James

Don't think the Irish could have cleared £100m of debt.

I believe that some of his selections yesterday were on the basis that he wanted players with derby experience on the pitch.

Much missed in my opinion since he hasn't been starting in his preferred central role. Yes, he doesn't get the goals and assists, and he doesn't look as good as he did preseason. But, he is the only midfielder that properly looks to provide a short passing option to the defence, and earlier in the season, the defenders have shown that they will use the short option if available. During the full 90 minutes, his passing isn't perfect, but I dont recall him ever getting dangerously caught in possession, and a few times during the game, I have seen him find space, look up and play a delightful pass to Viduka or one of the wingers. This may not be consistent over 90 minutes, but it is a lot more than I have seen from Smith, Butt, Barton and Emre. Defensively, he isn't as good as Butt, and he doesn't tackle as well as Smith or Barton, but he is still pretty good in this department, reads the game well, and makes many good interceptions, and wins a lot of second balls. Not meaning to sound patronising, but the analysis of goals that we score always seems very limited, ie all the praise goes to the goalscorer and whoever provided the assist. Lets take Milner's goal yesterday for example, all the praise and thanks is heaped onto Milner for the good run and cross. What about the good run into the box by Owen that made the cross dangerous, brought Gordon closer to the near post and stopping him coming out for the ball, making the space in the far corner of the goal? What about thew one-two that allowed Milner to beat his man? Or the pass out wide to Milner in the first place? Or the winning back of possession prior to that move? I still need to rewatch the goal to identify these players, but these are all key contributions, without which we would not have scored. When playing, Geremi has provided more key contributions than any other central midfielder. That is because he is the best player in the side at converting defence into attack. Scott Parker was often criticised for winning the ball back and then failing to do anything good with it. Often, the same can be said for Barton, Smith and Butt, while Emre rarely seems to find himself in a counter-attacking situation. Based on all I have said, Geremi should be one of the first names on the team sheet for most matches, and it should be up to the other players to fight for their place alongside him whether it be a 2 or 3 man central midfield.

Not match fit, and out of position, and to be honest we may have been better with someone in his place, but I see potential, ie he was the only one of midfielders to successfully pass the ball forwards all game. For a few brief spells in the second half, he did seem to get a little grip on the game when he drifted centrally.

It is hard to tell though with the shots they have for goal kicks etc whether there is a player in a good position to receive the ball.

I saw two quick clearances which is two more than you'd get from Given.

Back this month or next.

I'm starting to get the impression that he is going to walk straight back into the team if we continue with our current strategies, and that Allardyce is picking N'Zogbia on the right wing, or Milner on the left wing under the assumption that in the long-term they are second choice to Duff in this position. Does anyone agree with that assessment?

Have to say, enrique seemed quite anonymous from what i saw.

That is a reward, not a punishment.

All credit to him for working that move pretty much by himself, shades of last season. It may have been lucky, but I believe that if the ball hadn't gone in, Owen would have gotten to it and the result would have been the same.

What a crock of shit, not one single decent chance on goal in 94 minutes despite fielding a good strikeforce. Our mentality away from home is shit, and our midfield selection is shit.

He's safe for now, but I'd say its borderline towards the possibility of a suspension.

What did he do? Studded someone in the groin.

Barton should be sent off.

Our biggest problem is that Barton keeps going to ground with no chance of winning the ball, and this is creating too much space for them.

Players ranked in order of goodness in the first half: Faye Harper Smith Emre Viduka Owen Taylor Rozehnal N'Zogbia Milner Barton

Ashley travelled with the fans in one of the coaches then.

Guy who posted this team yesterday said that it might be a 3-4-3.

Training as normal, so must be dropped. What I've noticed with Allardyce is that he seems to have some sort of buzzword each week which reflects the gameplan for the next match, and this week seems to be about Derby experience, he's playing players that have played before in wins over Sunderland, while apart from the two centre backs, all the other players have played in other famous derby games at some point.

I notice Admin have turned off many forum features in anticipation of forum blow-up later.

Viduka took full part in training yesterday, so that shouldn't be an issue.

He wasn't in any training photos, but that doesn't mean that he wasn't there.

Owen does actually link up with the midfield a lot better than martins when we are passing the ball around well. Martins relies a lot more on others than Owen does in my honest opinion.