KaKa

Taylor is unbelievably bad ... how can anyone argue this?

I was nervous until I saw the team. I feel very good.

Just knowing that even if we concede we still have a chance of scoring enough goals to win with the players we have out there.

Wigan vs Bolton ... got to be hoping Wigan wins that one right?

It really is such a shame we can't really enjoy the exciting changes being made at the club at the moment, due to the threat of relegation.

If we could just stay up there will clearly be some very exciting times ahead for us.

It's so nice to see investments being made in the youth at this club and not just reading about other clubs doing it.

Geremi's mobility won't be as much of a problem as long as Beye makes himself available and really bombs forward. This will create space for Geremi to whip in his crosses.

It's funny because other than Geremi we don't really have anyone else who crosses the ball that well.

I also have a feeling Geremi will link up better with Beye and he will get Beye the ball in more dangerous attacking positions.

Milner's impatient style and general lack of awareness didn't really allow Beye to join in the attacking play enough.

Geremi on the right is likely to be what happens.

If he can produce the kinds of crosses and freekicks he was during the ACN then that would be awesome.

Keegan has pretty much shown us that he will go with experience over anything else.

I expect both Martins and Zoggy will come off the bench.

Um ... but weren't the players crap under Sam too?

Geremi did seem a bit overwhelmed in centre midfield, but does seem t do better out wide as either a winger or right back.

Not exactly pacy but his ability to play simple passes and cross from a variety of places means he could be quite valuable as Nobby was for us last season or how Beckham has been lately for England. Neither really bomb up and down the flank yet they are still effective.

Milner does things that a footballer needs to do. Occasionally sets a goal up, occasionally scores one, occasionally puts a cross into the box, occasionally makes a key pass to set someone else away, occasionally beats his man. Probably doesn't do any of them as often as he should. Works his f****** bollocks off as well, not in a false way like Alan Smith by kicking people but in a genuine run-60-yards-to-stop-the-other-team-scoring kind of way.

 

Duff doesn't ever do any of those things. I'm not in the least bit surprised that his return has coincided with this club's worst run of form since 1978. He's by no means the only reason of course (God no), but he is a very big one nonetheless. You're basically adding a man to your midfield who contributes nothing going forward or back and obviously in the process losing someone who does, be it Milner, Geremi, N'Zogbia, Emre, whoever. Geremi had been on the field for two minutes on Saturday when he robbed a defender and whipped in a cross better than Duff ever has for us.

False Hair, false position, false versatility, false scowl, false strength, false shooting, false heading, false leader, false hold up play, false link up play, false ability, false everything.

Would make a great actor as he has managed to con, I don't know how many managers, into believing he is a top footballer, when he isn't even a footballer in the first place.

I think the stick Owen has been getting lately from our fans that he used to get has calmed down quite a bit.

 

He's a c*** . Money grabbing fake fuking footballing prick with a frail body and no heart.

He's a c*** . Money grabbing fake fuking footballing prick with a frail body and no heart.

He's a c*** . Money grabbing fake fuking footballing prick with a frail body and no heart.

He's a c*** . Money grabbing fake fuking footballing prick with a frail body and no heart.

He's a c*** . Money grabbing fake fuking footballing prick with a frail body and no heart.

He's a c*** . Money grabbing fake fuking footballing prick with a frail body and no heart.

He's a c*** . Money grabbing fake fuking footballing prick with a frail body and no heart.

He's a c*** . Money grabbing fake fuking footballing prick with a frail body and no heart.

He's a c*** . Money grabbing fake fuking footballing prick with a frail body and no heart.

c***.

c***.

c***.

c***.

c***.

c***.

c***.

c***.

 

 

Better? 

One of the worst signings ever.

Allardyce is tragic. I held my tongue when he signed this fat waster, and tried to convince myself that maybe Sam's fitness expertise would benefit him. Utter bollox.

Imagine if we had taken a punt on Santa Cruz instead ... makes me sick.

It's a bit obscene as well to be honest, Drogba throwing his money about like that when ordinary fans are scraping the money to buy a shirt for their kids.

It's very likely he gives them away to people for free though.

At the end of the day, no matter how bad a team is our strikers really ought to still be able to fashion some goals out of open play having played so many games.

Martins was managing this despite how crap people feel he is.

Why can't the much better Owen do it then?

The guy can't even shoot the ball!!! He never shoots during matches?! I mean he knows the team sucks and he isn'tt likely to get enough quality chances, at least have the odd random pop from distance for goodness sake! No one will hold it against you.

The guy is one of themost limited strikers in the premiership right now.

When Martins came on yesterday, I knew for a fact he would force a defender to make a mistake and I knew for a fact he would have a decent strike or two at goal from distance.

He did both on more than one occasion and caused genuine panic in the Liverpool defence.

