Lotus

The only reason to bring him on now though would be to see if we can hold them to 1 goal and hope we can nick a goal near the end. Saying that, i don't think he'd be dong any better than Tiote if i'm honest.

I have no idea what he's supposed to be doing and clearly, neither does he.

We're not doing much down the wings and we can't seem to play through them. Over the top, direct play would seem to be our only answer here. Shola is the only option from the bench for that kind of thing.

He's not having a good game so far.

Problem is, they look like they know what they're doing. Bit of movement when they get the ball. When we get it, player looks up see who might be free. No pattern to our play.

Has been coming, unfortunately.

Also, the idea that if we'd scored a second goal the match would have been all over. Looking at our personnel on the pitch at that time, they could have got the goal they needed. In fact, they did anyway meaning we had to score 3 more to win without going to penalties.

I'm convinced Pardew is clueless when it comes to combining the two yeah. That's something that I've commented on about him, it's either one or the other. We got to Old Trafford and The Emirates and try and play football and we get battered at the back. We try and keep things tight which means we aren't very good at attacking. Basically our transitional play under him is dreadful. I've said this a few times.

Would happily give his squad place to Remi Streete or Curtis Good.

Would wonder if it's best to only bring HBA on if we're actually losing. Might be a bit risky with that hamstring. Unless he just wanders about like Messi did the other night

His form allows Santon (when back) to switch to RB as well when Debuchy's knacked/suspended/whatever.

Genuinely? He said catergorically that Marveaux will be starting on Sunday? I am bit surprised as that is a game i could see him getting squeezed out of. Can you give a link to the quote please? Sure I read it in some of the post match comments. Could be on twitter, on here, or another website. You can start looking, if you want? I've already read it once, don't need to again. I've looked, can't see owt. Might be on twitter, i'm not on that. Said on the nufctv interview that Marveaux isn't good playing Thursday and Sunday which is why he had a limited role last night, kind of indicates more a role on Sunday. Cheers! Yes, it does. Funnily enough, i think he might be better coming on as a sub on Sunday when they start to knacker. Guess we'll see though.

Luckily we will monster them. I'm being honest here, i think it will be tough for about 25-30 mins or so. They'll have so much energy and be all hyped up. Closing everything down like mad dogs. Think they'll tire, we'll score and their heads will drop. Repeat for the 2nd half.

Reckon it will be manic in midfield.

Why did we float free kicks in from about 5 yards inside our own half? We're more likely to concede than score when we do that. We'd be better off just playing it short and trying to keep the ball for a bit, the old Juventus way.

Looked canny for the first 20 mins or so then seemed to lose a little bit. Never a wide man. Much better in the middle.

Genuinely? He said catergorically that Marveaux will be starting on Sunday? I am bit surprised as that is a game i could see him getting squeezed out of. Can you give a link to the quote please? Sure I read it in some of the post match comments. Could be on twitter, on here, or another website. You can start looking, if you want? I've already read it once, don't need to again. I've looked, can't see owt. Might be on twitter, i'm not on that.

I agree.

Would love to see this team. Wonder if swapping Marveaux for Sissoko (positionally) might be a tad more effective?

Genuinely? He said catergorically that Marveaux will be starting on Sunday? I am bit surprised as that is a game i could see him getting squeezed out of. Can you give a link to the quote please?

Thing about last night, we only needed to score another 3 goals to go through. You see, if you leave it until the last to have a go, a shot even, then you start to get desperate, then you get picked off. Personally i think we should have tried to attack (sensibley) the game early on rather than waitin until 70 minutes. Should have tried having a few shots on goal in the first half. That's what i honestly think. We just tried to not lose for the first hour. Bigi & Jonas were there to protect the the FBs, not test the opposition (the only time Bigi did was when he found himself central). I think we could have had a go at controlling the game a bit more. Would have picked a bit of different team for that but we had the players. Anyway, we'll never know! I don't think we'll be back in Europe for a bit, i think deep down we all know that so i must say i did enjoy it while it lasted.

Bollocks man. There's a difference between "keeping it tight" and not managing a single attempt on goal in 40 minutes. This.

Christ on a bike!!!!! No going near their goal for 40 mins is not the way to win a game! I've got an agenda!!! Jesus! Yeah, my agenda is 'have a go'. What's yours?

I don't think he'd have set up this way had we had Coloccini/Taylor and Santon fit. I think a lot of his thinking was not having a particularly strong back four, and not having his "door openers" available to play much more than half an hour each. Haven't we set up the same way (defensive and hoping to grind out results) pretty much the whole season? We see weaker squads play better football every week. It's all about psychology and inspiring players to push themselves to play better. Just because we have alot of international class professionals doesn't mean they don't need inspiration to push them from time to time or that arm around them to help. That said the players are clearly united with pardew and have bought into what he feeds them. For me it just looks like it's easier for him to play defensive than try to inspire his players mentally to step up. If Swansea play the way they do against someone like Benfica next season, I think they'd get ripped apart tbh. I think our best chance of winning the tie tonight with the players available, was the way we set out. That, imho, is bollocks. Swansea may well get seen off for a variety of reasons but because they have the ball a lot more than the other team won't be one of them. And if the only chance we had of winning the game tonight was the way it panned out, 10 mins of pressure out of 90, then we just had no chance, simple as. That's bollocks like. No chance? When Cisse scored there wasn't a person in the ground who wasn't fairly confident we would win it. We were incredibly close. Not for me. ON is of the opinion that the way we approached the game was the best tactically that we could have done. Don't agree with that and my point was, if that was the best approach possible then we weren't ever really in it.