Shak

Krul Simpson Taylor Williamson Santon Anita Tiote Marveaux Ben Arfa Obertan Ba Wouldn't mind seeing us give that a go. Really want us to go with a 4-3-3 but I don't think Ba will be put out left considering how much he's outplayed Cisse this year. Start with that and really try and fucking go at a team for once. Have Ben Arfa and Obertan switch flanks every so often, with the extra man in midfield we should be able to get a better grip in midfield than we have so far this year and actually string a few passes together.

By the way, teams that keep the ball well, create plenty of chances and score goals tend to be difficult to beat.

He's already made us a difficult side to beat though IMO (something that he deserves a tremendous amount of credit for), do you not think he should be pushing on and trying to build on that? The next logical step seems to be to focus on our attacking play, which on the evidence if this season he either isn't doing at all or else he has no idea how to go about it.

That's fucking desperate like.

As a few others have said I feel bad for him but but I'm interested to see what this leads to in terms of our first eleven. Get well soon Jonas.

If he did add something new and it failed horribly, would you say he should have stuck with what he done last season? If that thing was attempting to play good football then absolutely not. Had we been going out and really trying to pass and move and were getting caught on the break a lot due to our players being out of position (which is what I suspect a lot of Pardew's tactics right now are aimed at preventing) then I'd certainly be a lot more forgiving than I am of what we've been seeing this year. I'm not going to go on about it much because I think he's done a great job since he's been here and I really would love to see him succeed, but if I'm being 100% honest I don't see things going well for him from here on. I think he's a very good tactician from a defensive point of view, generally we're a hard team to beat and we look well organised and committed. But it appears that he doesn't have a clue about how to get a team playing well when in possession. It's not that what we're trying to do doesn't work, it's that we don't seem to have the first idea what we should be trying to do. His strategy so far seems to be to talk about playing good football in the media and hope that that somehow that translates itself onto the pitch. We'll continue to get plenty of scrappy points in games we don't play well in because of how well organised we are off the ball, but at the same time we'll keep dropping points at home to teams that we really should be beating because we have no idea how to attack them.

As for Pardew, my main feeling towards him this year is disappointment tbh. Think he's bottled it big time. Should have been looking to push on and try and build on what he did last year. Instead he's tried to just repeat the same things he did last year with nothing new added, been a huge let down IMO.

*WARNING: Short, concise post coming* Swansea didn't pass us off the park tbh, they just knocked it around aimlessly for the sake of it and hardly had a sniff of our goal to show for it. We looked the far more threatening side. Anyway, I can see what Otter is saying to some extent. The main reason we're so shit in an attacking sense is that our movement off the ball is absolutely fucking woeful. There's no reason a 4-4-2 can't produce good football, but with the exception of Ben Arfa none of our players ever stray from their positions at all. This is the root of the problem. A good passing team will have players that constantly drift into different areas, finding space to receive the ball or dragging defenders out of position for a teammate to run into and exploit. They move as a team, working to create space for each other as well as themselves. We don't do that at all. Everyone has their position and that's where they play. When we go 4-4-2 though our two CM's generally stand next to each other like a pair of holding midfielders. It's rare that either of them ventures forward and gets beyond either of the strikers. Our forwards meanwhile aren't much better. Neither drifts out wide to try and find a bit of space, Ba sometimes tries to drop deep but while he's quite decent technically he's no playmaker by any stretch of the imagination. The result is that the divide between our midfield and attack is massive, and the natural outcome is then loads of long balls. Compounding the problem is the fact that our first choice wingers, Ben Arfa and Jonas, are both much more comfortable cutting inside than they are hugging the byline and getting crosses into the box. Our first choice fullbacks are no better, Santon because he's more comfortable cutting inside too and Simpson because he's extremely limited as an attacker. The net result it that our front six end up setting up like this when in possession. Cabaye Tiote Jonas Ben Arfa Ba Cisse No space to play the ball forward in, no threat from out wide, no real attacking plan at all. It's generally hope that Ben Arfa produces something special at some point or that one of our hopeful punts forward bounces nicely for Ba or Cisse and they can put one away. Switching to a 4-3-3 isn't going to be some sort of great cure for our problems, but it would help a lot for a number of reasons. First, when we go with three in the middle it leads to Cabaye playing in an advanced position. This helps a lot as we now have someone who is capable of linking the midfield to the attack in a way that Ba can't. We still have our two holding midfielders in Jonas and Tiote, but we now have someone who's capable of drifting around between midfield and attack and picking out a killer pass in the final third. It also takes our two strikers out of each others shadows. By forcing one of them out onto the left you're making him provide some space for the team, simply by just standing out there. He's still not going to provide a tremendous threat in terms of getting to the byline and putting crosses in, but it stops teams from being able to just play very narrowly in defence and giving us no space to work in. It also puts what is by far our best player in a position where he's much more likely to do some real damage. In a 4-4-2 Ben Arfa tends to get the ball in two main ways. The first is to drop deep and receive it from Simpson. This means he's generally getting the ball somewhere in his own half with most of the opposition team in front of him, good as he is he's not going to hurt them from there very often. The other way is to drift infield and try and find some space between the midfielders and the strikers. However once he receives it what does he have in front of him? Usually just two strikers who are within a few yards of each other, neither is pulling wide to create space for him to work with or for their strike partner to exploit. On top of this Jonas is providing no outlet on the left and Simpson isn't going to go bombing down the right on the overlap either. So it's either try and pick out a perfect through ball or go it alone, not a whole lot that you can do there. Stick him in a more advanced position and he's much more likely to get the ball in a position where he can hurt teams. With Cabaye linking midfield to attack he's less inclined to drift infield every time, he can try and isolate his fullback and when he does get the ball he'll be in position to actually do something with it more often. I don't think switching to 4-3-3 is going to lead to us playing wonderful football all of a sudden, but I do think that it will allow us to build from the back much better than we currently do. It's a system that suits our players far better than 4-4-2 does, I really don't even think there's much debate to be had about that.

