Neil

Despite making up a bit of ground in the past 3 weeks, I'm still a fair distance behind in the main personal league I'm in. Never has 1 game (the 8-2) screwed me over so much in Fantasy Footy. What Rooney ©, Nani and Young got in that match is pretty much exactly how far I'm behind. Hoping for an Adebayor hattrick today.

What's this talk of Villa fans "attacking" Sunderland fans after the 2nd goal? Or was that my Mackem friend completely exaggerating events?

Notice how many of those chances though were shots from outside the box and scrambled attempts inside the box without really getting a clear-cut chance. Man Utd were poor. A better team would have punished them.

It's not often this Newcastle side go 12 league games unbeaten or something. Then we travel to a team who have only lost 2 home games in the last 22 and who we never play particularly well against (1 win in the last six in all competitions). You can forgive people for being a bit negative People can be whatever they like. I won't understand a mentality of almost writing this off as a likely defeat when you consider how well you're doing. This as good an opportunity as ever to beat a Stoke team who are tough at home.

You'd think you were playing Barca Real Levante judging by some of the comments on here. Very realistic you'll get something. Tough, yes, but regardless of their style of play there's no-one in their team worthy of a scared Yao expression. Get Cabaye, Jonas, Ben Arfa, Ba on the ball and think about hurting them instead.

I can see what you're saying Kris but I don't particularly agree. I think the whole physicality argument is clichéd. People keep on saying holding up the Premier League as the benchmark for "fast, physical football" when in fact I see as much emphasis on technical ability as I do "getting into the opposition's faces". The Mata/Silva example is a bit twisted to fit the argument. These are great players who just happen to be living in a time of embarrassing Spanish midfield riches. Think it's a bit unfair to use "they don't start for Spain" as reasoning for people prioritising physicality or technique.

Yes and no. Man Utd would have had few qualms if the match had finished a draw, but we did our usual thing of showing far too much respect for far too long. When we actually got at them and went forward instead of fannying on with sideways passing then - get this - we actually looked like scoring.

Dani Alves just casually thumps it in from way out.

lolololololololol

No, Martin, I can very much wait to hear Gary Neville.

The linesman's wasting time.

This is a masterclass in camping in an opponent's half yet not looking dangerous.

It's what we do. We leave it far too late before we decide "hang on, let's try and score a goal."

Textbook stuff at the moment. 1-0 down, well in the game but not 100% going for it. Moyes will throw on Vellios/Stracq in 5-10 mins but someone else should've been on 10 minutes ago.

Shockingly, when we actually have the balls to go forward and get at Man Utd, we look like we have goals in us. Stand off them and they'll boss the game. Revelatory stuff.

We often are.

What, end up like a club with more major honours than Tottenham?

Probably got a new haircut.

Isn't there talk of their owner stepping down as well? Roig is it? They could be in big trouble.

Fuck's sake, who gave Prophet the spinning Dowie face again?

May sound very long odds, but they're not when you consider how shite they've been this year.

You don't have to look far either to see the finger of blame in full action. Referees kept making poor decisions against them apparently (I see he's gone decidedly quiet on that front since the shambles that was the derby), and everyone's apparently out to get Suarez. Those are merely 2 recent examples off the top of my head. I'm not going to waste my time justifying why I think Liverpool are not a top 4 team, it's clear as day why they aren't. Actually, I guess it'll be good to see fans get their hopes up and pretend like they have a better team than they do, only for the results to show that they, oh, wait: don't have as good a team as they think they do.

Crawley equalise, D&R down to 10.

Even though they had Tevez, Aguero is a cut above. What's impressed me about Aguero is - as well as the outstanding quality we all knew he possessed - how quickly he's settled into this league. I guess truly great players don't need a "settling period".