Gallowgate Toon

Gutted... This is one of those days where i just feel like giving up on football. Honestly we've got some crap players this could happen to but it happens to our best and our main hope for the season. I hope he gets well soon and is the same player when he returns.

Nah Routledge will stay on, i think CH sees him as our most dangerous crosser of the ball and considering he bases our system on Carroll and Nolan, he's going to set up to their strengths.

Nolan isn't useless, he's useful but only in certain types of games. He is intelligent in using space but the problem is that he needs it there, he doesn't have the ability to make it for himself. He's great at making runs into huge gaps but he's not going to one-two with someone else and make it for himself. In that sense he's very over-reliant on other people to carry him through certain games, like Stoke, where the it is tight, defensive and space is limited. So against Stoke, yes we had Routledge and Ben Arfa (who were both double-marked), who do make a lot of space but not in the right areas, it doesn't help out wide, you need someone in the middle who's going to open those gaps. Ben Arfa may have come in a lot but that didn't help our cause, it played into Stoke's hands making it congested and even harder for our already struggling central players. So taking this into consideration, he's not totally useless. I think he's decent away from home or games that are a lot more open with space but he's a passenger in those really tight games. Bad news for us because the teams we need to be beating will come here and be hard to break down and they all have the ability to nick a goals themselves. For those games we're going to need two solid players out wide to stretch them and a mobile player in the middle to drag defenders out of position a bit more. Next game against City is going to be tight, they defend well but tactically we can easily have the better of them. Have Jonas and Routledge out wide to stretch them and keep the space more open in the middle. Ben Arfa starting in the hole can pick up the ball from a deeper position and run at the central defenders, that is going to drag them all over the place and there will be loads of space for Carroll to get into.

So despite Nolan being in the side for his goal scoring prowess - and starting every game so far - we are hardly banging them in are we? It's only early days though tbf, he seems to think we're creating a lot but we aren't really doing that either.

Does he? Every game i have watched he played on the wing. Any idea how often he has played central? He's mostly been deployed as a winger, rarely been played through the middle in the past but he doesn't play anything like a wide player, more importantly he doesn't think like a winger. Even on his youtube vids, his most effective work has come from the middle, often cutting in and making something happen. In a way he's nullified on the wing, yes he's a good dribbler but it's easy to double mark him out wide, there was a wall in front of him at times against Stoke. Get him in that free role and his options are endless. He can make himself available and dribble from deep, he can play people in and he can make some decent off the ball runs and if he can make himself space he's got a good shot on him too.

The justification to play Nolan ahead of Ben Arfa is based on goals but Nolan hasn't looked like scoring since Villa, his only good chances against Blackpool he fluffed. Ben Arfa may well not score many but it won't take very much for him to beat Nolan's tally (which is only going to be bolstered by penalties, which Joey Barton is equally as good at) as long as Ben Arfa can make space for himself around the edge of the box, i'm sure he can get some shots off and with his accuracy that'll surely result in goals, something Nolan doesn't have the ability to do.

I think it's just a matter of time for him now. The Journal are suggesting that CH doesn't think Ben Arfa is ready to take the playmaker role due to language barriers and not being used to the league but he may well do in the (hopefully near) future. If it doesn't keep on going well for Nolan, he'll be dropped to CM in my opinion and then he'll get found out there as well. It's all a matter of time.

All that worrys me about that is its dependant on Carroll's movement. I think it's quite the opposite tbh if anything it requires the movement of Jonas and Routledge much more. They have shown a great ability in the past to make some clever runs between defenders, as long as they get into those positions, all Carroll has to do is move to get some space to get a shot off. Carroll has to be the 'fixed' point of our attack with the 3 behind him playing 'fluidly'. If you bring Ben Arfa into the equation then, yes, he likes to roam but i did see him make some penetrating runs off the ball into the box against Stoke. The good thing for Ben Arfa is that he will provide an option for the wingers but not back or to the side, actually ahead of them, something Nolan just doesn't do. I mean Carroll's biggest problem atm is that he's double marked, with Ben Arfa off him though defenders will have to be a lot more cautious.

Surely it's just a matter of time before the management team cotton on. Hughton, it appears won't. His justification for Nolan is that he can pop up with a goal, CH doesn't appear to be thinking about the bigger picture. He has learnt in the past, just hope he does this time.

He just doesn't have the mentality of a winger, it's fine coming in sometimes but he's always looking for it. He's a central player, all of his best play for us has come from there and it's criminal he's not starting off Carroll.

We're not creating chances at the minute, even at Everton we weren't creating that much, just playing nice possession football and nobody please say we created lots against Blackpool because we didn't and the half chances we did create came from scrappy bits of play against the worst defenders in the league not fgreat passing passages of play. The 2 teams that have come here recently have sat back for large periods of the game and we've not broken them down and it's down to one thing, a lack of movement in the right areas. It's very hard to create when nobody is making the runs because no space opens up and that's the only way you're ever going to make great chances. I think we have the right personnel to be opening these teams up, we're just playing square pegs in round holes in the key attacking areas. Ben Arfa is like a player i've never really seen before, he's like a sort of hybrid. He has all the attributes to be a world-class winger with great close control, pace and a good cross but he undoubtedly has the mentality (and ability) of a trequartista. He doesn't stick to the wing, he doesn't get the ball and immediately look to skin players and whip balls in and doesn't really make runs down the channels, in short he's totally wasted there. Against Stoke, he would come off the wing and look for the ball and when he made runs (when not in possession), they were always from a central position, running into the box and between the defenders. The problem with this is, we're wasting a valuable attacking position, the balance of the team just isn't right when he's there. It means we only have one winger that is isolating himself to be with the fullback, only one winger working the channels and only one winger looking to get between the full back and the centre back. Jonas does work the line like a real winger though and he ticks all of the above, he has to play there. For Ben Arfa, it has to be in the middle or not at all when we're playing at home, i just hope Chris makes the right decision.[

Fair enough, Nolan has a rep for nabbing goals but Wayne Routledge doesn't, he never looks like scoring, so why not take him off instead? It just doesn't make sense, unless Hughton's doing this on purpose, using man management to keep Ben Arfa's feet firmly on the ground.

