ExiledGeordie

HBA involved in any form on sunday is a bonus. He'll probably get half an hour and might be needed to open things up if god forbid it's a tight, frustrating game. I'd bank on Cabaye, Sissoko and Gouffran causing them enough problems though.

Strange one tomorrow is that in the event that the Mackems win tomorrow the silver lining of sorts will be that Qpr will be really mired in the shit. Draw would be best

Yeah just read that myself, what a cunt if that's true

I wasn't blaming them just making the point that it seems they think we played our first eleven thursday night with the same lot to play again sunday. Agree though europe did ruin them and the same thing will probably happen to Swansea next season too.

As I mentioned in the other thread, a few of the Stoke fans on their board seem to be overestimating the effects of the trip to Russia on sunday's match when you consider the players that were rested, were ineligible and those who only came on for a few minutes. Need to put these to the sword and they've slumped in form recently. Hardly a pushover and always dangerous from set pieces but with our quality we should be able to put them away. I see Huth is suspended.

Quite a few Stoke fans by the looks of their board seem to be overestimating the effect of tiredness as a result of this match. Especially when you consider Debuchy, Gouffran and Santon didn't play and Tiote and Taylor only came on for very brief periods. Oh yeah how come there's no Stoke match thread yet? Just realised.

Yeah he's strong, holds his position and seems good on the ball. Seems to have a pretty good idea when to get forward too but without leaving too many holes at the back.

The fact that he has such fantastic recovery pace too is very reassuring.

I don't think it's bashing when you show concern to the lads poor defensive play, especially when you consider he is a defender. Call me old fashioned but i prefer my full back to be a good defender above all else, then you look for one who has good forward play too. This - absolutely. Totally agree.

He's not match fit, looked a bit rusty, he's been out 10 weeks. No big deal and to be expected. He got 60 mins so thats progress and will clearly play some part again on sunday. Can't wait to see him play live again.

Shite, not much else to say

I'm very happy with the result because I'm very confident we can take them at SJP - but neither team should have even bothered with that match. Both teams barely got out of first gear and were clearly happy with a 0-0. I don't think you can really fault us too much as the away side but as the home side Anzhi just didn't seem to go for it. We were very organised and solid though. Glad we're taking them back home for a cracking second leg

60 mins under the belt, the sharpness will come

Obertan just brings nothing to the side, awful awful player

If he played Williamson on Sunday with no injuries to Taylor/Mbiwa I'd immediately join the Pardew out clan

If QPR beat the Mackems on saturday at home then the momentum will really start to build for them. There's still loads of big games between the sides at the bottom to come though, almost 12 pointers ffs, very tight still. We need to bag 3 points on sunday to ease any remaining pressure.

Just said on total sport he's doubtful

Just said on total sport he's doubtful

I don't know, Wigan are the masters of scraping through at the end and the next placed team are 7 points clear of QPR. Yeah it's hardly cut and dried that they're going to stay up even after beating Southampton. Their last 3 games is Arsenal then us at home then Liverpool away. They really have to beat the Mackems on sat to stay up

Christ those Reading and QPR games Villa have coming up next

Agree and disagree with what you say. We've been utterly shite this season but I thought both the performances against Metalist away and Southampton at home were good performances. If we piss about against Stoke at home a week today though and fail to put them away then things will start getting nervy again.

The corners yesterday were shocking but I don't think there's that much you can criticise him for yesterday. It was a stupid cock up at the back for the goal and our general play second half was pretty good. We took it to them second half and should've scored. He has his limitations but I don't think there was that much wrong yesterday. We've certainly played a lot worse and won.

Either way you just shouldn't be conceding s**** goals like that in the 85th minute. Should've at least been a decent away point but they completely shot themselves in the foot

Agree we are not creating enough clear cut chances or playing him through, he is to involved in open play for my liking also. I just want him to concentrate on finding space between defenders and dragging them about HBAs return should help rectify this. My god I saw that goal again this morning when I turned the tv on, what was Santon doing FFS and it wasn't the best effort from Mbiwa nor Debuchy to stop the cross. Easy cross to defend though, should've been dealt with.