Gallowgate Toon

I was banging this drum for ages! 4-3-3 was supposedly going to save us and transform us into a glorious attacking team. He's not even playing 4-3-3 though It's pretty much 4-4-1-1/4-4-2 masquerading as a 4-2-3-1. Sissoko isn't involved in the midfield battle ever, he's often battling with centre halves and full backs.

Cabaye is drowning in defensive work, once again. He looked at his best vs. Reading, when he wasn't some defensive midfielder and was in a genuine midfield 3. He's overworked and just can't compete physically against the extra man, which is essentially what is happening here.

It's not a gimmick, it works fine for many teams. Fact. Another fact all formations are s*** under Pardew. It can work with the right players, which we don't have. We also make it doubly difficult by not playing Moussa deeper, so it's essentially a 2 man midfield that can't cope.

Elliot Debuchy Taylor MYM Haidara Tiote Cabaye Sissoko Marveaux Cisse Gouffran I hope.

Hard to disagree with some of that. He'll always be prone to doing something a bit daft, but if he's used correctly he'll do far more good than bad. Never a 20 million player but pure defensive midfielders seldom are as, more often than not, they're not particularly great footballers.

at what point did you see that ? before they scored i could only see us scoring, after they scored I saw it like you did. I thought you looked tired and pretty devoid of ideas from the off. You're right, though, once they'd scored, it got worse. I thought they were worth their win, but the scoreline probably flatters them a tad, as it suggests they were relatively decent, which they weren't. They just had more application. I thought they had more focus and aggression. They had only one player who offered any real threat in Sessegnon, yet despite our work on defence all week under Pardew, he was given the freedom of the park to cause havoc. In contrast, they closed down our attacking threats quite successfully. We seem to have a problem picking up players playing in 'the hole'. We gave Sessegnon acres of space and let him gather momentum time and time again. Was just going to mention this exact thing. Considering our love of pre-match scouting and adopting our performance/shape to deal with oppositions, how is it that Sessegnon constantly gets free reign against us? Never mind the starting formation, we then switched to f***ing 4-4-2 and gave him even more license to roam about in between the midfield and defence. Just stick Tiote or Perch on him, let the two central defenders deal with Graham and any extra threat from in-front/the sides and push Cabaye on a bit/drag Sissoko back in a bit to compete with Larsson and N'Diaye. Generally hate our version of the 4-2-3-1, but today took the biscuit. RE: the 4-4-2 stuff, I agree, that left us ridiculously open, especially with Sissoko and Tiote together. It just seems that nobody in midfield ever has a defined role. We play Cabaye and Tiote virtually the same, picking up balls and then spraying it about, they're used as dynamic players, attacking and defending, when neither can play such a role. Tiote isn't a good enough footballer and Cabaye's not a good enough athlete. It's frustrating watching, looking at the heat map today and those 2 were pretty much playing in exactly the same position. Both are so deep but nobody comes to fill in that space left wide open in the middle, it's no wonder we can't create passing combinations. They need to to back to basics, mainly with Tiote, who is a pure defensive midfielder. Keep his job simple and play him in the hole in front of defence. Tiote Cabaye Sissoko The above seems a much more logical set up for us the more I think about it.

at what point did you see that ? before they scored i could only see us scoring, after they scored I saw it like you did. I thought you looked tired and pretty devoid of ideas from the off. You're right, though, once they'd scored, it got worse. I thought they were worth their win, but the scoreline probably flatters them a tad, as it suggests they were relatively decent, which they weren't. They just had more application. I thought they had more focus and aggression. They had only one player who offered any real threat in Sessegnon, yet despite our work on defence all week under Pardew, he was given the freedom of the park to cause havoc. In contrast, they closed down our attacking threats quite successfully. We seem to have a problem picking up players playing in 'the hole'. We gave Sessegnon acres of space and let him gather momentum time and time again.

It's no coincidence that he's never been the same since those comments about 'doing more'. He's not a defensive midfielder now, he's become a central player, he actually plays ahead of Cabaye most of the time.

I wish he would do a Q&A session. I'd love to know some of the shit that goes through his head. Echoing what others have said, we only play with 2 formations, surely the players know our shape by now, so what is he blithering on about?

Yep. Absolutely infuriating. Our midfield organisation has been terrible all year, Pardew wants some multi-talented middle but doesn't have it, yet continues to persevere with shit that isn't working.

As has been said 1000 times, he needs to be the player he was when he first came. Stick to protecting the space in front of the back 4. I hate what he's been turned into, he was class how he was, as a defensive midfielder.

I can't think of the last time we had a comfortable win. The one that comes to mind was probably the 3-0 win against Wigan at home, when they had 10 men. Seems the majority of our wins have been scraping over the line holding onto the lead or last minute jobs such as Stoke and Fulham. It just wears you down. It's just a game, a form of entertainment and it's infuriating that managers like this are the ones that rise to the top.

Absolutely no positivity for this. You just know how he's going to play it.

This one's going to get worse over time for me. I was pretty apathetic/numb during it, but I can feel myself getting more and more p*ssed off that we lost like that, to such a poor team. Really longing for a side that's exciting, there's nothing worse than this tight margins crap that's being served up.

Agree Midds, I lost a lot of confidence when Shola came on that early. Their defenders are good at the physical battles, sending that useless lump on was never a good idea at all. Perhaps after 70 minutes but at half time, deary me.

Eurgh, we actually lost to this shower. So frustrating. One of the strangest matches I've ever been to.

Still can't believe how much we played into their hands for this. I know things went against us, but they were hardly great.

He needs to be dropped back, but not into a midfield 2.

He seriously needs to freshen it up and make sure we're winning midfield battles. The middle of the park just isn't functioning and our wide men are too deep.

Agreed. Seemed to struggle with the physical elements today. I imagine he'll beef up a little over the summer, a la Colo a few years ago.

It's hard to do that though when he's stuck out on the wing and shunned away from the centre of attention. If we were tactically discipline and organised, had two solid holding midfielder's with quality passing skills (Cabaye, for now) I would play Marveaux in the centre to play behind the striker and do what Sessegnon did today- drift, drop into space between the lines. I think he'll always be in and out of games, no matter what position. I agree with you however, he should be in the middle, not wide. Whether that's in a 4-2-3-1 or straight 4-3-3 is another matter.

It was a ridiculous decision. Substitute pace and intelligence at the first opportunity for an oaf that was never going to win the physical battle over 20 minutes, never mind 45. You could tell at that point that Pardew was panicking then, no clue how to break them down. It's 2013 and Shola Ameobi is genuinely our plan B, that is the fucking truth.

Half time sub Absolute waste of a substitution.

I thought he was great for his first 10 minutes, good passing, looking quick but he was poor after. Clearly not fit.

Mirror image performance to those early O'Neill ones. Set up to counter, break forward and score from range. They played it smart today, we really didn't. It'll go tits up with him like it did the last one, there's an element of unknown in their favour right now.