Tachikoma

There was nothing unique about it at the time. Replacing a physically weak and frail attacking midfielder with a more defensively stout one while leading 1-0 is a perfectly logical thing to do. People like to use hyperbole when they have hindsight. In fact, we have played good football before with Perch and Anita in midfield. The much larger issue is the general attitude the team played with, especially after Reading scored a goal. We seemed fairly comfortable before that. We were too scared to attack after we scored and for all the focus on defence, the team capitulated and fell into chaos after allowing the fortuitous equaliser. We've seen this story a multitude of times this season. The sad thing about us setting up defensively to "counter attack" is that the only form of counter attack we know of is to boot the ball straight at the striker and hope for the best

I'd only want Blanc tbh. Adkins is probably a good manager, but wont take us further than midtable anyway. Even though thats what we all might have to settle for under Ashley.. Regular midtable finishes

Seriously? Now that everyone accepts that this season is a trainwreck you had to go one further and start being negative about next season? With the team we have that is realistic - how many will want to stay? I can't see any of Cabaye, HBA, Marveaux, Krul, or even Debuchy wanting to slug it out in the championship.

Hughes is one of the few who are just as bad as Pardew, if we sack Pardew and get him I ... just don't know anymore.

The starting line up was fine, but those substitutions were just astoundingly bad I knew and said a couple of days ago he's start Shola and Jonas. he just can't help himself. Neither contributed to us going forward. But then, how well a player can attack is not Pardew's chief consideration. It wasn't Shola or Jonas's fault that we lost today, and it sure as hell wasn't their fault that we went to a 4-5-1 in the second half.

The starting line up was fine, but those substitutions were just astoundingly bad

Will take Adkins, Di Matteo... ok probably not Hughes.

Was 7, should be 9 now.

Only just learnt what that meant a couple days ago, but yeup.

We literally could have done them 2 or 3 nil if we had just kept the same shape in the second half. When losing: Do nothing to change shape until 70th or 80th minute. When winning: Take off most creative player at 65 Has to be deliberate

Wow. How the fuck did Cisse do that.

Willo probably won't.

He's done the same thing ever since he's managed us though, he never, ever lets the team play

Watch Reading turn on the style now.

That's the problem isn't it? He should have gone ages ago if we wanted to salvage anything from the season

Welp, that's that. Pardew better be packing his bags now.

How the fuck are we going to win this

Bigi on for Yohan

MORE DEFENSIVE SUBS! Don't want to lose the precious point, do we? Must be done. The cunt. Bigi getting ready

FFUUUUUUUUUUU

We'll tuck Santon into CB

:yao:

Justification for whacky lineup: 1. We suck at using the ball in clever ways, so its silly to attempt the European-style 4-2-3-1, which will probably turn into an uber defensive 4-5-1. The reason 4-3-3 worked so well was because we had HBA, who we don't have this game. 2. There will be a certain amount of hoofing, no matter how we line up, and without Shola/Ranger we simply cannot compete for anything in the air. 3. A 4-4-2 with Santon and Marveaux gives us two wingers who are capable of crossing the ball, which should speed up our transition from defence to attack and add to Cisse's effectiveness. I know

What fresh hell is this!? Pardew is comfortable with 4-4-2. I try to come up with the most offensive 4-4-2 I can think of.