Cronky

It's a very effective tactic, especially when those throws are fast, low and more accurate than any corner. On the other hand, it's a bit unfair, in that a team is gaining more of an advantage from a throw in than they should really get, and doesn't make for great football. I wouldn't like to see Stoke become the model for promoted teams, with a long-throw specialist and a load of big, physical players to take advantage. If the tactic became too popular, FIFA would probably have to look at banning them.

Do you have any proof of that? All of those statements are matters of opinion, so of course there's no proof. But I can't see that there's much doubt that Keegan didn't like working to a DOF. He'd stayed away from the game for three years and not been to a single match, so the idea that he was disillusioned with football isn't a wild one. His company wasn't doing well so again it's not exactly sticking your neck out to say that that influenced his decision to return. Not to mention he quit after only a few months in circumstances that are still unclear. The most logical explanation is that his motivation was always a bit brittle. Not for the first time either.

This issue of when did things go wrong has been much debated, so I'll keep my opinion brief. The longer Shepherd stayed as Chairman, the more we became a one-man band. After 2003, he made a series of bad decisions and we've ended up struggling ever since. I had high hopes that Ashley would turn things around, but he made a mistake in appointing Keegan. Keegan clearly wasn't suited to the role that Ashley had in mind, he was disillusioned with football and IMO wouldn't have come back if his company hadn't been in financial trouble. The chaos of this season has all stemmed from that.

There was only one positive that I could see from the game - Andy Carroll. It looks like he's arrived.

Butt is awful man. There's no point in having a DM if they're just going to give the ball away. It defeats the purpose. Sad thing is we all know that, but we've no one better...... It really is that desperate. Im wondering whether we should give cacapa another go at DM, atleast he cant cock it up in defence then I can't stand watching Butt either. I get a bit hesitant because the game's professionals do seem to put more store on a defensive midfielder than us fans do. Perhaps putting in someone who can pass the ball would expose the defence a bit more. What tips the scales for me against Butt is his lack of leadership. You just get the feeling that he doesn't like taking responsibility and doesn't provide any drive or inspiration. You really need your experienced players to energise the rest, but half the time he's playing them into trouble. Butt is one of the few who I would say tries to take responsibility. Butt certainly sees a lot of the ball and makes a lot of passes, but that’s normal for someone in that anchor position. It’s his decision-making on the ball which I find very frustrating. It’s like he has a limited range of passing that he’s confident about, and he sticks to that regardless of the situation around him. In that way, he often misses opportunities to play a more positive ball. He has particular specialisms – First is the ball across the pitch which he plays slightly behind his team-mate, because he doesn’t have confidence in his ability to weight a ball for his man to run on to. This then forces the player to check or reverse his run and invites pressure from the opposition. The whole team ends up being forced backwards and we end up with a defender hoofing it long. He often plays this ball when he’s in trouble himself, and his team-mate ends up in worse trouble. Second is the lofted ball across the pitch to the opposite wing. Spectacular when it comes off, but it’s telegraphed, it’s not usually accurate enough, and tends to turn our possession into a 50-50 battle at best. Third is the ball down the channel, often played with the head down, the body language signalling loud and clear exactly what’s going to happen, and again turning possession into a 50-50 ball. I don’t want to be too hard because he’s making the best of limited ability, but he’s in an important position in the side and it always looks to me like he’s more afraid of making a mistake than doing something positive. That’s what I mean by not taking responsibility, and I think it affects the whole side. Apart from anything else, I reckon players are hesitant about making forward runs because they’ve no faith in his ability to find them with a pass.

Butt is awful man. There's no point in having a DM if they're just going to give the ball away. It defeats the purpose. Sad thing is we all know that, but we've no one better...... It really is that desperate. Im wondering whether we should give cacapa another go at DM, atleast he cant cock it up in defence then I can't stand watching Butt either. I get a bit hesitant because the game's professionals do seem to put more store on a defensive midfielder than us fans do. Perhaps putting in someone who can pass the ball would expose the defence a bit more. What tips the scales for me against Butt is his lack of leadership. You just get the feeling that he doesn't like taking responsibility and doesn't provide any drive or inspiration. You really need your experienced players to energise the rest, but half the time he's playing them into trouble.

I feel a bit down after that game. Shearer has to try to change things for us to get out of the current mess. As someone has said, we lacked any flair in CM, or any pace and invention up front. Trouble is, our quick strikers - Martins and Lovenkrands - now seem to be out of action and in any case have to be fitted around the undroppable Mr Owen. In CM, Guthrie often looks good, but lacks the experience (and currently the fitness) to really impose himself. Barton would make a big difference to us, but his promised comeback seems to be receding.

I don't think Shearer should have said anything except that Oba's unfit. The rest can be dealt with in-house. All this publicly hinting that he's been unprofessional or worse isn't going to do any good.

