The College Dropout

Balotelli is more similar to Aguero than Tevez/Dzeko which is why he's so out of favour and has been unable to produce. When fit, Aguero starts and plays to his strengths. Principally playing on the shoulder of the defenders, using his pace in behind.

Bobby put a lot of emphasis on energy and pace. I don't know the stats from that season but I'll bet we won a lot of points away from home. Dyer, Bellamy and Robert used to cut teams apart on the break. Add that to Speed and Shearer's threat from set pieces with some craft from Solano and we had a pretty potent mix. Bobby put a lot of emphasis on energy and pace. I don't know the stats from that season but I'll bet we won a lot of points away from home. Dyer, Bellamy and Robert used to cut teams apart on the break. Add that to Speed and Shearer's threat from set pieces with some craft from Solano and we had a pretty potent mix. I said this a while back, but that front 6 is my 'template' for building a good side and probably always will be. Such a fantastic, functional and exciting balance. Agreed. We won and lost with the effectiveness of that front 6.

Santon has been a poor defensive fullback a lot this season. If anything Jonas does his job for him. Don't remember the last solid defensive performance from Santon without Jonas. I think he was saying that Santon has to attack constantly because Jonas offers so little going forward. It's a delicate balance with Santon and Jonas... Jonas does offer some protection but would Santon be able to defend more if a more attacking player was in front of him? I don't really know the answer. Well he was piss poor defensively without Jonas so the answer is probably no.

17 goals in 32 matches for City last season whilst not playing regularly. People like to play dumb with Balotelli. His general level of performance at the Euros was superb. Ran England ragged. Scored a great goal against Ireland. Showed great composure and awareness to find Aguero against QPR when a lesser player would've turned and smashed it.

Santon has been a poor defensive fullback a lot this season. If anything Jonas does his job for him. Don't remember the last solid defensive performance from Santon without Jonas.

The Simpson & Willo stick is OTT.

The Ivory Coast look strong again and I can see another final for them.

Would keep him until the end of the season.

His build-up play is so-so. Sometimes good sometimes poor. Exclusively at his best when running in behind the defenders. Pretty quick but not a dribbler. that's why he reminds me of Darren Bent. He's got more variety in his finishing though.

Benteke's a beast tbf. Same man who had Smalling bounce off him.

in terms of pure defending. Colo has been as bad as Williamson this season in general bar the odd game.

Despite clear footage to the contrary. Ok then... Aye you could see Pardew going nuts on the sidelines in the last 15 or 20 minutes because of the hoofing. It clearly wasn't a gameplan at all, and just the sign of a nervous team desperate for a win. The first half performance was entirely down to luck too. The first half performance was down to Pardew setting us up well, as he did against Reading. The 2nd half performance was down to him undoing his good work. Really? I think it was more to do with us not being able to weather the (somewhat inevitable) storm with a couple of poor decisions (one from Debuchy in particular). You watch the premiership every week, and you see a losing team spring out the traps second half all the time. It's about weathering the storm for more than a couple of minutes. I have no doubt that if we had made it to about 60 mins without conceding we would have won much more comfortably. Villa would have burnt out and we would have started playing again. As it was, we shot ourselves in the foot 3 mins into the second half, which set us on the back foot for the rest of the game. You may be right, but I've never seen Villa dominate to such an extent over a 50 minute period. How many clear cut chances did they actually have like? 3? Our players clearly lost their bottle when the kitchen sink was thrown at them. I'm 99% sure that Pardew didn't want them to play the hoof ball that they resorted to as well (judging by his anger on the touchline at Krul). They are terrible like. They remind me of us. Spent the last 10 minutes hoofing it again and again. We couldn't keep the ball to repel pressure to save our lives and they kept lumping it up. I don't know if they'll go down but atm they are the worst team in the division. T

He hasn't looked fresh in about 6 months. Sub, start whenever.

Aye they where always going to have a period against us. And they scored straight away from it.

Yep. Literally the difference between us and the opposition last year. Sure Krul and Colo where great but those lads needed little to strike a goal last season.

I'm not anti-Pardew but I watched the majority of those games and we where not on the front foot, controlling the game with the ball in the majority of those matches. Man U 3-0 : Great battling performance. Great strikes from Ba & Cabs. good defending. Tiote/Cabs owned Giggs/Carrick. WBA - great counter attacking which was great to see. Contained them easily and destroyed them on the counter. Swansea - 2 great goals from Cisse against the run of play. Contained them pretty easily, scored on the counter twice. Bolton - The Ben Arfa wonder goal? 0-0 for ages around 70 mins before the wonder goal. Didn't create buckets. Chelsea - 2 more wonder goals, contained them well. That's the theme imo. We contain well, score some great individual goals and we won. We were great defensively last year, plenty of clean sheets. We did a good job of containing teams and that was largely the plan imo. Demba carried us goals wise until January, then Cisse & HBA took over. We didn't smash any teams nor comeback from behind. Very reliant on scoring the first goal us. We are still good for a goal but we invite too much pressure on the team this term and if we have to chase a game? Forget about it. A draw is the best you can hope for. I think it is safe to say that in each of those games highlighted we were the better team and had more chances. I am sure someone can find stats to prove me wrong, but that is my recollection. Aye we defended superbly in all those games and played well. But when we beat Man Utd & Chelsea we had no gilt-edged chances. Half chances dispensed well. We certainly didn't create mopre chances than Man Utd. when we beat them.

I'm not anti-Pardew but I watched the majority of those games and we where not on the front foot, controlling the game with the ball in the majority of those matches. Man U 3-0 : Great battling performance. Great strikes from Ba & Cabs. good defending. Tiote/Cabs owned Giggs/Carrick. WBA - great counter attacking which was great to see. Contained them easily and destroyed them on the counter. Swansea - 2 great goals from Cisse against the run of play. Contained them pretty easily, scored on the counter twice. Bolton - The Ben Arfa wonder goal? 0-0 for ages around 70 mins before the wonder goal. Didn't create buckets. Chelsea - 2 more wonder goals, contained them well. That's the theme imo. We contain well, score some great individual goals and we won. We were great defensively last year, plenty of clean sheets. We did a good job of containing teams and that was largely the plan imo. Demba carried us goals wise until January, then Cisse & HBA took over. We didn't smash any teams nor comeback from behind. Very reliant on scoring the first goal us. We are still good for a goal but we invite too much pressure on the team this term and if we have to chase a game? Forget about it. A draw is the best you can hope for.

Furthermore, when we sit in deep, he rarely talks about it post-match as being a problem. Rather not being able to hang on or something. Long story short. Pardew has no plan of how to control games with possession.

Hear*

You can here Pardew all game on the TV. He doesn't encourage us to push up when we are deep in our own half in the 70th minute.

has he had many good games without Jonas?

Missed him yesterday. Just for the fact Jonas had to play 90 minuyers.

Definitely needs time to adapt. Solid on the ball, defensively not the greatest so far.

Remind me more and more of Darren Bent.

Cabaye doesn't have the best engine and tends to tire after 70 minutes, hence rarely finishing games last season. Jonas' legs have gone. We normally bring on Shola and he can barely move. Perchinho doesn't have the best engine either. All you need is Shola up top and Jonas in midfield and we will look knackered. on the break we had nobody y'day.