CHRIS HUGHTON has explained why he took off two his star performers in the 2-1 defeat against Stoke City in Hatem Ben Arfa and Cheik Tiote. Both his summer signings were shining against the Potters, with Ben Arfa full of running and Tiote putting in another solid and tidy display against Tony Pulis’ side. Hughton threw on Jonas Gutierrez on 62 minutes for the Frenchman, with United leading 1-0 as he looked to help find that second goal. And when Stoke pegged themselves back through Kenwyne Jones five minutes later, Tiote was sacrificed for Shola Ameobi as Kevin Nolan dropped back into midfield. Hughton told the Chronicle: “I was looking to win the game. “With Jonas, he can be more direct in the way he runs at the ball, and for Tiote because he’s very much a defensive midfield player. “What I had left on the pitch were two strikers in Andy Carroll and Shola, and a midfield player in Kevin Nolan, that are all capable of scoring goals. “I wanted to leave goalscorers on the pitch. Read More http://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/newcastle-united/nufc-news/2010/09/27/nufc-boss-hughton-defends-tactical-switch-72703-27349389/#ixzz10kY8em5z

Routledge hits the first defender far too often, in fact with most of his crosses. I know but people don't mention his crosses so much because they actually get off the ground, they just look better than Jonas', even if it still reults in the same end-product.

So, basically, he was giving the ball away repeatedly? That's not true, he only lost the ball once. If anything he wasn't trying to make something happen enough.

Why was Bafra poor exactly? He's not going to score wondergoals every game. [/wink] He is the only player we have who can give good passes into the box and he did that, just that there wa nobody there except Carroll marked by about 500 Jabba's. He's obviously not going to be amazing every game, and I'm not suggesting that. I just thought he was poor. He rarely attempted to run at anyone, and there was 4 or or 5 occassions where Barton was trying to tell him to go past Carroll from flick ons and he just stood there. Obviously, there is a language barrier there to break down, but I just thought he was poor, and practically marked out of the game. Second half, i'll agree with you although it was only 15 minutes old. First half though he was playing well, did some nice runs and put in good crosses and was effective in possession of the ball.

My argument has never been that Routlege is s*** or that he 'did much wrong', it's been that he offers no more than Jonas does. But Jonas, unlike Routlege, is used as a scapegoat pretty much every game. It's all about how it looks. Jonas' crosses are mainly terrible daisy-cutters whereas Routledge's get off the ground.

Definitely but unfortunately we don't really have anyone suitable to Carroll imo. Ranger and Ameobi are too similar to him for it to really work and although i like Loven, he's not good enough at this level. That only leaves Xisco, who i think has the ability to be a decent player but he won't get the run of games. All that leaves it sticking to what we already have which imo could be extremely effective but it needs work as the balance isn't right. It's all really good until you get to the front two, where they just don't suit each other and lack the necessary mobility/brains to create opportunities themselves. The first half is a great example of this tbh, we played some lovely, neat football and were looking to thread through one of our forwards but it just wasn't happening, they couldn't creat any space for themselves.

I think it's more of a 4-4-1-1, which i think is fine for home games, you just need the right personnel to be playing in the key areas. If the second striker isn't performing his role properly, linking midfield and attack, then it just doesn't work and the shape is lost.

Our main problem, is that when we're at home, we're so one-paced up front it's easy to defend against. We have good creative players imo and very nice passers of a football but what's the point in having a great passer if there's nobody running onto them with a bit of pace. Carroll needs somebody with more mobility to play off him and we need someone playing upfront that isn't afraid to get the ball and run at players, if only we had a player like that...

Stupid mistakes keep costing us at home. Hughton seems to have his substitutions the wrong way round: When you're losing a match, make the substitution too late, when we're winning, make them too early. I am seriously pissed off about the HBA decision but it's not necessarily that he took him off, it was just that he did it so early. Stoke weren't doing too much before he came off and they looked scared of his potential to do some damage, if it was still 1-0 at 75/80 minutes i would have understood at 60 minutes, there's still plenty in the game. I don't take this he was tired stuff either, before he was taken off against Everton, in the 85th minute, he was still running past people for fun.

How is Ben Arfa's fitness a problem? He was bombing up and down the wing in the 84th minute against Everton, there's no way he was tired, he's just not defensive enough.

He was the only one looking to move us forward, he has drive. The thought of him, Ben Arfa and Routledge playing together would be awesome but it just doesn't look like happening.

We let Stoke back into it with negative tactics after half time, he took HBA off so early because he wanted us to sit and protect our lead. You can't sit on a one nil-lead, it's suicide because if the other team scores, the momentum shifts and it's hard to recover that. As soon as that second half started, we didn't take it to them and it was a conscious decision, our players weren't moving forward and weren't looking to get at Stoke

HBA may not have done much but he's the one player who can create a situation out of nothing. We're not a particularly creative or potent side, so why take off one of our best chances to grab a goal? He took him off with half an hour to go with only a 1-0 lead, that is madness! As others have said the game would have opened up, there was plenty of time for him to make his mark.