Christ, I'm still shaking. 3-5-2 was a very bold decision, but in order to be effective the wing backs have to be prepared to get forward. That only happened in the last 20 minutes, when Stoke funnelled back. We had the usual problems. We were hitting the ball long to Shola, who isn't that good in the air despite being 6 foot 3 or whatever. Carroll came on and gave us some threat in that area, and that's ultimately how we got the point. Up till then, we really didn't look like scoring. Even by his own low standards, Butt's passing was appalling. It looks like Shearer has faith in Owen. I wish I had.

In a nutshell really. Yeah, I agree. Hull are the team we have to aim for to get out of the drop zone. Portsmouth, the Mackems, Blackburn and Stoke have got the players to stay up, but Hull really don't.

I decided to watch Barca last night, which was one of my better decisions. I've seen the Chelsea goals, and it looks like two completed unchallenged headers on the edge of the six yard box, from a player not especially renowned for his power in the air. It seems that when this zonal marking goes wrong, it goes wrong big time.

It couldn't be 1992 - KK was appointed in FEBRUARY, not April...he was also able to buy 2 players who were instrumental in preventing relegation. Shearer does not have either the luxury of 2 extra months(and extra games) or the ability to make crucial buys. Well....yeeahh..... but you know what I mean. What might feel like rock bottom can be the springboard for success. Despite the fact that Keegan took over a bit earlier in 1992, my memory is that the team was looking far worse and relegation looked like a certainty rather than a possibility. We had just lost 5-2 to Oxford and 4-0 to Southend.

Well, it could equally be 1992. Sometimes the darkest hour is just before the dawn. Early days, but I've been very impressed with Shearer so far - and anyone who knows me would know I've not been his biggest fan in the past. It wasn't a great performance on Saturday, but the focus was there. There were no histrionics from Shearer - he projected a calm confidence which hopefully will rub off on the side. I particularly liked the fact that, despite the fact that it looked like we had a good goal disallowed, there was no ranting and raving about the ref. That's the right attitude - it was a mistake, it's over, we move on.

What I find exceptional about Rooney is that he's not just good at producing those moments of skill that will open up a defence, but he's actually very good at all the ordinary things as well - like work rate, heading, tackling, defending, reading the game. And his work is nearly always useful, he doesn't just run around like a twat, trying to take over things that his team mates can do. Messi and his like will produce more of those moments of exceptional skill, and Messi in particular can do things that other players can't. But Rooney can turn his hand to virtually any job on the pitch, and that makes his overall contribution quite exceptional. He's involved all the time.

Have to agree. I'm a huge admirer. His occassional outburts irritate me but he is a great player and does everything you could want really. I'd take him over Ronaldo every single time. ...over Ronaldo?? World Player of the year and Ballon d'Or of the year right? over 40 league goals last season, when has Rooney got anywhere near that? Not to mention the amount of chances Ronaldo creates for others. Sorry just find that statement incredible. I hate to admit it but I have to defend Ronaldo here; not been talked about thatmuch during this season, and he's already got 20 goals, not to mention the 70ish goals of the past 2 seasons. The bit I don't agree with is "zomg thats amazing for a winger". He's only a winger in the sense of him starting there in the official formation. The amount he drifts from there, and amount of simple goals he gets from 10 yards out after being laid on by others suggests hes just a roaming forward, starting from the wing. A few of Rooney's performances recently have however suggested he might be starting to realise some of the potential to its full capacity. Perhaps I have been going on a bit about him recently, but I don't think he's ever played better than he's playing now. Man U were looking quite jaded last night, and he absolutely carried them through. I'm pretty sure they'd have lost 2 or 3 nil if it hadn't been for him. To that natural athletic talent and skill, he's now added a very shrewd and creative football brain. He's one step ahead of defenders all the time.

Another amazing all-round performance by Rooney, I thought. Considering that he won't reach his peak for another 4 or 5 years, it's staggering to think what he might achieve. Apart from all his other qualities, his ability to anticipate what's about to happen and get into just the right position to receive the ball is quite fantastic.

Enrique's passing is very unreliable, so I can understand the advice. If you're going to lose the ball, lose it in the opposition half of the field rather than your own.

I always smile a bit when Keegan or anyone else is described as a 'legend'. A legend is just a popular story, it isn't a historically accurate account. For me, the true test of a manager is someone who can over-achieve on the financial and player resources at their disposal. Sir Bob was the only manager we've had who clearly did that. It's been interesting to look back at the team that we had in his day, because there's no way they should have been getting top 4 places and competing in the second stage of the Champions League. Keegan had a crucial role in galvanising the club during his first spell, but he was backed in a major way by Sir John Hall's money. It's no coincidence that he left first time round when the time came to balance the books, and left second time round when he realised he couldn't persuade Ashley to spend big. On both occasions, he's managed to sell his actions as standing on points of principle, because of his reputation in the area. It's probably true that those of us living outside the area tend not to have the same feelings for Keegan, but that doesn't mean we've got it wrong.