Despite not having the ideal partner for him in our team right now he simply needs to be out there. He has to be the very first name on our team sheet.

That is the honest truth.

Keegan won't drop Owen for the same reason England managers wouldn't for so long. He scores in crucial matches. Unfortunately, without pace he can be easily marked out of a game. The best bet suerly has to be to play him and Martins so we have sometthing else for the opposition to worry about?

 

 

Owen scoring in crucial matches is a myth. In international tournaments his record is shambolic

 

How is it a myth? off the top of my head...

 

vs Argentina 98 (goal + pen)

vs Brazil 02

vs Arsenal FA Cup Final (2 goals)

vs Man Utd Charity Shield

vs Portgual 04 (goal + pen)

 

Charity Shield?

 

Owen's problem isn't that he doesn't score in crucial games, it's that he's finished.

Simple as that, it really is. People just refuse to accept it. Why I will never know.

Isn't Martins needing a player alongside him who is a target man 1) totally obvious and 2) what plenty people have been saying since he arrived?

 

His best games were almost always alongside Sibierski. Some of their link up play was excellent at times and Sibierski is pretty limited to say the least, despite being an infinitely better player than Smith.

That is why I mentioned Berbatov, as the type of player I felt would form a good partnership with Martins.

I don't think a standard brutish target man like Heskey would necessarily work too great either.

Martins needs someone who drops a little deeper and gets involved with the midfield play and looks to thread things through for him.

Funnily enough, if you dropped Owen and Smith out of the reckoning and replaced them with the two forwards on the bench - Martins and Carroll - I think you'd have a front pairing that would put the shits up our relegation rivals. Even if they didn't score, they might create enough havoc to get others in.

This is what makes our whole situation all the more frustrating.

We've continuously watched the same people fail us all season, but there isn't even the slightest evidence of any changes being made.

Butt, Smith, Duff and Owen are apparently untouchable, having not achieved much of anything this season.

Our top goalscorer, despite being away for over a month, however, cannot find a place in the team.

Simply infuriating.

The media is playing a huge part in this. They to some degree are picking the team we play.

 

KK is understandly following the same line as many others that in a time of crisis you need your old heads on the field, those who have proven themselves in the top flight.

 

The media would have a field day if the likes of Owen, Butt, Barton, Smith and Given were dropped in favour of Martins, Lua Lua, Carrol et al.

 

IMO while KK plays the big names then the fault for this season will be deflected from him to his predessors or the players themselves. The minute he starts to pick his 'own' team instead of the stars then it's his reponsibility.

 

He may also think that the pressure of a relegation fight is too much for some of the younger players in the camp and that the so called big names are the only ones that can handle the situation.

 

It's a straight choice between Owen and Martins, because of their physical size, I don't think any manager would pair them together and on reputation Owen always wins, not that that is right.

If this was indeed Keegan's thinking then I could somewhat understand, although it would still irritate me immensely.

However, Keegan chose to play both Owen and Duff as strikers and left Martins out over the weekend. I was extremely dissapointed by this. I doubt you could find two smaller, weaker specimens of men never mind footballers.

Someone I was having a chat with mentioned how our struggles this season coincided with Owen's return to fitness and the inability to integrate him into the team.

Do people agree with this?

I wonder if we would have been better off this season if he had maintained his struggles with his fitness.

How many games have we won where he has started as opposed to those games he hasn't started?

Martins would be tons better in a decent team with some movement iyam. Not many of our players can I say that about.

 

In exactly the same way that Adebayor would look so much worse playing for us instead of Arsenal. He definitely wouldn't be the same player he is right now if he were in our team.

 

It troubles me that people can't see this. Instead they will tell you that Adebayor is a class player and has always been much better than Martins, when his early time at Arsenal proves otherwise.

I'll tell you Martins will never be as good as Adebayor. Feel free to bump this when he proves me wrong.

 

Fair enough if that is your opinion, but you cannot really say this with any real certainty.

 

If Martins ends up leaving us I really would love to see him go to a decent premiership outfit, just to see what becomes of him in a better footballing environment than we have been able to provide for him since he has joined us.

Well I was obviously offering my opinion. I say it with a fair degree of certainty all the same. Why the f*** would you love to see him go to a rival if you rate him though? I think some people are more arsed about being right on here than they are about the good of the club.

 

Didn't mean it like that at all. I was just saying that it would be interesting to see how he might do in the premiership with better players around him, should we decide to move him on.

 

I would hope that we wouldn't move him on, and if we do so I would hope that we got players of a high calibre in anyway, so that we are a better team and we don't suffer for it.

 

I just would like to see him succeed in the premiership as I believe he can do it. If it is with us then all the better.

 

I remember intensely disliking Dyer for a long time before he left, but couldn't bear the thought of selling him to another English club cos it was plain to see he had the potential to come back and haunt us. Same applies to Martins, but that doesn't mean he should our main striker over the next few seasons.