Says it all that I wasn't bothered to stay up and watch it, there's no excitement in watching us play at all this year. Best case scenario is generally a lucky three points after a disjointed performance, but we're a fucking chore to watch at the best of times. I'm appreciative of the good things Pardew has done but I'm finding it difficult not to really lay into him right now. The fact that this group of players have shown they can play good football if set up to do so yet he insists on his shit, negative approach to games makes it hard to have any sympathy for him. He's looking more and more like a coward, afraid of getting the odd thumping by allowing his players to go out and express themselves, it's so disappointing. Still giving him a bit more time to get his shit together, but honestly I don't know if I expect him to do so.

We all make mistakes Dave, don't beat yourself up about it.

http://thesecularity.com/download/file.php?id=721&t=1

Can't remember who exactly, but one of them was in fucking acres of space for that, just Cabaye's cross was fucking shite.

I'm guessing this may have a lot to do with why we're not seeing him. Gonna be very hard for him to break into the first team and make an impression if his mind isn't fully focused on football, would make sense for Pardew to keep him out of the firing line until his head is in the right place for it.

I love the smell of victory in the morning.

What an absolute pile of fucking bullshit. Jammy fucking shit goal and a pathetic sending off, what a miserable season it's been so far.

Would appear that Stu and I shall be watching this together in a pub in Melbourne. I'm gonna start shouting anti-Ashley abuse at the screen if we're losing, see how he takes it.

Krul Simpson Colo Taylor Santon Tiote Cabaye Jonas Ben Arfa Ci(Ba)sse Is how I expect us to line up by the way, same as usual. Looks so tasty on paper, hopefully we'll play some great stuff like we have been doing with it all year.

This might just end up being the worst game of football the world has ever seen. Would take a point right now, no fucking doubt about it.

Losing to Man U is never the end of the world. The fact that the game was over after 15 minutes has to be alarming though. Had they really wanted blood I reckon they could have absolutely hammered us yesterday. Wouldn´t hold my breath. Been saying that all season. Luckily the Mackems have been fairly shit themselves this season, agree that I'm not too hopeful that Pardew has learned a great deal. He seemed to be attributing it to Man U being amazing yesterday rather than us being shit again, but we'll see.

Gonna be a real pity for him if he persists with this 4-4-2 rubbish and we struggle this year. The fans will start to get on his back and, to be quite honest, I'll find it hard to have much sympathy for him. He found a system last year that had us producing fluid, entertaining football and winning games while doing it. This year he's dumped it in favour of playing a narrow, defensive, long ball system and we've been brutal to watch as a result and quite frankly are lucky to have as many points as we do this year. He continues to talk a good game but the fans aren't stupid and his words are going to carry less and less weight each week while the performances continue to be as bad as they've been. Needs to sort his shit out, to be quite frank. Another shit performance and a loss against the Mackems and there'll be the first real murmurs of discontent amongst the fan base. That'll be a bit harsh on him given how well he did last year, but as I said any fucking idiot can see how shit his tactics have been this year and as long as he persists with them it'll be hard to have much sympathy for him.

Another rubbish performance tbh, game was over after 15 minutes and Man U just cruised their way through it. Kind of result that's been coming this season tbh, hopefully it serves as a wake up call before the game against the Mackems.

Don't think there's any way Pardew will drop Jonas, which is unfortunate if we're staying with a 4-4-2 because he's absolutely finished as an offensive force out wide. Would love to see Ferguson get a few games on the left wing for the first team. Another option would be Ferguson at left back and Jonas LW. Ferguson overlapping down the left giving us width and Jonas helping to protect Ferguson defensively. Hope to see plenty of him in the coming months in any case, he's at that age where he really needs to start breaking through and as others have said he's impressed pretty much every time he's gotten a chance in the first team.

Kick off is at 5am for me.