Punk77

Jumping on the bandwagon? Being an avid supporter since 92/93, I take your utterance as an insult. I'm not from England, but that doesn't make me shitty supporter. Jumping on the bandwagon often refers to people who starts to support a team because of success. And one thing NUFC has not experienced during my years, is success. I although agree that there are enough people who jumps on the Man-U bandwagon. Norway is stint with those fuckers. It's easy to be a supporter when you win minimum one trophy a year. Supporters' character is defined when the going gets tough: then you'll see that a shitload of man u players will jump off the bandwagon. But fuck, that doesn't apply to me. If I was a bandwagon supporter, I would have jumped off years ago.

Agreed, I actually hoped that he didn't sign a new contract. He's probably on £40 000 a year. And he's shit. He's not worth the money compared to how often he's injured and what he delivers on the pitch..Yesterday was a fucking disaster. Amateur errors.

It's those famous margins that sometimes makes and brakes such important games. We could have really have been in the European fight with victories against Bolton and Everton. But we were fucked due to injuries to Barton, Enrique, Ireland and Ranger. Two of those players were almost fit. Man U on the other hand had both Vidic and Ferdinand out for todays match. Consequently Lpool bags three points and we doesn't. The injury on barton pisses me of. Pretty sure we would have nailed two matches in a row with him on the pitch. Fuck!

Ranger's injury was the final nail in the coffin. We did build some pressure at the end of the game. And I think Ranger coming on could have made a good impact, enough to maybe salvage a point.

I'm not sure Routledge would have made a difference. He's only useful on counterattacks. But against defensive, physical teams like Bolton and Everton, he's s***. As i've mentioned before, Pardew made one tactical error: starting with Tayls. Should have gone with Ferguson and Jonas. The way Tayls backed off is f***ing pathetic. He's played in PL for ages, and still he doesn't know that the last thing you should do with players like Arteta is to invite him into the box.

Unless we lose the next game it is actually better form than under Hughton. But we've now reached a stage of the season where it's difficult to compare CH and Pardew. The fixtures are now starting to wear on our squad, which has little depth. The probability of injuries increases with the amount games played. This affects Pardew's results of winning. When CH was in charge, we did not have so many games under our belt, and consequently we did not have so many injuries. That had an advantage for CH. Besides, CH benefited from Carroll, which Pardew didn't.l The question you really need to ask is: Would CH have manged a better track record than Pardew with the same amount of players available. The probable answer is no. Pardew has most of his home games against the top half teams, Hughton had most against bottom half teams so it was never going to be as simple as saying CH </> AP tbh. The fact we have matched our earlier form against tougher opponents without certain players shows we arent doing too badly though. Well pointed out. I think we still may manage a european spot. It's a tight run, and we'll have players back soon. And Lpool has a hell of a run in with many tough opponents.

Unless we lose the next game it is actually better form than under Hughton. But we've now reached a stage of the season where it's difficult to compare CH and Pardew. The fixtures are now starting to wear on our squad, which has little depth. The probability of injuries increases with the amount games played. This affects Pardew's results of winning. When CH was in charge, we did not have so many games under our belt, and consequently we did not have so many injuries. That had an advantage for CH. Besides, CH benefited from Carroll, which Pardew didn't.l The question you really need to ask is: Would CH have manged a better track record than Pardew with the same amount of players available. The probable answer is no.

Williamson - 8 Jonas - 6 Swap them around. Thought Jonas played well. Maybe deserved a 7 tbf, but didn't really produce anything of value. Williamson had a really good game, I thought. Agreed. Williamson has grown for each game. I think he's been our most consistent defender recently.

I'm afraid that he will just spiral downwards. After the sale of Carroll he's been sloppy and he's been lucky that some of his mistakes did not result in goals against us. He's one our best players, but still it must be allowed to criticise him when he's not doing his job properly .The last 4-5 games he's not been his usual self. He's not a holy grail FFS.

He's not been himself lately. If he continues this development we have no other choice but to sell him. His current performances does not justify his big salary.

Exactly,..Too bad Pardew didn't start with ferguson on the LM

Dearly missed. Typical, we had a good chance of solidifying a chance for Europe, only to be fucked up by injuries. We're totally different team with Barton on the pitch. He distributes the ball to the part of the pitch where the opponent is unbalanced. Without him we are constantly playing against an established opponent. That makes everything harder for all our players.

