Gallowgate Toon

Was a Peterboro player iirc.

Saw Loven at work today, was with his daughter. Thoroughly nice bloke but you'd think he was a chav if you didn't know he was a footballer.

I'd rather play him than Carroll as out target man tbh he's got a great touch and has a great work ethic which constantly brings others into play and his headers when he does win them are accurate. I was impressed, he wasn't outstanding but his teamplay was very refreshing to see as it was so consistent.

I thought he played pretty well tbh, a very no-nonsense CF on today's showing. He did look like a very effective target man and some of his hold-up play was excellent particularly his first touch, not much of a goal threat but it's very early days obviously but i like the look of him.

I think it's harsh to judge Smith in his current role when he's playing with Nolan.

My point was that they rarely used the through ball but when they did it was just an extension of their main plan, to get at Simpson. Of course they didn't have one gameplan but they had a key area that they knew they could control the game from, that was Simpson's side and they could do whatever they wanted whenever they had him and Guthrie pinned back. I just think that you're singling out Colo as their target when it was evidently Nolan they were getting round as they played a 3 man central midfield, it's not a complex tactic to swiftly change the side at which you attack on, especially when you have someone as slow as Nolan helping to protect the defence from deep runs, it worked because he always left his man leaving the left side incredibly open. Also you say that he tried to stand in front of the pass, i definitely didn't see this, i was direnctly behind the goal in the first half and i always saw Colo track Bednar, on all 3 occasions in the first half which then left a massive gap between him and Enrique where one of WBA's 3 midfielder's would always run to, leaving Nolan for dead. I can't remember much that Steven Taylor did well tbh all i saw him do was flounder about when the ball was in the air and the only block i remember was Smith near the end but if you but if you'd like to remind me of any important blocks he did then i'll eat my words and what do you mean by 'more defensive work in general' exactly, it's a little vague. All i said Colo did well with was one-on-one defensive work, which is what he wasn't so good at last season with big and strong strikers (see Fuller for Stoke etc) but he always dealt with them well yesterday, consistenly nicking the ball away and not getting bossed, i was just saying i was impressed by that improvement in his game but i can't remember Taylor doing anything like that in comparison.

Tbh Valencia has been Man U's second best player this season after Rooney, he's not the problem and could turn into a real quality player. Man U's problems stem from the rest of the team as they are just a load of grafters bar Anderson, who i think is good but needs a run of games, he looked very impressive in his first season.

They were knocking through balls behind him from about the 5th minute. They nearly got in instantly because of it. At one point first half Brunt got in behind Colo & it took Taylor & Enrique both coming across to crowd him out. They knew how to take him out of the game & he did little of note. Very reminiscent of last season, the embarassing defending for the 2nd goal especially. Taylor had a much better game. I think i was watching a different game to you, from what i could see they consistently hit the right flank targetting Danny Simpson. Now i know that Colo plays on that left side, i think you may have been hit with a bit of bias here. As for Taylor, again he was no better his dealings with balls in the air was pretty terrible (as was Colo's) and on the deck he didn't deal with Bednar well, i didn't see Colo get turned once (with the ball on the ground) by Bednar or Miller, did you? Your statement about them knocking balls through is garbage as well. If you're speaking about Brunt then that's Enrique's fault because Brunt played LW. And i watched West Brom's tactics very closely, they did not as consistently attack Colo as aforementioned they attacked Simpson. They played about 5 through balls max and they only did that after Thomas got Simpson out of position, they would then shift the ball inward to their deeper lying CM, who would then put a through ball through the left side which would then be overloaded because they knew they could get in behind Nolan (who when defending took the left side of midfield, with Smith on the right) as he didn't have the legs to track, so consequently Enrique and Colo had 3 men to deal with. Their tactics were spot on, they knew exactly how to get us bent out of shape and they did that always through Simpson and Nolan.

Thought he was pretty good at dealing with Miller and Bednar on the deck tbh, they never got round him. Yeah so he didn't do well for the goal, they all make mistakes Steven Taylor could have been at fault for about 5 potential goals. Aerially Taylor and Colo weren't so good last night, their marking was slack in general imo but they had a lot to deal with.

