Tachikoma

Ramage, Shola and Steven Taylor? We nearly ruined Shearer by playing him as GK though.

Games Luque played in (under Roeder): Sunderland, Lillestrom, Wigan, Aston Villa, Ventspills. Games Luque scored in: Sunderland, Lillestrom and Wigan (bad offside decision). Game Martins played in: Every match since Aston Villa Game Martins scored in: West Ham (edit) Talinn (2) ****ing silly to write off a player like that, especially when you consider that people are mostly judging him by the games where he was thrown into the deep end by a clueless manager carrying a personal vendetta.

Used it, and won my group match this week (2 wins in a go now) should have stayed with Giggs instead of getting C.Ronaldo, though :/

I'm in. What do I do now?

Agree with everything except the bit that Diouf was difficult to pickup. A well drilled defense would never have made a mistake as big as that - that goal was schoolboy stuff. I thought Ramage coped with Diouf reasonably well, Diouf didn't contribute that much in open play other than a few theatrical dives. The fat prick on the other hand...

Anelka AND Martins.

Glen Johnson and Wayne Bridge - Can't possibly say no to them.

ugh, horror week. Lowest ever score this time, and I'm tempted to use my wildcard already.

thats basically the same thing Toon4Life said, but yeah, good reason not to pick "Roeder out". I took the 4th option.

Everyone who is criticising him seem to have forgotten that he's only 21 and at the moment, he looks very raw but he obviously has the talent, kinda like Milner in his first season with us. I'm not sure whats Roeder thinking (assuming that he actually followed Martins progress prior to signing him), giving him the number 9 shirt and throwing him into the deep end right off the bat; it isn't doing his confidence any good and judging by his decision making yesterday, he badly needs it.

When he played against Aston Villa and Ventspills, I did see some effort in the performance contrary to what everyone says; he tries to flick on headers, comes back to defend, tries to pull off little one-twos (didn't work at all though), and he does try pressuring defenders by closing down their passing options (and did force defenders into making mistakes once in a while), despite the fact that he obviously isn't that type of player. However his touch and passing was mostly shite, in a way that suggests that he is lacking in self-confidence. He truly does not have a future at the club anymore; however I would like to see him given a run in the team for at least a month before january, if only to boost his sell on value.

Has he even played 5 games in a stretch yet? NO. If he plays 5 in a go (not alone upfront in a 4-5-1 like his last two appearances) and doesn't put in a performance ala Martins against west ham for at least one of them, and didn't play reasonably well for the remaining 4, fine, then I'll accept that he's shite.

booyah, finally got one prediction right

Must be his papa did you get a good look at his face?

overrated, 6 years older than he really is, panic buy, that I can accept as an opinion. but "poor man's cisse"?

Everything comes down to Roeder's ability as a manager now. If he's as shitty as the pessimistic lot says he is, we'll find out soon enough.

Mallorca, partnering Eto'O.

Luque looked a fish out of water, end of story. Yes, his control/passes were shitty for a player of his (former) reputation, but I think, he realises it too, judging by his body language anyway. This one's a little knee-jerk :/ as poor as the opposition was, they were rather well organised at the back and didn't leave much room in the box for a lone striker to exploit. Frankly I don't think Luque will succeed either, but he should be given a chance to play his normal game for a few matches (as in a 4-4-2 with someone else leading the line), and I wish Roeder would show him half the faith he has shown in Shola.

Lets put things in perspective: its only his first 90 minutes in god knows how long, and the first poor performance after a string of promising ones, not to mention that he was never going to look good playing alone upfront. Give the abuse a break already.

At any rate, Luque isn't going to be sold in this transfer window, now that he's cup tied and with the lack of apparent suitors.

Martins would form a better strike partnership with Luque than with Shola.

haha, not surprising if its true, really.

Luque did play in a 4-4-2 at Mallorca, didn't he?

Malaysia, where half the football-watching population are England supporters

If we can keep the ball on the deck (a definite possibility with the quality in our starting midfield four), Luque and Martins could be something like Luque's partnership with Eto'O at Mallorca.