Smal

He was costing us nearly a goal a game through individual errors. He's been really, really bad this season.

That's horrendous for Williamson, like. We've proven before many times it's perfectly possible to have two centre halves injured.

Les trois amis

Apart from he isn't similar to either of those players. He started off as a winger, I'd like to see it tried. He'd have to learn to go on his left foot a lot more for it to be successful however. Either way he'd certainly be more of a threat than Jonás or Obertan.

ahaahhahaha

Because he's not very good, obviously.

If anything he should be starting ahead of Coloccini at the moment, not Taylor imo.

Hopefully not here :scared:

Dani Alves says Barcelona should sign Jack Wilshere. :MJpopcorngif:

Apparently he's on Twitter now. @s_marveaux

Aye, it's that bad I'm actually off to go and do something with my weekend for a change in a bit.

I'd like to point out I'm not calling for Perch to be played over Tioté. Nobody else has either.

That's a pretty basic understanding of the game, like. So, when under pressure, with Cabaye marked (I'll ignore your suggestion of Sissoko as he's playing further forward and this would be a daft ambitious pass), what's he meant to do? Play it backwards to the defence or keeper, putting them under pressure, every time? Even if the ball forward has a chance of reaching the winger/striker/Sissoko? I'd expect him to try the forward ball myself. Eh? You can still pass the ball forward in a simple way. Of course he doesn't have to pass it backwards all the time . It's when he starts lofting 30 yard passes that come off 1/10 times that annoys me.

When the situation calls for what? Tioté trying to make daft passes that he's not capable of? I don't think such a situation ever arises. Especially when Cabaye and Sissoko are on the pitch next to him.

I don't really think Tioté needs to be making direct ambitious passes though. I'd much rather his passing was as simple and easy as Perch's. That's how it was when Tioté first joined the club and I think we'll all agree that was by far his best form for us.

How many passes does Tiote make per game? People say his passes are simple, backwards and square. I'd like to see the distance compared to Perch. I'm certain Tiote makes more passes than Perch and they're more ambitious. That's why I put the key passes stat in there as well. Tioté may well try a lot more ambitious passes, but he doesn't actually end up making any more important ones than Perch does.

I don't like to keep bringing up stats, but I feel it's necessary here. Perch certainly keeps hold of the ball a lot better than Tioté. Perch: Pass completion this season - 88.8% Dispossessed per game - 0.3 Turnovers per game - 0.4 Key passes per game - 0.5 Tioté: Pass completion - 83.6% Dispossessed per game - 1.6 Turnovers per game - 1 Key Passes per game - 0.6 I'm not saying Perch is a better/more effective player here, but he keeps the ball a lot better than Tioté does. Perch has played a few games at centre half, but it shouldn't make that much of a difference.

His pass accuracy stats have been very low for someone who plays his position. I have few problems with him losing the ball when he's making an ambitious forward pass, which, as has been said, is a large part of his role; but there's been plenty of times where he's made sloppy passes which he should easily be making. Other than that he's been absolutely class. Can't believe he was so cheap. I'd like to see him and Cabaye rotate positions more though just to keep the opposition guessing.

I could see him scoring a few goals from the left wing as bizarre as it may sound. He'd be more of a threat than Jonás for sure.

Might as well just let HBA try and score directly from them.

By his standards he wasn't bad, but there's no denying he offered no threat whatsoever once he got towards the opposition's 18 yard box.

You don't need to but it would be unjustified to call him a scapegoat when he is clearly not playing up to the necessary standard for this club.

I don't get this 'people need a scapegoat' thing. Of course people are going to pick out our worst performers. Jonás is by far the worst performer who gets in our first team consistently now, so he's inevitably going to come in for a lot of stick.

two goals isn't a great deal when going away, obviously better than 0-0 but not enough to go back to playing a largely reserve team. I think it'd be ok against this lot, like. They looked really average to me for the most part.