Gallowgate Toon

Well played to him, he's been very solid of late. Real battler too.

They were absolutely shit and in no way deserved to win that. Still, a draw isn't good enough against a team as rubbish as that. Pardew's decision-making let us down badly, they contained us well but we played right into their 6-fingered hands. That's 4 belters they've scored against us in the last 2 games. Cunts.

It's like we're playing Russian roulette with his decision-making. Some games, he gets it right but then seems to completely fuck it up the next. He shouldn't have strayed away from the team that was excellent against Cardiff.

He shoots far too often. Just stop it, please.

Rubbish and stupid, needs to grown a brain.

Unbelievably thick from him. Pathetic.

We need some more presence up front, had one or two instances where we've got in good positions but there's been a lack of bodies in the box. The balance looks way off. I'd get Cisse on for HBA or Gouffran.

What a finish.

I don't think MYM is ready to be the defence's organiser, yet. I wouldn't say that's a reflection of his leadership skills either, I just think he needs to get a run for us where he can play his own game and feel confident and comfortable in this league. Basically, just focus on himself. I think if he gets a couple of months doing that, he'll be ready to lead our back line.

One thing's for sure, if this is true, we just can't rely on his fitness anymore. Colo needs to be phased out, MYM needs to come in. I'll probably be in the complete minority here but, for me, Mapou is the best candidate in this squad to take the captaincy, perhaps not right now but in the very near future. He's young but has achieved a lot in his career, leading his side to a Championship, he's a winner. I think if Pardew showed more confidence in MYM, we'd see a more consistent player and generally terrific defender. Oddly enough, I'd partner him with Williamson until January, then buy someone else. Willo can do the basics and is seemingly a good organiser, letting MYM settle in and develop his own style, rather than having to adapt to Colo. Taylor's too stupid to have a defender bedding in alongside him, he's the type that needs his hand holding. It's not ideal but it'd do and would pay huge dividends in the long run, in my opinion.

Fancy the Gouff to score.

Unless we suffer from a bad injury crisis, I really can't see us going down. I think we'll be somewhere between 8th-12th come May.

Debuchy and Santon's positioning has been more to do with how we look to set up, in my opinion. Of course, they are attacking full backs but Pardew seems to be trying to find a balance with an 'offensive look', fiddling with the midfield while the FBs are told to get up high. Recent games suggest he may have learnt his lesson, however. Hatem was was doing well defensively until he was made the focal point of the team, I have faith he and Debuchy could work together. Gouff deserves his run though, hopefully HBA's taking notes.

I'm not exactly confident. We've probably been the most unpredictable team of the season so far, there are some signs we're finding some consistency now but I'm still not feeling like we'll win, despite how appalling they are. I am certain we'll score on the break though, their defence must be the slowest in the division.

According to Dummet, Williamson is always communicating and that makes him easy to play with. Got to say, he does look our most vocal defender, by some distance too. Although, I do think Mapou will fill that role in time, I was fortunate enough to catch some of his Montpellier days and he was a brilliant captain, led by example and was certainly not afraid to talk to and bollock players. I think he just needs to grow into the club first.

He'll be a tremendous player for us, I still believe that. He's shown some really good stuff this campaign - which has seemingly been forgotten about since the awful Goodison showing - and with a little more refining, he'll be great.

Nice to see a bit of passion and fire in a side that has been far too sterile for near enough a decade. The celebrations really looked like they meant something and that was great to see.

Debuchy's 'OK' but Santon seems to shoot more than he crosses after cutting in. I think he's only hit the byline once, against Villa.

In his brilliant run of form, he scored 6 goals from crosses/crossing situations of some sort. Only one of them came from cutting in. Villa - Jonas puts in an early ball. Norwich - Jonas puts in a low early ball. Liverpool - Ben Arfa puts in an early cross from deep. West Brom 1 - Ben Arfa plays first-time, low cross. West Brom 2 - Ben Arfa cut back. Bolton - Shola cross. Our service from those areas isn't as good as then and that's why we won't see that Papiss Cisse. As of now, I'd play Gouffran ahead of him because he suits our style more but being heavily reliant on a front 3 really isn't very sustainable. I'd rather we had further threats so we'd not be contained by the likes of Hull if they get their gameplan spot on or if one of Remy/HBA has a shitter.

There's also more to wide play than wingers, and I'm not saying it's just about running down the line and putting an aimless ball in either. It's about mixing it up, we cut inside the vast majority of times and want to play ourselves into the box. We also rarely play early balls, our delivery is very often floated. It leads to opposition regrouping, packing in the space and that's fine for Benteke or Lukaku but we don't have one of them, nor do I think playing in the way we do would get the most out of them either. They'd perform better than Cisse, sure, but as well as they have for their clubs?

I don't think our wide play has been too good, like. It's a bit better but we've mainly got goals from individual excellence or rebounds from deflections or saves. 3 of our 4 wide men are on their wrong foot, it limits what we can do, to an extent. Cisse's not very good at what we ask him to do, sometimes he really doesn't help himself but we really don't do him many favours either. It's just basic tactics, you play to your strikers' games to get you goals. We have a number 9 type who has obvious limitations but benefits from space and has a game based around movement, we should be looking to play to that a bit more. Cardiff showed we're making some effort towards that, I think Cisse will be alright if that continues. He's certainly not the long term option.

West Brom and Aston Villa are renowned for their dominant, varried football that revolves around wingers putting crosses in now..? Who said they were renowned for it? They're certainly more varied than we are, no question. It is difficult to vary your attack many different ways when playing with a centre forward who contributes the actual sum of nothing to the play. Yeah, our centre forward needs to be a great link man for our full backs to put in a decent early ball, or for Ben Arfa to look up a bit more. We're not talking complicated stuff here and it's not beyond our personnel to vary it up a bit. I mean, how the hell did we score and win games with Cisse leading the line in 11/12, if he can't do anything?

West Brom and Aston Villa are renowned for their dominant, varried football that revolves around wingers putting crosses in now..? Who said they were renowned for it? They're certainly more varied than we are, no question.

Yeah, and that Lowton who put in at least 2 magnificent crosses against us. When was the last time one of our full backs did that? Weimann was the one who put in that brilliant first time cross for Agbonlahor too, if I recall.

Oh great, a gif. Players like Benteke and Lukaku would improve us but they're not the full answer, especially as those two actually get goals out of teams that have some good wide men and play varied football.