themanupstairs

thirded

If the fifth most populous city in France are saying it as well, that's good enough for me. did you google that little factoid first?

Who's Dyson?

POTY

Basically.

wow

Give over, nothing too them, just like the muppet they sold to Liverpool. Such average players that get praise because they don't lose the ball but they only play 5/10 yard side passes. Along with that they hardly get a foot in, don't score goals, don't have much pace and aren't strong. In a Swansea type style of play they just look neat and tidy. Michu is a far bigger miss! ok chill man! 4 wins on the bounce and you think you own the place

The goals you mention are interesting because they were against teams who had the onus on them to attack us. Champions League contenders and/or home teams who we had space to run in behind. Norwich, and WBA are not going to commit to attacking away from home at SJP like any of those other teams we scored prettier goals against. The space for us to attack is much more limited. True about the away games, not entirely true about the home games. When we went 2-0 against Norwich, they came at us second half. Instead of immediately changing our formation to counter attack them with pace, we took Remy off and sat back, when we could have exploited that. There was a slight improvement in attitude against West Brom, and although we conceded, we didn't let the panic set in. No, we didn't. We didn't? Could've sworn we did Remember going ape shit about it at the time.

Same here. I hope you're right, but why? I think Pardew thinks there's still a potent goal scorer in there somewhere ( same as me) and he was reluctant to drop Cisse in the first place. You could bring Ben Arfa in but that would mean moving Gouffran in from the left and I don't think the manager will want to disrupt the team ethic by doing that. HBA can play the false number 9 again, with Remy and Gouffran either side. I actually wouldn't mind seeing that against a side like Swansea. It didn't really work though did it? Plus you lose even more aerial strength, something which has been key to our good results in the last few weeks. Cisse might not be great in the air, but he at least will challenge for them. Otherwise you are reduced to wasting Remy by turning him into a target man when he's far better playing off one. We're not hoofing it as much these days though. HBA can hold the ball up and if he has Remy and Gouffran's movement for company, we can do some damage. We tried it in a derby. Just because it didn't work then doesn;t mean it won't work ever. The key is for Ben Arfa to release the ball a lot quicker.

The goals you mention are interesting because they were against teams who had the onus on them to attack us. Champions League contenders and/or home teams who we had space to run in behind. Norwich, and WBA are not going to commit to attacking away from home at SJP like any of those other teams we scored prettier goals against. The space for us to attack is much more limited. True about the away games, not entirely true about the home games. When we went 2-0 against Norwich, they came at us second half. Instead of immediately changing our formation to counter attack them with pace, we took Remy off and sat back, when we could have exploited that. There was a slight improvement in attitude against West Brom, and although we conceded, we didn't let the panic set in.

Same here. I hope you're right, but why? I think Pardew thinks there's still a potent goal scorer in there somewhere ( same as me) and he was reluctant to drop Cisse in the first place. You could bring Ben Arfa in but that would mean moving Gouffran in from the left and I don't think the manager will want to disrupt the team ethic by doing that. HBA can play the false number 9 again, with Remy and Gouffran either side. I actually wouldn't mind seeing that against a side like Swansea.

Britton is by far their biggest miss. He's the unglamorous glue that links it all together. Where's groo btw? Be interesting to hear his input.

How has he fluked upon it? He put Sissoko out wide when everybody was kicking off about it & he persevered with it. He's got other options other than Gouffran to play so I wouldn't say that's a fluke either. It sounds more like his idea of the players he has rather than some fluke. In addition he's worked brilliantly to get Gouffran playing like he has. I think if it was most other managers other than Pardew doing well people would be more receptive but a couple of people went over the top calling Pardew worse than s*** last year so now he's getting results they don't know how to handle it. Hence looking for any reason possible we don't ''deserve'' a win. Anyway I'm just enjoying the wins. He was worse than s*** last year. This year he's gone back to basics and that was a good decision because it's the football he knows best. Yup. But this is his ceiling. If he does well and we find ourselves in the Europa league again, we're fucked. He may have solidified our spot in the PL, but we need to kick on from here and allow our football club, with some of the players in its current squad to reach their full potential. Ergo, Pardew and Ashley must fuck off

I'm as equally inclined to say that Cisse's baron spell cannot go on as i am to say that Remy's purple patch can't. Ramsay and Giroud have 55% of Arsenal's goals. Remy and Gouffran have 63% of our goals. Soldado and Sigurdson have 64% of Spurs' goals Rooney & Van Persie have 68 % of Man U's Sturridge and Suarez have 72% of Liverpool's. Having an in form goal scorer or two is vital to the majority of teams that want to be doing well. You are absolutely right of course. Having said that, if you watch all the above goals scored between all the above players you will notice a glaring difference in the way they were scored. We create nowhere near as many clear cut chances as the above pairings get (barring Soldado & Sigurdsson). The football we play relies on scraps and moments of individual brilliance in the majority. Naturally, scraps and wonder goals are part of football, but they are not as sustainable as playing in a way that creates more clear-cut chances for your forwards and midfielders to score from. The worry is, if we go through a barren "unlucky" spell, where we get no scraps to feed off, and Sissoko/Cabaye/Remy don't pull rabbits out of hats for a while, what do we do then? Surely there must be a way to score "easier" goals with a more distinct style of play? This is clearly evidenced by Cisse's horrendous lack of form. Yes he's missed one or two sitters, but they come so rarely. A forward lacking in form and confidence needs even more service. We spent bloody 10M on the lad, might as well figure out a way to get that confidence back up again. (Not excluding Cisse from criticism here at all, as I believe he also needs to pull his finger out). I think it's clear to anyone watching that we aren't trying to score perfect goals. We don't play it into the box on the deck and bamboozle defences with our attacking movement. But what we do is effective. We have a lot of attempts. And if you have a go ten times, one of them has a chance of coming off, whether it's from a long range whack, a cross into a crowd of bodies or a through ball on the break. Well I'm not by any means asking for sweeping Arsenal style goals. I'm realistic enough to know that a) it takes years and a certain kind of footballing philosophy at the club to produce that kind of football. And b) that the Ashley/Kinnear/Pardew combo is probably not the holy trinity to produce it. What I'd like to see is more goals like Remy's against Spurs and Chelsea. Ben Arfa's away at Villa. Some of the tap ins Cisse scored on his debut season. These goals show that you've opened up the opposition defence and made it easier for the forward/midfielder to finish.