I reckon most people, while rueing what mmight have been, were probably pleased enough to see John Dahl Tomasson making a success of himself at PSV then Milan - he seemed like a decent lad and it just didn't work for him here. If he had gone to Man U and had that success though....

"If Martins ends up leaving us I really would love to see him go to a decent premiership outfit"

How else was I meant to interpret that? And I hope he goes abroad if we sell him.

I don't know how you were meant to interpret it.

I like martins and want to be able to see him do well in the premiership and watch him every week.

This doesn't mean we as a team will be crap with no good players does it?! Couldn't we still have an excellent team better than the one Martins is in? Couldn't our players whoever we choose to bring in still be excellent players too?!

I would just hate to see Martins end up on a poor team similar to the one we currently have and hear people continue to claim he is rubbish.

If he went somewhere like Man City, Villa or Everton I have no doubt he would be a better player than he has had a chance to show so far. I would hope we would be able to build a better team so that we wouldn't miss him though, and we could still enjoy our club's success.

Hope that is a bit clearer.

Martins would be tons better in a decent team with some movement iyam. Not many of our players can I say that about.

 

In exactly the same way that Adebayor would look so much worse playing for us instead of Arsenal. He definitely wouldn't be the same player he is right now if he were in our team.

 

It troubles me that people can't see this. Instead they will tell you that Adebayor is a class player and has always been much better than Martins, when his early time at Arsenal proves otherwise.

I'll tell you Martins will never be as good as Adebayor. Feel free to bump this when he proves me wrong.

 

Fair enough if that is your opinion, but you cannot really say this with any real certainty.

 

If Martins ends up leaving us I really would love to see him go to a decent premiership outfit, just to see what becomes of him in a better footballing environment than we have been able to provide for him since he has joined us.

Well I was obviously offering my opinion. I say it with a fair degree of certainty all the same. Why the f*** would you love to see him go to a rival if you rate him though? I think some people are more arsed about being right on here than they are about the good of the club.

Didn't mean it like that at all. I was just saying that it would be interesting to see how he might do in the premiership with better players around him, should we decide to move him on.

I would hope that we wouldn't move him on, and if we do so I would hope that we got players of a high calibre in anyway, so that we are a better team and we don't suffer for it.

I just would like to see him succeed in the premiership as I believe he can do it. If it is with us then all the better.

Martins would be tons better in a decent team with some movement iyam. Not many of our players can I say that about.

 

In exactly the same way that Adebayor would look so much worse playing for us instead of Arsenal. He definitely wouldn't be the same player he is right now if he were in our team.

 

It troubles me that people can't see this. Instead they will tell you that Adebayor is a class player and has always been much better than Martins, when his early time at Arsenal proves otherwise.

I'll tell you Martins will never be as good as Adebayor. Feel free to bump this when he proves me wrong.

 

That's not what he's getting at.

 

Both have good attributes but both are pretty s**** at the basics, what Arsenal have done well is they've disguised Adebayor's shortcomings rather than trying to improve on them, his first touch is still awful and his decision making is still poor too but they've gone out of their way to play to his strengths, he's good in the air and strong on the ball so they play to those strengths, the biggest advantage he has is having a team full of technically gifted players that pass and move a ball well and create space for him, something we could only dream about but should aim for.

Exactly. You did a much better job of explaining that than I have managed to so far.

What you have said is basically what I was getting at when I said that it annoys me that people admit that Owen is better with a strong target man type beside him, but won't acknowledge that Martins would also be better with a more technical creative type beside him, someone like Berbatov for example.

It's about recognising each individual's strengths and surrounding them with the players to get the most out of them.

Martins would be tons better in a decent team with some movement iyam. Not many of our players can I say that about.

 

In exactly the same way that Adebayor would look so much worse playing for us instead of Arsenal. He definitely wouldn't be the same player he is right now if he were in our team.

 

It troubles me that people can't see this. Instead they will tell you that Adebayor is a class player and has always been much better than Martins, when his early time at Arsenal proves otherwise.

I'll tell you Martins will never be as good as Adebayor. Feel free to bump this when he proves me wrong.

Fair enough if that is your opinion, but you cannot really say this with any real certainty.

If Martins ends up leaving us I really would love to see him go to a decent premiership outfit, just to see what becomes of him in a better footballing environment than we have been able to provide for him since he has joined us.

Martins would be tons better in a decent team with some movement iyam. Not many of our players can I say that about.

In exactly the same way that Adebayor would look so much worse playing for us instead of Arsenal. He definitely wouldn't be the same player he is right now if he were in our team.

It troubles me that people can't see this. Instead they will tell you that Adebayor is a class player and has always been much better than Martins, when his early time at Arsenal proves otherwise.