West Brom are as close to a Premiership side as we'll see this season (bar if we play a PL side in the cup) and if i'm honest i thought we were lucky to get a draw. What i saw last night was one team of teamplayers, another one full of individuals led by a manager who quite obviously is not in as much control as we'd like to think. We've been lucky this season to rely on an individual moment of quality against lesser teams but last night was a massive wake up call. Defensively we were reminiscent of last season, lack of protection to the back 4 and feathers ruffled when a big powerful striker comes to play. Simpson was quite simply awful and he was playing against a player who would maybe only just scrape it into a low Premiership side. Colo and Taylor defended well when the ball was on the deck particularly Colo who i thought was impressive with one-on-one situations but when it was in the air neither dealt with the situation particularly well but a lot of their problems stemmed from the midfield, which i'll get onto next. Enrique, played alright but seemed to feel the pressure. The midfield was absolutely dire, West Brom knew this and set up perfectly to get us at our most vulnerable. They had a 5 man midfield and caught us time and time again on the counter, constantly overloading our fullbacks. This problem was caused by our particularly weak right hand side, Guthrie is not particularly quick and therefore holds no threat of counter attacking, so their fullback had no fear in getting forward. The other of West Brom's tactics was to break through the middle, on at least 20 occasions, 2 of their 3 central midfielders would burst towards our box, they were rapid and continuously left Smith and particularly Nolan for dead and they made no attempt to track them. This left Colo and Taylor with an extra man to pick up which would force one of our fullbacks to cover, leaving their man free which gave West Brom's fullbacks more incentive to get forward. This will be a massive problem if we get promoted as we will leak goals, what makes it worse though is Hughton's total lack of power and authority as Nolan is evidently a big character in the dressing room and a part of the player democracy. Everyone could see Nolan was causing us a lot of damage but Hughton was too scared to make the call and this is why he'll never be a good PL manager. I can't really complain a lot about the strikers, Shola was crap but his service was awful and Lovenkrands tried a few things but again service was so bad that it didn't make much of an impact. Quality goal, was nice to see after his family loss.

Such a shame about De La Red, very talented player imo hope he makes a return after his problem has been diagnosed. I remember watching the highlights of the game where he collapsed, it was horrific.

stop teasing man, what was hischristmas shopping ? New tracksuit for the wife, matching of course. From what i saw, he hadn't made many purchases. Presumably some shoes for a woman (unless that's his thing) as he was leaving the womens shoes section but it was sort of surreal as not one person appeared to notice him other than me and he just wandered round looking like he was about to shit himself the next time an attendant sprayed some perfume at him. Was going to go up to him and crack a joke like 'browsing for January, Chris?' but thought i might look like a bit of a tit, so let him be.

Saw Chris Hughton and his christmas shopping in John Lewis yesterday, looks strange out of a tracksuit mind.

What fucking goal...

When a player takes a pelanty and misses it, then the commentator watches the replay and says: "Well, it wasn't the greatest penalty in the World". Well of course it wasn't you cretin, that's why he missed it.

Watford are the same as most teams this division, they play some nice football until the final third, they had a few chances but today was arguably our defence's worst performance of the season.

Was the best goal i've seen at SJP.com for a long, long time. It was fantastic both the turn and finish.

They only really need a goalscorer imo. They are a perfect team until the pinnacle of that attack and i don't think Van Persie's even good enough to lead the line on a consistent basis, he's never been prolific.

Actually, Forlan had a class season tbh so he deserves to be on par like.

Utter dross? In comparison to Villa, yes. Dzeko? Having an absolute laugh. Giggs? again a load of shite. Forlan? Henry? Vidic? Basically the majority from Fabregas down are laughable compared to Villa.

I'm sorry but the fact Villa is that far down compared to some of that utter dross is ridiculous. What does the lad have to do to get the credit he deserves?

I wonder how the "offers" compared with (1) the fee we paid for him and (2) the salary he gets here. I share your scepticism there. I don't think he's changed as a player - it's the quality of the opposition that's different this season. If the only problem was mental, I'd have some faith in him adjusting to top level English football, but I think the problem is also physical. He's too slow, he's not that strong and he's poor at set pieces. Basically, Premiership strikers were able to bully him, and when they managed to turn him or get him even slightly out of position he had no hope of recovery. Surely set pieces and beasty strikers (a la Parkin) are more present in this league than the tier above, from what i've seen anyway. And of course there's a mental aspect, being clever is the biggest part of a defender's game moreso than being massive or exceptionally quick, take Micah Richards for example, he is the defender you've described above but failed miserably in the centre half role. If you're a defender that's not mentally on it, that's when you're done for. He'll now be up to speed with the English Game, which is again arguably played at a quicker pace in this league.

Cracking result for Atletico today, Aguero absolutely demolished them. He will be an awesome player.

I feel sorry for Pellegrini like, so much to think about on top of being a manager. He's going to have to do something soon though, if he wants results from Kaka, he needs to get him in the centre, he's so wasted in wide areas.

Higuain absolutely has to play, he's the future of Madrid. I like him a lot, i also like Benzema (the jury is out on him but he will do it imo). Pellegrini has so many options but he just fucks it up with his selections.