Chris_R

It's hard to actually dislike Shola because he comes across as a nice chap who is just playing for the club he supports, actually living the dream that all of us have. The problem is, he's about as good as most of us would be. Fucking terrible footballer 95% of the time. Immobile, slow, ponderous. That said, Pele would have looked crap today. The service, if you can even call it that, was non-existant and you can't expect anything of a striker if there's no balls being put into the box for him to attack. Shola's job today as the main striker was to convert chances, not create them from nothing. He wasn't given any chances to put away, so I find it hard to make him a scapegoat for today's gutless performance.

Brighton fans singing "You're getting sacked in the morning". Sadly they're wrong.

Because he's playing on his natural side. Ferguson often manages a few good deliveries from the left as well. It's not rocket science, yet Pardew fails to grasp it week in, week out.

So our best attempt on their goal was from a Brighton player's knee. Says everything about us.

Awful dive / reaction. Still, it gets that muppet off the pitch.

Why's our fucking clownshoes manager got right-footed Obertan on the left and left footed Sammy Ameobi on the right? Has he got no concept of the role of a winger? 45 minutes of hoofball coming up to Ranger and Shola.

How long do we keep saying that we hope he can turn it round? I mean, we all do. I don't think anyone cares who is in charge as long as we do well and win. But it's getting ridiculous now and he's showing no signs whatsoever of learning from his mistakes.

Mediocre would be, say, putting the right players in the right positions but doing nothing especially clever. Our starting line-up would be best described as "tactical suicide". Almost everyone on here could see that at 19:01 when the teamsheet was announced and we saw the semicolons delineating GK;Defence;Midfield;Strikers that showed us that Cisse was in midfield and Shola fucking Ameobi was up front.

So our striker was at right back, our right back was at left back, our right winger was on the left wing and Shola was on the pitch. Apart from that, the line-up was spot on. Well done Alan. At least you put Krul in goal.

This, many times over. Obertan looked dangerous, and he was our only genuine wide player on the pitch. Taking him off left us playing through the middle with Ameobi, Ranger and Cisse up front. You can't play that narrow and get through teams, and it was obvious that we were just going to revert to hoofing it. Which we did. What we needed was more width, not less. Obertan on the right, Ferguson on the left, Ameobi and Cisse up front. Or Cisse and Ranger up front. Or Sammy on the left and Obertan on the right, with Cisse plus Shola or Ranger up front. So many good choices and he consistently picks the wrong ones. I'm out of patience.

That Caulkin quote, ffs. Of course Cisse and Ba didn't work. Whenever we played 4-4-2 with them up front we had the wingers on the wrong bloody wings. We could have had Shearer and Bellamy up front but with that supply they'd have looked fucking dreadful. Otherwise we had Cisse on the right side of a 4-3-3, which is just as baffling. Even on the left of a 4-3-3 he might look better as at least then he can cut inside. However I genuinely believe that if we had a right-footed right winger and a left-footed left winger playing in a 4-4-2 then Cisse and Ba would have looked ten times better as a strike pair. Still, it's all academic now. Unless we then go on to repeat the same mistakes with whoever else we bring in during January.

Disagree entirely. Firstly, if Pardew was even remotely surprised that Ba is leaving then he needs his fucking head read, as it's been coming for months. If he failed to factor that into his plans then he deserves a slap. Secondly, Cisse without preparation is a far better striker than Shola will ever be, even with a whole year's solid rest, preparation, training and instruction. Thirdly, Cisse is not a winger. Just isn't one. Should never have even been under consideration to play there. Wingers play on the wing, strikers play up front. It's not fucking rocket science. If you have 2 good strikers and no good wingers, one of the strikers goes on the bench. Because I can pretty much assure you that a half-decent winger on the wing will be infinitely more effective than an excellent striker. For all three of the above reasons, Pardew needs a massive kick in the nutsack.

He's going to be at left back for a long time, might as well get used to it. End of. Well what's the point in complaining about anything then? Might as well shut the whole bloody forum. If something's wrong, people are entitled to point it out.

