HaydnNUFC

I'd like to keep Hayden and Yedlin as well too, mind. The former because I think he'll mature into a decent player, maybe not a starter but a nice option to have, and Yedlin because he'd be a great backup full back to better quality counterpart.

No overreaction at all just telling it how it is. As for far superior teams as some on here keep saying maybe Bristol City should have played the same way the other week then with a team assembled for pennies if they had I don’t think they would be in the semi final right now. That performance until the subs come on was shocking and in 46 years of watching football I have never seen any Newcastle team play in that fashion what happened for the first half. You’re not going to change my mind or others and vice versa and I accept that it’s football and footballs always been about opinions but it damn well certainly wasn’t a overreaction. Well football's moved on from 46 years ago, it's a shame in many ways, but we can't really turn the clock back unfortunately. I’m talking about the whole 46 years and not actually 46 years ago. Never seen any team play like that formation in my life with no attempt to even try and combat the threat. This suggest you don't understand our tactics against Man City and that you don't understand how tactical shape, positioning, discipline etc. works. Watch the Man City game less than two years ago and you will see how tactical shape, positioning, discipline and with a counter threat should be. So yes I fully understand what it takes to play against a superior team. What I saw on Wednesday is a team that was able to practically walk the ball into the last third of the pitch, no challenges and players losing their markers at will resulting in chances and shots on goal happening every few minutes. When the subs were made I saw the team then press city ensuring space and chances were kept to a minimum and we then started to push city back, which was like the full 90 minutes of the last city game. I understand fully I certainly don’t think you do though. Again, you don't understand the tactics we employed. If we went man or man, toe to toe with this Man City side we let in 4+. We had a squad with much more quality then, a lot less heart and desire but without doubt more ability. We were also up against a half decent City side, not the world class one we were up against earlier this week. You said we did nothing to combat them, that's just bollocks, our entire set up was to combat are frustrate them. It nearly worked. Players losing their markers .... see the shape of our team? We weren't marking individuals, our set up was to be disciplined and not allow space, spare defender tracks the runner, it very nearly worked against on the best teams we've seen in the last 20 years. I saw the shape, I saw that city players were getting space and behind that shape time after time after time. It only nearly worked because city had an off day in front of goal - our play did not stop them getting behind our defence, into the danger area, getting shots on goal. Just can’t understand the mentality here we were cut to shreds man. As far markers well actually if Yedlin hadn’t lost the player he was supposed to be marking we might have actually got the draw. You do not allow a player your marking make runs you follow your manIf you allow teams with quality to play they will. You will never stop quality teams from having one or two chances but that first half performance was a case of putting ten men behind the ball to try and stop the space however it was not executed very well. Isn’t it funny it’s only in the main Newcastle fans who actually think this was acceptable. In some ways it would have been interesting if city had their shooting boots on because the attitude . would have been far different that’s for sure. You also mention we had a better team last time possibly you’re right but it still went down but Rafa had them playing exactly the right way that night as he did against Liverpool earlier in the season and Tottenham until the sending off. Those three games were a totally different and correct way for playing a defensive game, putting pressure on the opppsition. Not allowing space and not keep kicking the ball straight back to the opposition and having an attacking threat. Not one person on here has also cared to answer my point about how a Bristol City team costing pennies managed to counter a far superior team either. Just cannot believe that people on here thought we did well on Wednesday especially that first half. The team 2 years ago went down due to shocking management by a shocking manager in Steve McClaren. Give Rafa those players over a 38 game season and would we be where we are now? No. And I'll answer your Bristol City question. I didn't watch the game between them and Man Utd but Man City are miles ahead of their rivals. They're coached better on and off the ball and are breaking goalscoring records, winning records, the lot. Look at the movement to create an option man:

Just...no.

Exactly this. The only semblance of hope we would have of a takeover being done is if we were being linked to players who are in the 15m plus bracket. Scraping around the bargain basement is going to get us nowhere but the Championship. If you buy cheap quality in life its usually s**** Trying to link transfer gossip in tabloids to the takeover not happening. Pure

Howlers that come to mind are Bristol City (h), Norwich (a) and Rotherham (h). He recovered from the latter thanks mainly to Yedlin.

Wijnaldum for me.

When you play these you have to limit the space. If someone commits to closing down their intelligence and movement will punish that player for moving out of position and move the ball into the space left by that player. Our ball retention you can put down to the fact we just have poor players, which we do. I doubt in Rafa's tactical approach he wanted the players to hand Man City possession as soon as we won it back, but that's what we did and we do it against many sides. It showed really badly on Wednesday because of how well Man City retain possession and badly we were at retaining it. As for the approach, look at Napoli v Juventus at the start of this month. Juve scored in the first 12 minutes iirc and then camped out in their half for the remainder of the game, about 3-4 players committing to breaks and the same number on attacking set plays. Rest of the team back. Juventus won the game but was that approach cowardly? Was their football just surrendering as you're implying ours was? Allegri was hailed as getting the game tactically spot on. If he lost it I'm sure he would've been lambasted. If we got a point on Wednesday the press would be hailing our tactical approach. And so would many on here who haven't done so.

Good result for us.

Don't do this, