the game went on. they put pressure on, sissoko and debuchy who ran the first half then looked shot, weren't looking for the ball off the defenders (so where do they put it ?) and didn't really work off the ball.................but it's all pardews fault. (i've slagged him off for other things, wasn't the strarting XI i'd have picked) but the difference between the first and second half was down to villa, not to pardew and tactics.

sissoko was struggling for a while before he went off, just looked fucked, was stretching at one point. the change wasn't tactical.

he did ? don't blame the players for not responding to higher tempo from the oopo ?

tactics probably the same as the first but they never responded from the whistle in the second half. the players never responded to the higher pressure and tempo.

seemed to me like cabaye and sissoko just ran out of steam and couldn't adapt when the pace was upped more than any tactical thing.

sissoko has been struggling the last 5 or so.

neither cabaye or sissoko showing for it off our defenders.

colo off then ? hasn't been close to anyone defensivly.

and cabaye has read what he's done, dropped in behind if needs be, alongside if space is there if needs be. this could reall allow tote to return to what he does best...... back 4 tiote ben arfa cabaye sissoko marveaux cisse all the movement in the world.