KaKa

It really is a sad situation ... I mean why can't we pass the ball? Forget the likes of Blackburn and Portsmouth who are well ahead of us at the moment, even West Ham and Middlesborough pass the ball around better than we do, and generally play better football.  This really is unacceptable.

Sam's position for now shouldn't be in danger and we should give him time to adjust and come to terms with the new position he is in. However, if things are still as they are now by the end of the season then his time might be up.

I am sincerely hoping that his plans were severely hindered byt he summer of upheaval and so he focused on securing the basic necessities first i.e. squad depth and players who could keep things tight and tide us over till January. Come January I am hoping for a higher class of player who can then allow us to begin to establish a more balanced and better brand of football which should get us better results.

I live in hope ...

I can't help but feel he was only given so much initially as he wasn't exactly their guy, and they probably wanted to see how he would go about things before backing him fully with funds.

3 match ban for Joey according to the Times today ... just great.

Curbishley had the sense to play him in the middle as part of a three and he is thriving.

Funny but I think Taylor might have better potential as a right back. He's a bit of a showmanshipsort and getting forward allows him to express this side of himself. At centre back it's way too dangerous.

It's become apparent to me in the last couple of weeks that Allardyce is blinded by having a world class player in Michael Owen at his disposal. This has led him due to move away from the system that made him successful at Bolton. The problem is that Owen can only play in a front two while Allardyce wants to play 3 central midfield players as its been so successful for him in the past. So he's trying a strange hybrid formation that has a central midfield player playing wide- Geremi, Barton and Emre have all done this of late. The Portsmouth match did little to support the cause of playing two natural widemen.

 

The same thing happened when Bolton first bought Anelka.  He began by moving to 4-4-2 but in the end played Davies wide right to maintain the shape of the side. Fortunately, Allardyce learned his lesson that time. Unfortunately, I don't see Viduka or Owen playing wide anytime soon. 

 

What makes the situation a whole lot worse is that Michael Owen looks nowhere near the sort of world class player you compromise your formation for.

 

For me, if Allardyce is to succeed he'll probably need to ditch Owen and bring in a centre forward who can hold the ball and battle with Viduka for a single central striker position. You could then play Martins/ Milner/ Duff/ N'Zogbia off this central striker.

 

In the end, after spending years at Bolton probably longing to manage top class players, the biggest player Allardyce will ever manage must be sold or will end up costing him his job.

 

 

Spot on.

As long as Owen is in the team we will continue to struggle and it's as simple as that.

Emre is absolutely worthless ...

No Faye on the corner.

Kenwyne Jones is a huge danger!

Is Harper retarded? Seriously?

Such bad body language and effort with the kicks?! Why?

Taylor is such an awful defender.

Taylor has so many bad habits as a defender it is worrying ...

We're going to have to have Rozehnal mark Jones.

Taylor is bound to do something very silly.

Two promising players that should be brought along a lot slower in my opinion. They are playing way too many games right now and they really aren't quite good enough yet to be doing so.

Their lack of experience and nous really costs them and us in so any games. Just not quite their yet. Imagine if we had Duff at his best and Wright-philips at his best on each wing just as an example. We would be twice the team we are right now. We need that level of experience and performance on the wings in my opinion.

I think they should both be brought through a bit slower and I agree they shouldn't be first team players at all for me. When Duff returns and Sam has decked him into shape he should start on the left ahead of Zoggy. We should get a decent experienced right winger to start ahead of Milner on the right.

They should be brought along the way Nani at Man U is or the likes of Diaby and Theo at Arsenal. They definitely shouldn't be in the first team right now. They are just way too inconsisent and naive.

This is going to be a tricky call for Sam this weekend and it should be interesting to see what he goes with.

 

With Kenwyne Jones playing upfront for Sunderland we absolutely have to have Faye in defence to challenge Jones in the air, so Faye in my opinion is not an option to step into the defensive midfield slot.

 

I would like to see Rozehnal in this role but I'm not sure if Sam would play him there in such an important gamw which is sure to have a fiery atmosphere, especially as he hasn't played this position for us yet.

 

I think we might see a 4-3-3/4-5-1 to compensate for Butt's abscence. Geremi, Barton and Butt in midfield perhaps?

 

Who do you think Sam will go for and who should he go for?

 

 

 

Hmmmm.

Oops meant Smith there!

Sorted now. Good spot.

This is going to be a tricky call for Sam this weekend and it should be interesting to see what he goes with.

With Kenwyne Jones playing upfront for Sunderland we absolutely have to have Faye in defence to challenge Jones in the air, so Faye in my opinion is not an option to step into the defensive midfield slot.

I would like to see Rozehnal in this role but I'm not sure if Sam would play him there in such an important gamw which is sure to have a fiery atmosphere, especially as he hasn't played this position for us yet.

I think we might see a 4-3-3/4-5-1 to compensate for Butt's abscence. Geremi, Barton and Smith in midfield perhaps?

