TRon

Brings back memories of Souness at home to Fulham where we lost 4-1. Bruce seems to be similarly inept in a glorious way.

I'm not going to judge him on the basis of what I've seen so far because he's played in two of the worst 45 mins possible against Arsenal and Scunthorpe. I'd like to see him come off the bench at Fulham as we seem to play better football in the second half and he needs to be on the pitch when we are pushing up the pitch and passing the ball.

Me too. Just leave him out of the match squad and by all means do it as nicely and respectfully as possible.

I'm tempted to throw Bendtner in there as well but I would prefer to sign a mobile striker. I'm prepared to believe that Ba will come good when we play proper football instead of launching the ball at him aerially from deep.

As we already have an offer in for him I suppose Maiga is one of the favourites. If the contract clause stuff is true then Roux must be a contender as well. Either would do me.

What would that be? Goals scored by a canny fat midfielder relying on knockdowns from a big striker?

He was utter crap man. He's the first player to give it the big hoof under the slightest pressure on the ball. Thank god we got a set piece which he could score from to justify his presence on the pitch. Utter liability otherwise.

Good football is good football. You shouldn't have to rely on the opposition to allow you to play it. How does instructing your goalkeeper to hoof the ball 70 yds upfield help exploit the inferior oppositon's technical weaknesses?

We'll not see the best of Cabaye and Marveaux until we stop trying to bypass the midfield. We saw the truth in that in the second half tonight. Part of the reason though was because Cabaye and Marveaux dropped deeper themselves to dictate the game where previously Gosling and Lovenkrands had been floundering.

Pardew is starting to show the colours of the manager at West Ham who didn't know how to incorporate Tevez and Mascherano. The new French additions seem to have him non-plussed so sticking with the tried and tested in Joey will be right up his alley. Wow, that's a bit of crazy logic. He's just saying that he wants an important player to stay, no idea how you drew that conclusion . If he was that important we wouldn't have given him a free transfer. What I'm saying I guess is that Pardew seems confused about what sort of football he wants to play. It looks like he'd prefer to play direct football with player he knows but he's having to work with French footballers who don't know the system. Similar to when Tevez and Mascherano were thrust on him at West Ham.

What a strike this lad has. For such a frail looking lad he can't half give it a wallop. Fucking legend in the making.

I'm not a Pardew basher but his inability to get the team playing from the back is a concern. He won't keep his job if he persists in playing Allardyce football with a team increasingly made up of French footballers used to technical football. I'm being generous in assuming he's not got good enough full backs to bring the ball out, but his GK is kicking balls long to the centre forwards as well. And as Tooj pointed out in another thread, Swansea have worse players yet still managed to play nice attractive football. The opposition tonight had a lot to do with how we played, credit to them they pressed very high and forced us out of our stride. Don't know if it is a small pitch but they made it look like one. Premiership teams won't do that to us but of course will have more ability to hurt us. It's a fair point but how often do you see good sides forced out of their stride? I've watched Man U, Chelsea, City and Spurs and their players don't get rushed out of their passing game. You could say they are better teams, but we were two divisions better than Scunthorpe on paper. I think if Pardew picks the right players and gives them confidence to play like Keegan did for example, we'd see improvements quickly. We did beat them at the end of the day mate, and deservedly so. Lower league teams have been upsetting us (and many others teams too) with their gung-ho approach to cup ties as long as I've been watching football. Just glad we showed strong character and prevailed this time, but credit to Scunny they did a good job on us first half. Yes it was a good result. Scunny should have been picked off and destroyed on the counter when they were pressing us but that's just my opinion. It takes quality footballers to do that and I think the side we picked in the first half was unbalanced and contributed to the confusion.

I'm not going to sing the praises of our full backs but controlling the ball and making a short pass is basic and our full backs are good enough for that. What isn't good enough is that only marv and cabaye actively looked to recieve the ball... No no no. At least not good enough under a tiny little bit of pressure. They're both proffessional footballers, yes they can. It's a pretty big flaw for any footballer let alone a premiership footballer. If you recall when Keegan first took over from Allardyce he remarked that the players were almost scared to make short passes for fear of losing the ball. He had to encourage them to play the pass and he'd take responsibility for the mistakes. This is how you teach a passing philosophy. Keegan wasn't brilliant tactically but he knew how to make a team play the way he wanted.