In the 2nd half Hibbert tapped Jonas on the leg avoiding the latter a clean break into the box. If you watch the situation from behind, you could see Webb reach into his pocket to pull out a second yellow. However, he stopped his hand when he saw that the perpetrator was hibbert.

With Barton, Ireland and Enrique back we'll handle Stoke. Luckily Tiote is not suspended.

I think Williamson have been solid in defense lately. He won every duel in the air today..

I thought Williamson, Tiote and Best were our best players today. Jonas had some good spells but also did things too hard.

Could be much worse, it's only just happened so it will be a few days before Pardew can make a definite declaration on it. Hopefully all wil be ready. Barton has been deeply missed. With him on the pitch we could have taken this game. But we should not expect a victory with so many injuries.. We must keep in mind that we are a promoted team and got shitload of injuries. It's hard for Pardew to get anything out of this game when players have to play out of position and we have no offensive forces to use. Although I think he did one mistake with his starting line. He should have used Ferguson on LM and moved Jonas to RM. Jonas is a good defensive player and would've been more helpful in taking out Baines and Arteta who are Evertons main attacking force. Taylor was a disaster today and invited Arteta into the box too many times. I think simpson and Jonas would have handled this task better..

With all our injuries it's not surprising that we struggle a bit. Everton is a good team that always have a good finish on the season. We're now missing Enrique, Barton, Ireland, HBA and Ranger. Four of them are classy players that would be missed in many teams. Too bad we're not cynical enough when in attack. It's very important to finish our attacks so avoid counterattacks. Probably bad defending on the first goal though. Arteta was able to run straight into the box without pressure.

It's logical that the injury frequency increases as the season progresses. More games=increasing the toll on the players=probability of injures also increases.

One advantage with Simspon is that he hits some cracking crossers. If Taylor overlaps him, Everton will have enough room to cover. Everton's left side is also their strongest card. If Simpson and Taylor eliminate Baines, we have a good chance of winning this game.

Agreed (although I still have a slight inkling that his impact is partly down to tired legs). Ditto! Ranger had not much to show for when he met a team similar to Everton, Fulham. Ranger needs his physicality to gain a good advantage, which he's not getting if he's starting. I hope for Shola and Best on top. Ranger can come on during 2nd half. The Fulham game was an absolutely crap team performance, you can't judge Ranger on that. To some extent I agree. But Everton is a physical and defensive team, and right now Ranger is mostly about physical presence and terrorizing the defense. However, if he starts, he will start to feel the fatigue approx. simultaneously with Everton's defenders. Accordingly he will never get the upper hand. On the other hand, if Rangers is a substitute, he will be lively and fresh when he enters, while the defenders start to feel tired. It's this difference in energy that tilts the game in Ranger's advantage. Ranger is the only impact substitute we have, who is truly able to change the game when needed (Bolton, Lpool, Arsenal). That's why it's better to save him and put him on when the game needs to change character or when the other attackers are getting tired.

A draw is a perfect result. I'm glad we didn't go for Bentley. Has been rubbish the two matches I've seen him.

Agreed (although I still have a slight inkling that his impact is partly down to tired legs). Ditto! Ranger had not much to show for when he met a team similar to Everton, Fulham. Ranger needs his physicality to gain a good advantage, which he's not getting if he's starting. I hope for Shola and Best on top. Ranger can come on during 2nd half.

Maybe Pardew is not risking Barton and Ireland if not necessary. If that happens we'll probably see this team. Same defense as last match Jonas - Tiote - Nolan - Ferguson Shola/Loven Best This formation could be very interesting. It could enable Jonas to cross with his favorite foot. And the few matches I've seen from Ferguson, he's impressed me when he's surged forward.

Tbf to Shola, he's been quite superb in some matches. His hold up play has been nothing more than fantastic. Unlike before, he now passes the ball when players overlap him. His play has also allowed the rest of the team to move higher up. Losing the ball in such situations is dangerous because we will be weak for counterattacks. Due to our lack of depth, he's even played some games semi injured. Also, we've not been playing with an attacker that complements him. A fast, industrious attacker ala Bellamy in our side, could have benefited Shola big time imo.