How has he fluked upon it? He put Sissoko out wide when everybody was kicking off about it & he persevered with it. He's got other options other than Gouffran to play so I wouldn't say that's a fluke either. It sounds more like his idea of the players he has rather than some fluke. In addition he's worked brilliantly to get Gouffran playing like he has. I think if it was most other managers other than Pardew doing well people would be more receptive but a couple of people went over the top calling Pardew worse than s*** last year so now he's getting results they don't know how to handle it. Hence looking for any reason possible we don't ''deserve'' a win. Anyway I'm just enjoying the wins. No one isn't enjoying the wins. Some of us are just pointing out that the football we play is somewhat disjointed and inconsistent. What Pardew has managed to do in this run is get the players visibly up for the games (something he failed to do on many occasions last season), and for that he deserves credit. That motivation and "will to win" is the only consistent element I have noticed during this run. The football remains pap. We play some lovely stuff out of the back and into the middle third. If he wants to keep this up, he must work harder on translating that into the danger areas. And for the record, this idea that people WANT Pardew to fail is absolutely ridiculous for obvious reasons. Unless you are a mackem, you want whoever is NUFC manager to succeed.

doubtful that it's his.

This is the crux of it Ian. I disagree. The better sides are dominating games they should be dominating. Sure, the league is more open this year than previous editions. But why does that necessarily mean that we can't ask for our team to at least TRY to score the 3rd and 4th that would kill the game off? Why can't we ask to be entertained? Everton did it against Stoke, Liverpool regularly do it at home against the weaker sides. It's the "nature" of football that say 7 times out of 10, the better side will dominate a match at home to a less fancied side. Of course you get your anomalies, and off-days etc., but those become understandable when you don't consistently see a discernible drop-off in attacking play and focus on backs to the wall defence, when you're 2-0 at home to Norwich/Hull/WBA. Has a lot to do with the damp atmosphere at home as well. Imagine the place if say 5 times out of 10 we won by a comfortable 2 or 3 goals against the weaker sides, playing a cohesive attacking gutsy brand of football.

I'm as equally inclined to say that Cisse's baron spell cannot go on as i am to say that Remy's purple patch can't. Ramsay and Giroud have 55% of Arsenal's goals. Remy and Gouffran have 63% of our goals. Soldado and Sigurdson have 64% of Spurs' goals Rooney & Van Persie have 68 % of Man U's Sturridge and Suarez have 72% of Liverpool's. Having an in form goal scorer or two is vital to the majority of teams that want to be doing well. You are absolutely right of course. Having said that, if you watch all the above goals scored between all the above players you will notice a glaring difference in the way they were scored. We create nowhere near as many clear cut chances as the above pairings get (barring Soldado & Sigurdsson). The football we play relies on scraps and moments of individual brilliance in the majority. Naturally, scraps and wonder goals are part of football, but they are not as sustainable as playing in a way that creates more clear-cut chances for your forwards and midfielders to score from. The worry is, if we go through a barren "unlucky" spell, where we get no scraps to feed off, and Sissoko/Cabaye/Remy don't pull rabbits out of hats for a while, what do we do then? Surely there must be a way to score "easier" goals with a more distinct style of play? This is clearly evidenced by Cisse's horrendous lack of form. Yes he's missed one or two sitters, but they come so rarely. A forward lacking in form and confidence needs even more service. We spent bloody 10M on the lad, might as well figure out a way to get that confidence back up again. (Not excluding Cisse from criticism here at all, as I believe he also needs to pull his finger out).

Sorry like, but this is a cracking post. Monkey is spot on as usual. We created almost nothing from open play. We keep the ball well in our half and around midfield, but are absolutely dog s*** hopeless in the final third. This recurring theme cannot continue for long, in addition to relying on a different in-form striker to bail us out every half-term. take your NEGATIVITY elsewhere sir, we don't believe what we see with our eyes in here (when we're winning), we look purely at the league table then close our eyes, put our fingers in our ears and scream NEGATIVITY until the doubters go away that's how you discuss and analyse football good sir, we'll have none of your s*** in here

Sorry like, but this is a cracking post. Monkey is spot on as usual. We created almost nothing from open play. We keep the ball well in our half and around midfield, but are absolutely dog shit hopeless in the final third. This recurring theme cannot continue for long, in addition to relying on a different in-form striker to bail us out every half-term.

73 points by the end of it. Back in the top 60 on N-O which is always a decent indicator.

HTL was the Dave Jones fanboy was he not?

Isn;t Cabaye one yellow away from a suspension as well? Wouldn't mind seeing HBA, Cisse and Anita come in for Ameobi, Gouffran and Cabaye. One of the few occasions this season we need to rotate a bit as we begin the heavy winter schedule.