Pardew is starting to show the colours of the manager at West Ham who didn't know how to incorporate Tevez and Mascherano. The new French additions seem to have him non-plussed so sticking with the tried and tested in Joey will be right up his alley.

Ba will score more than Best, no argument. He won't if we keep playing long ball football and hoofing the ball towards his head.

True. Who said that? I've seen a number of people whinging about these two leaving without being replaced. Have to say I'm even more excited at the prospect of Cabaye & Marveaux than those two. Going to be much better to watch. Generally speaking, the posters citing nolan goal record as a major loss know nothing about the dynamics of a football game. Their opinions are worth ignoring. Amen to that.

I'm not a Pardew basher but his inability to get the team playing from the back is a concern. He won't keep his job if he persists in playing Allardyce football with a team increasingly made up of French footballers used to technical football. I'm being generous in assuming he's not got good enough full backs to bring the ball out, but his GK is kicking balls long to the centre forwards as well. And as Tooj pointed out in another thread, Swansea have worse players yet still managed to play nice attractive football. The opposition tonight had a lot to do with how we played, credit to them they pressed very high and forced us out of our stride. Don't know if it is a small pitch but they made it look like one. Premiership teams won't do that to us but of course will have more ability to hurt us. It's a fair point but how often do you see good sides forced out of their stride? I've watched Man U, Chelsea, City and Spurs and their players don't get rushed out of their passing game. You could say they are better teams, but we were two divisions better than Scunthorpe on paper. I think if Pardew picks the right players and gives them confidence to play like Keegan did for example, we'd see improvements quickly.

I'm not a Pardew basher but his inability to get the team playing from the back is a concern. He won't keep his job if he persists in playing Allardyce football with a team increasingly made up of French footballers used to technical football. I'm being generous in assuming he's not got good enough full backs to bring the ball out, but his GK is kicking balls long to the centre forwards as well. And as Tooj pointed out in another thread, Swansea have worse players yet still managed to play nice attractive football. Disagree there With what specifically?

Pardew has had the whole of pre season to make them realise that, I remember when keegan took over from allardyce and in his first game against bolton, had harper roll the ball out to the left back instead of launch it to little oba. Exactly.

I'm not a Pardew basher but his inability to get the team playing from the back is a concern. He won't keep his job if he persists in playing Allardyce football with a team increasingly made up of French footballers used to technical football. I'm being generous in assuming he's not got good enough full backs to bring the ball out, but his GK is kicking balls long to the centre forwards as well. And as Tooj pointed out in another thread, Swansea have worse players yet still managed to play nice attractive football.

It's down to Pardew to instil the passing philosophy really. Keegan might have had his faults but he was meticulous in how he got his teams to play the game. It really does come down to the manager.

To be fair, I don't think it's moronic to say that he's been garbage while here and that is all that matters. I think we'll not see the best of him until he's playing alongside somebody like Ben Arfa who will bring something different to the team. I think Ba has been unlucky so far in that he's been playing with players who are too similar to him. At least I hope that's the reason because he's our best hope of playing a decent forward out of the ones currently at the club. I would agree with this. While I agree he hasn't looked good, you don't get a record like he's got unless you know how to put the ball in the net. I think he is one of those strikers who needs to be playing in a team which provides better service to feet. If he'd been playing the second half he'd have scored when we were creating so many chances.

I think once we start to get the team filled out with players who are comfortable on the ball we'll start to get goals through decent movement and passing rather than relying on a defender to score from free kicks.

Nice free kicks but one of the main reasons our football is so shit at the moment. He hoofs the ball forward at the first sign of pressure from an attacker. The sooner he is off the team sheet the better.

I think he'll be a good un tbh. Once we changed the personnel in the second half and got some ball players on the pitch he livened up quite a bit. Obviously he looked a bit lost when we were trying to play Scunthorpe at their own level with the ball being thumped towards the corner flags.