Gallowgate Toon

To be fair, we've had 2 games with 10 men against superior teams and a game at Old Trafford where we probably produced more chances than we'd have expected. If we're not creating against West Ham and Watford I'll start to worry. Let's be honest. Didn't look like scoring against swansea anyway. Ditto Arsenal. 2 half chances and one genuine chance is hardly anything to talk about in attacking terms. I don't consider any of the teams we'v faced to be real untouchable top quality. Pretty sure McClaren himself has said the passing/attacking would come later, the focus is on making us solid first. After last season, he has to be super careful with confidence, especially as do/did have quite a tough opening run of games. I think there's a plan in place and this has to be remembered, it took us quite a while to look an attacking force under KK when he came back, let's not forget.

It's amazing we sat back against Southampton but still had 56% possession, even with some of our players clearly being absolutely paggered for the last 15 minutes...

Palace countered the shit out of Chelsea, I imagine that's exactly what we set up to do. And yes they do have a different mentality, but that's for good reason.

If we'd pressed from the start we'd have been ripped to shreds. They couldn't have been set up better to capitalise on space and if we'd let in the early goal and then had to press on, we'd most likely have been thrashed. Don't think 4-3-3 would've made much difference yesterday, either. They've an excellent midfield, it's not like Sissoko and Wijnaldum are physical enough to compensate either.

Stop acting like a tool ... how about an intelligent articulate response to defend your points .... 'Get a grip' is hardly Rene Descartes stuff is it ... either that or don't reply at all. He's hardly wrong, tbh. Your initial post is pretty reactionary without taking into account any context at all. How quickly do you think we're going to develop into a passing team? He's said what he wants to deliver and you've given him 4 games to do it.

Well we've played two of the best teams in the league and we've played two games with 10 men. It's hardly a surprise. So have West Ham and decided to attack them instead of assembling an 8 man defence. McLaren is a proven failure and is already laying the foundations of ruin with his negative philosophy which cost him and England dearly Can't stand the suave smiling clown instead of moving forwards we decided to go sideways. Looking forward to defending a 0-0 lead every week ... seen enough already it's negative dross and will end in near disaster come May West Ham haven't just come off any absolutely gut-wrenching season and aren't trying to implement a completely new system. Their situation isn't comparable to ours. Southampton, imo, is truly what we're trying to aim for. We controlled that for long periods until fitness kicked in. We've actually started the last 2 games openly but were getting mullered. We shut up shop against Man U and then things went South vs Arsenal.

Boro aside, which McClaren teams have been dour and defensive? Edit: club teams.

Didn't we dominate possession against Southampton, for large periods? We looked very comfortable until fitness went. Even so, it's a ludicrous post, it doesn't take much to figure out what we're trying to do - they've explained their plan.

Don't think we'll be boring at all. He seems to have changed a lot since Boro (which was nearly a decade ago, tbf) and will try and play good stuff. Nothing amazing, aye, but still good, passing football.

Watched it back and I don't think it's a red at all. Even the slow mo isn't that bad. Bollocks decision, simply a yellow card.

Thought Haidara was relatively solid defensively, tbh, and made some really good tackles. He needs to play games, he's certainly got brittle confidence.

Looking back over the start, we could've done better at getting ourselves into it, but I do maintain we did look positive going forward when we got the opportunity. Suppose it is difficult when they were so obviously set up to retain possession (and are excellent at it) but we needed a bit more to stamp our authority on the game. We tried to pass it short but seemed to lose too much faith early on with it, we were better when down to 10 for it, tbh. Was good to see SM trying to get the players to push up and push on late on, mind. Reckon the close-score will actually benefit our confidence, in a way.

What did he say? 'the player did well to get up, I don't know how he's still walking after the reaction he gave'

Ripped Coquelin in his NUFCTV interview Get in, Steve.

Also want to add that his movement off the ball was very impressive, at times. Bet he's learnt that from Bielsa.

His role was very different at OM, from what I can gather. He's obviously a very gifted footballer, definitely one of those that is quicker with the ball at his feet.

The linesman was an utter fanny, had an even worse game than the ref too.

For the next match, I'd be doing this, but I don't think it was right for today. We should go to West Ham and look to nail the cunts and look to play more of a possession game.

Fucking this.

I was/am fucking foaming, tbh, and that's a good thing. Potentially good game spoilt by an utter bellend. Really felt like we could've had this lot, today, we had the right players and set up.

We'll miss him against West Ham, like. He probably does need to calm down a bit but we need to make sure he keeps an aggressive game. He did 1 or 2 really nice bits of link up before the decision and we need a striker in away games that won't give defenders an easy ride.

Posting stills of tackles is utterly, utterly pointless.

He's mint. Really hope he gets dropped to CM against West Ham. Good to see him berate the ref (shouldn't have been booked for it, considering how often other clubs do this), as well, shows why he was the captain of a title-winning club.

Looks a player, to me