It was a scrappy performance, but this is what I noticed. The team kept believing, from first minute to last. Mental toughness is what we need at the moment, and Shearer has it.

There's a lot that one could debate in your post, Chris, but this leapt out at me. Where did you get this information from? It certainly doesn't fit the picture of the bloke who walked out on the club with about 8 games to go of that season, and needed to be persuaded by Terry McDermott to return.

Oh dear, I don't think this'll help. Praising Shearer is one thing but rubbishing the players is another. I'm sure Sir Bob is still bitter about the way his team were dismantled and he was given the push, and that's spilled out.

I'd agree that the overall performance was better than most people are saying here. The players looked more relaxed and positive and I think that's down to Shearer. I also thought that, after the goals went in, it was notable that the heads didn't drop and we kept going. We lost because they're better than we are. We were getting the ball forward a lot quicker, and cutting out the timid passing that's only designed to keep possession. It didn't always come off, but at least the players looked like they knew what they were supposed to do. It looked like a team effort all round. Colo was at fault in both goals but shouldn't shoulder the entire blame. Duff put him in a bit of trouble for the first, and the second was mainly caused by Beye losing his header and exposing Taylor two on one. In general though, he's not looked strong enough for the Premiership all season. Beye did better than I was expecting at CB and I imagine he'll keep his place there and Colo will be replaced by Bassong or Steven Taylor when either are fit. Having watched the game, I actually feel more positive about avoiding the drop. There will be a lot of negative headlines because of the result, but Shearer has to keep them confident. Really, i thought we played horribly today. We created nothing and defended ok until the hour mark, which seems to be the story of our season. To me the players bottled it, maybe they felt that all the attention Shearer got was being put onto them and they were being made out by a lot of the media and fans to play like a CL side all of a sudden or maybe they just weren't used to the atmosphere. Speaking of the atmosphere i found it very tense, like an air of expectancy around the place that never quite materialised. We looked so much better when Guthrie came on but i'd rather have seen Nicky Butt taken off. I'm going to take a gamble here and blame Al for the loss today. I haven't seen his interview but i read here on via a previous post that he said he didn't want to play too open so we wouldn't be destroyed. In a way it makes sense because it's his first game etc don't want to get trounced but if he'd been watching close enough this season he'd have seen that we've played well when we've gone at the top 4 opposition bar Liverpool. We can't afford to play it safe anymore it's either cut your losses and go for it or you're screwed tbh. I know we won't probably go down and that Al was the right choice imo but i fear a little bit that if his tactic today was to play it safe, what will he do for the away games like Stoke? Well it wasn't pretty, that's for sure. What struck me though was that the players' focus and organisation looked a lot better, like they believed in what they were trying to do. And we did create one or two chances and were unlucky not to score. We were up against better players and the true test will come against Stoke. I think the chief difficulty for a manager in this situation is getting the players to relax and, in Shearer's own words, enjoy their football. There are still 21 points on offer and we're 3 points behind. The media often tend to write off teams' chances at both ends of the table far too early, when in reality there's plenty of time. Shearer at least seemed to giving the team some composure. There are problems in each area of the team - we're not a great side that just happens to be playing poorly. But if Shearer can get the maximum out of his players that should be enough.

I'd agree that the overall performance was better than most people are saying here. The players looked more relaxed and positive and I think that's down to Shearer. I also thought that, after the goals went in, it was notable that the heads didn't drop and we kept going. We lost because they're better than we are. We were getting the ball forward a lot quicker, and cutting out the timid passing that's only designed to keep possession. It didn't always come off, but at least the players looked like they knew what they were supposed to do. It looked like a team effort all round. Colo was at fault in both goals but shouldn't shoulder the entire blame. Duff put him in a bit of trouble for the first, and the second was mainly caused by Beye losing his header and exposing Taylor two on one. In general though, he's not looked strong enough for the Premiership all season. Beye did better than I was expecting at CB and I imagine he'll keep his place there and Colo will be replaced by Bassong or Steven Taylor when either are fit. Having watched the game, I actually feel more positive about avoiding the drop. There will be a lot of negative headlines because of the result, but Shearer has to keep them confident.

I don't like the look of Beye and Colo at CB, but presumably he had no other options with Bassong and Taylor being out. I was rather banking on one of them being fit, but I suppose it's not worth the risk at this stage of the season. Hummm... anything we get out of this game will be a bonus.

There are reason to be cheerful. I think Chelsea's main aim now is the Champions League and some of the players will have half a mind on the quarter final coming up this week. It's also a big relief to see no Drogba. Apart from Barton, we seem to have a full squad. I hereby deliver the kiss of death and predict a win, 2-1.