Kanj

This Ba saga is rather upsetting. On one hand, I absolutely love what he's done at his time here and still cling on that he and Cisse will form the greatest strike partnership we've had since the Shearer/Bellers days and obviously the Al/Ferd/Beardo/Cole prior to that. On the other hand, If we are offering him a good deal to stay here, and he won't accept- then he can rightly piss off to another club.

In that midfield 3 you have enough passers, tacklers, and grafters in there to do the dirty work, collect from the back, and get the ball to the front 3.

Fantastic posts all around Was thinking the same tbh. Would really love to see all fit in the same team and I'd see them being perfect for a Cisse type of striker.

I'd like to actually see is retain Sylvain, as long as he can stay fit through this period and continue to show his potential. He's very smooth on the ball, tends to make the right decision and is one helluva skilled player.

Class fucking starting 11 that

Pretty funny when De Gea's punch went out after Cisse scored...looked like he was chuckling and pointing like "wow, look where that ball ended up" and proper loved when Jones' own goal occured and he was laying on the ground...Papisto patted him on the back.

It's his passion. His determination for the team is absolutely second to none; there's few in the squad that put more passion and effort into their game. He has improved to the point of being properly useful in the last few games... in a position that he hates and isn't suited to. That is tantamount to his determination. I really love the bloke. yes 100%

The amount of times Simpson gets on the ball, you just hope that in January we replace him with Mathieu. He would have absolutely tore Evra a new one today.

Willo yellow means Perch at CB now right?

Kick in the gut type match. I dont really even know what to say at this point.

Hes honestly looking better and better every match, and this includes his all-around play too. Great goal, love the man.

Praying its not too serious. Fuck Valencia. Disgusting challenge.

This 100%.

I would still think about starting him against the mackems because he's always motivated for that one. He deserves his cameo for sure, he 100% does after that shift & goal he put in the other day. Don't think starting him is going to do us any favors on getting Cisse back on track

Would like to see Perch & Bigi play the holding roles in front of the back 4 for this. Anita continuing in his current role as well with Marv coming in for Jonas. Yes, we probably won't see that but that's what I'd be hoping to see.

He's always been a pretty good defender and gash in attack. He sees the ball a fuck load though.

Feel like we've all invested in this transfer man.

He makes Obertan look a class above now. Yes, he's fallen that far off.

The difference is, Ba could play out wide and it worked well for the team and the player. Exactly, not to mention the fact that Cisse has never looked anything other than class in the middle of a 3. Spot on Ron.

Start this lad ffs. Cool as fuck on the ball, kept thinking he would have done so much better on nearly everything Jonas was fucking up.

Brilliant shot man. Get the fuck in.

Please fucking win today.

Whats funny is his Europa League volley goal was fucking classic Cisse type shit. Running 1 way, volleying the ball far post. Outstanding stuff. I'll defend him in that he gets fuck all chances, but I won't defend him in that he should have scored a few more this season.

I think its more accurate to say Ba himself was more at fault for not scoring vs. the position itself (LW). But there were so many more factors involved when you compare Ba's drought last season vs. Cisse's. And I'm not defending Cisse either, I just think that his issue is that overall the team around him is in awful form, and we aren't creating the same amount of chances that we were last season. (When Ba and Cisse were in the team together). Wasn't it that Cisse was getting 1 to 1.5 to 2 chances a match and he was just putting them away (when he went on that run?) Off the top of my head... BA - The entire team itself was firing on all cylinders, creating chances and scoring (for the most part) - Ba was failing to score chances he was presented, and he was getting a fair few each match - Ba was very, very good in his all around play at that time but his finishing was very poor --> Had he scored a handful of those, his insisting to play central would probably not be an issue to him and he'd be fine out wide --> Seems to me, Ba 100% blames the system vs. Ba blaming himself for that goal drought CISSE - The entire team itself is not firing on all cylinders, not creating chances and only Ba is scoring - Cisse is failing to score the few chances he is currently being presented. And they seem to be a few only. - To me, its a compounded issue with Cisse - he's not as comfortable as Ba was out wide (although Cisse is playing much much better, and his general play looks better than it has in quite some time) and he's doing himself no favors with snatching at chances --> He'll score when the team starts creating more than 1 half chance for him --> But he's doing no favors to himself when he's not putting the ones away that he should (Man City equalizer, which not only would have been a huge goal for the match, but the team, and for him) I think Ba will still score playing out wide, that's my opinion. I say that because his form is much different than he was in end of last season, his tired legs (looked absolutely knackered). But at the end of the day, whatever the f*** it takes to get us 3 points man.