Pardew's fault anyway for playing Santon on the wrong side of the pitch. He's right footed, therefore he's a rightback. End of.

If that's 4-4-2, it's just about forgiveable. If it's 4-3-3, which the semicolons seem to denote, and Cisse is on the wing, then Pardew has lost any semblence of support that I had for him. Disgusting. Utterly disgusting.

If Cisse doesn't play centrally tonight, I think I'll cry. Simply must.

£9m + SWP. That probably knocks about £5m off the deal, surely? There's no way QPR could sell SWP if they tried. Probably not even on a free. He's a millstone around the club's neck and they'll have to Alan Smith this one through to it's conclusion I'm afraid.

This. For further proof see "Hoilett, J"

The only reason he cared about playing out wide is that it lessened his chance of a move that would put him on the money he felt he deserved to be on. Now he's got that money, and at 27 with what will be his final big payday, he won't give a shit if all they want him to do is drive the team bus. From all the interviews I've read of him talking of his struggles as a young footballer, it's all been about constantly getting a better contract at a better club rather than being a good footballer and playing well for the team etc. He's very single-minded and determined, with the sole goal of making as much money as he can. Being a good footballer has just been something he's had to do to achieve that. Not knocking him for that mind, just pointing it out.

This "Pardew finished 5th" malarky needs to stop. Carr assembled us an excellent team, and we finished 5th despite Pardew, not because of him. His part in putting that team together was next to none, and although he's a good spokesman and says all the right things and comes over as very articulate, he hasn't got the faintest idea on how to put together an attacking side that has any flair or can play lesser teams off the park. We defend doggedly, but once we get the ball we're just not set up to exploit teams or create chances.

So's Jonas for that matter. Simpson is terrified of a football, and Cisse is an out and out striker. For a cross to be dangerous, it has to be between the goalkeeper and the back four, and you can deliver that ball FAR easier with a cross swinging away from the goal than one swinging in. You've got far more area to aim at that way. Inswinging crosses have to be sooo accurate. And then you've got the added problem that the defenders are facing away from goal and can clear much easier than they can an outswinging cross when they're facing their own net. Finally, imagine yourself as a striker getting on the end of an inswinging cross. You have to look far further behind you to follow the flight of the ball, whereas an outswinging cross is going to be in front of you when you head it, facing the goal. So having the wrong players on the wrong side of the pitch means that our crosses have to be far more accurate to find our man, they're easier to defend against and harder to score from. Yet we persist with it. It's just beyond comprehension.

I'd say we need at least 2 if we're going to play 4-4-2, which seems to be Pardew's preference. The only traditional wingers we have at the moment are Jonas, Obertan and Ferguson, and it's difficult to make a case that any are good enough for the first team. Ben Arfa isn't a winger. He's great wide in a 4-3-3 but shouldn't be allowed near the wing in a 4-4-2.

He'll leave on some massive contract, then his knee will explode within a couple of months. For what it's worth, I think we need to part ways with him. We're setting our entire team up around him, which isn't doing us any favours. It's doing him favours, but ultimately all that does is make it even more likely that he'll leave. Ironically, although Pardew is desperate for him to stay he's making it more likely that Ba will leave with every game he plays entirely focused around him, as it's just putting him in the shop window all the time. If he'd played on the left of a 4-3-3 all season, he'd have far less goals and nobody would want to go anywhere near him at £90k/week, just as in the close-season. We'd almost certainly be higher up the table, Cisse would be scoring more to compensate for Ba's reduced return, we'd be playing better football and we'd have world peace and a cure for famine. Or something like that.

I think N'Zogbia and Milner was the last time I remember us fielding 2 proper, competent wingers.

Yes he has, as part of a 4-4-2, with a right footer on the left wing and a left footer on the right wing so they can't cross properly to him and the rest of the team just hoofing the ball up front. Baffled as to what you think that proves. He needs to play in the middle of a 4-3-3, or in a 4-4-2 with the wingers on the correct wings. Sadly we lack the personnel to do the latter, and the manager lacks the balls to do the former.