Who do you think Sam will go for and who should he go for?

Newcastle and Tottenham have spent twice as much as Arsenal have over the last few years and look at what they have achieved. We should be emulating the likes of Arsenal and not Chelsea.

Get a real manager with a vision and don't just throw money at the situation.

I'm surprised so many people would be happy to have the club in the financial state Chelsea are currently in if it meant winning something.

" A true Worldclass trophy signing" ( Whatever that means)

FFS not again. I thought that all this s**** was flushed away with Shepherd going!

Is it Ronaldinho, or maybe Rooney again. Don't get sucked in.

How many times did we hear we were about to sign a Mr Big?

What we want is a balanced team which can keep clean sheets, create opportunities from midfield with  strikers who can deliver goals.

When the crowd was chanting for Martins on Saturday I said to the bloke next to me that the best striker in the world would make no difference to how we were playing. Big long balls down the middle?

Which 1 player would have made a significant difference on Saturday or at Reading last week?

A true worldclass trophy signing?  In a good team yes. in the present set-up "All fur coat and no Knickers" as they say

 

Drogba would have dealt with those long balls quite handily actually ...

Maybe we're after him.

Sign him and move Rozehnal into midfield instead of Butt.

Or even move Faye into midfield.

He's f****** s***..i can't understand why anyone here would want him, Taylor is a far better defender than Ben Haim tbh..

Please, please, please do not take offence to this, but you have completely lost your mind if you honestly think that.

I know we've not won the title or owt, but City are doing well at the moment because of our false budget.

 

And I have to say, my seat is much more comfortable when I'm watching players of the calibre of Elano, Martin Petrov and Vedran Corluka than hopeless s**** like Paul Dickov, Ben Thatcher and Joey Barton.

 

Winning the title...meh. I just want the best (most entertaining, however you want to spin it) in the shirt, and I don't give a f*** how they get there. If it ends up with a pot in the cupboard, so be it. Even if it doesn't I'd still rather watch better players than not and I don't really see how anyone could want otherwise.

 

Short answer - yes

In my opinion what City did this summer is a perfect example of how we ought to go about things as they didn't overspend on a single one of their new players. They did an excellent job of scouting and got top players without forking out £20 million for each of them. This is why their success has been much more legit. Most people didn't know a single one of the players they brought in.

Imagine if they had brought in Robinho for £18 million rather than Petrov for £3.5 million, and Van der Vaart for £20 million rather than Elano for £8 million, along with the massive wages these guys would command. Even if they were in the exact same position as they are now, I'm not sure it would have been as enjoyable.

I have to say I'm with Dave on this one. I would rather we spent money a little more sensibly over a few seasons and aimed to win it or at least challenge in about three years.

I would absolutely hate to do a Chelsea and be burdened with the huge salaries that come with buying a ton of the very best players all of who would be guaranteed to be coming here for the money alone.

We ought to be a little more shrewd and go for the likes of Elano who wasn't quite recognised as being in the top tier of players yet, rather than chase players who are likely being eyed up by the likes of Madrid, Chelsea etc and therefore who would look to screw us over.

For example, instead of spending a fortune on maybe a Ronaldhino who might be made available this summer. We ought to be looking at the likes of Diego at Bremen or Carvalho at Shakthar.

Awful decision. Yes they have slipped down the table but they haven't been getting hammered from what I recall. They've lost quite a few close games I think. They haven't looked that bad at all. No worse than Spurs for example  :giggle:

The loss of Heskey has essentially cost him his job as he was the only decent striker they had pretty much. Of all the decisions he made the worst had to be letting Henri Camara go to West Ham on loan?! What the hell was that about! Camara is far better than all the strikers they have right now.

How is Butt, Barton and Emre in a three more defensive than four across the middle?

 

Well it's a 4-5-1 when we defend. So the wide forwards play a roll defensively just like Diouf and Davies did at Bolton. Therefore the midfield is much tighter.

 

We don't have the players then.

Any two of Martins, Zoggy and Milner could do a serviceable job. Preferrably Martins and Zoggy though.

How is Butt, Barton and Emre in a three more defensive than four across the middle?

Well it's a 4-5-1 when we defend. So the wide forwards play a roll defensively just like Diouf and Davies did at Bolton. Therefore the midfield is much tighter.

We played the 4-3-3 today for half an hour. Didn't help.

 

I was thinking more from a defensive standpoint.

 

I think we need to play the 4-3-3 until we settle down at the back. It's not like we are so much better attacking wise in the 4-4-2 anyway.

 

Can't have your cake and eat it though. If we play a defensive 4-3-3 (if it's possible) that means Geremi, Butt and maybe Smith in midfield. Not good.

Nah ... we could go with Butt, Barton and Geremi or indeed Butt, Barton and Emre. Nothing wrong with that at all I actually think it would make our overall passing play better when we attack.