Hanshithispantz

Aye, it was dissent - for some reason. He had the audacity to flick his hand in the air in disagreement with the referees decision. It was the most merge booking for dissent I've seen in a while. On the other hand Shelvey needs to stop sarcastically applauding/thumbs upping the referee after being booked, especially when he's being booked for dissent He'll definitely be given an immediate second yellow by some cunt.

:lol: fucking hell that's outstanding

Rafael McCarthy

Not sure what you're asking? We are creatively bereft in all areas of the pitch other than Jonjo Shelvey with Merino out.

He's another player who would be fine if we weren't so creatively bereft elsewhere.

When his Hollywood balls don't come off people get on his back like but without them we have very little going forward unless the opposition is all over the shop like Bournemouth were in the first half. He can find a gap in an otherwise incredibly tight game which completely opens the opposition up for an attack, it's great to see like. I just really want to see Merino ahead of him again like we did against Liverpool, Merino battling in midfield (and hopefully being better on the ball than he was in that game) with Shelvey in space behind him allowing him to spread the ball about with more freedom. With Gayle on the pitch he hopefully has a better outlet to hit too. I still don't think it'll be enough to turn us into a good attacking side but we'll hopefully be back to creating chances again.

11 starts last season. 4 goals, 6 assists. Selfish cunt. In a much inferior league. Scored 1 goal in 7 months, but he's a fantastic striker because he's a mad bastard. Wasn’t he also injured and barely playing for those 7 months? Not like Neesy to talk shit mind. Neither of our other strikers look like scoring, he’s got a much better record than them this season despite barely getting on the field. No idea how anyone can even try and dispute that he should be on the pitch. A few games ago aye, but if Gayle is fit then why should Mitrovic be starting ahead of him?

He always looks so fucking miserable too. I think it might just be his resting facial expression when he's playing but he walks around as if he's constantly arguing with himself in his head.

That's a load of shite like, Mitrovic's best quality is his link up play and how he brings others into the game. It's debatable that he'd be better if he was more of a 'plays for himself' striker, like Gayle Mitrovic isn't ruthless enough, he cannot play on the toes of the defenders like Gayle can, that's his problem. Joselu might run around like a headless chicken more than him like, I bet the team love him for it. EDIT: I mean 'he plays for himself' is a bit of a misnomer anyway. The vast majority of players will want personal glory, it's not just the obvious unashamed ones like Ronaldo and Neymar. If Joselu doesn't want to be the star man then, as the main striker, that's actually a canny big problem You want your number 9 to be unforgiving and greedy (within reason obviously), to be picking the ball up and walking to the penalty spot. You want him to be shouting at his midfielders for not spotting his runs etc.

Yet Joselu looked like Joselu. This 2 up top argument is odd, 4-5-1 works and has always worked. It isn't without it's own issues but it's hardly a formation that automatically makes your strikers shite. Gayle looked OK because he knows how to play as a number 9.

He's our best set piece taker by a mile, his crossing is far better than anyone else in the squad in general when he gets into position, his link up play with Yedlin is pretty strong, he's one of the better passers we have in the squad, he works his bollocks off to help out in defence, he doesn't lose it cheaply. He's all around just a solid option on the right who fulfils the role of 'grafting winger' well enough. I don't think he's amazing. He carries out his role well enough though where as I don't think Atsu does.

I'm saying Ritchie isn't tasked with running at defenders so I'm not going to judge him on that in the same way I will Atsu. This is like comparing Guttierrez with Obertan or something. Obertan was legitimately just shite where as Jonas was a fairly average player who formed a great partnership with Enrique due to his workrate and the understanding they had. Both were awful in the final 3rd.

Ritchie's assist rate is pretty much limited to set-pieces but there's a pretty clear improvement over him putting balls into the box compared to Atsu and Yedlin like. Atsu just isn't that great in the final 3rd. He's meant to be our direct winger, the one who has it in him to carve a side open, and he rarely ever does. Was decent in the first half today like.

I don't think Atsu is that effective like, but that's sort of the point. We need to replace Atsu with someone who can carry the ball forward and do something with it. Along with a proper AM and a striker obviously. Ritchie isn't infallible obviously but I think he's pretty far down the list of who we need to replace.

But the onus is on Atsu to run at defenders and make things happen - he does the former well but never makes anything of it. Often runs down blind alleys or whips in a rubbish ball. That's not Ritchie's game. If we're replacing one we replace the one who's genuinely pretty poor at his role rather than the one who basically does what's expected of him.

If we have a proper striker with a good partner behind him, as well a far better winger than Atsu on the left, Ritchie's negatives won't be as bad like. Benitez probably as much as any other top level manager in the Premiership has always had players like that. Dirk Kuyt the obvious one. EDIT: Fergy was similar.

It's one of the reasons I proper like Gayle Shelvey runs up to random players and starts screaming in their faces.

Thought he was good first half, 2nd we let Bournemouth get on top of us as a team and like everyone else he look somewhere between shite and industrious.

I'm just happy he's looking fit and hoping he can remain injury free as he's the only striker we have who isn't hilarious in front of goal. I think he made a decent enough account of himself today. Not great, but a marked improvement on the last couple of month.

Saying he "didn't do much" is hardly berating him like mate. You said he's our 3rd choice striker. Your whole argument is quite clearly based around criticising him too.

He's started one game in dokeys and look fine. Scored a goal that was probably unfairly chalked off and you're focusing on him missing a good chance to berate him? Howay man His finishing is good, that's never been an issue. Him missing one good chance isn't evidence of him being shite or that he will consistently be missing sitters.

Tammy Abraham, who Rafa wanted on loan but wasn't allowed. Ofcourse Jordan is blaming the signing of Jacob Murphy for our awful squad though.

You expected us to wisely spend every penny of our limited funds without no signings missing the mark like? The biggest issue with our limited funds was that we never had a coherent plan with how we would spend them because our daft sell to buy policy. There was no chance of Benitez ever building an effective squad under that shite.

We don't really need a good striker outside of the box though. We're a solid unit but absolutely horrible at scoring goals. Honestly cannot see how we could ever be serious about playing Joselu up top ever again tbh. If Gayle is capable of playing 90 then he'll score more.

He played like an actual striker for one. Was looking to play one twos and immediately run into the box. Scores a goal which was questionably dissalowed. I don't think it was some vintage number 9 performance but he made it look like we were playing with one again.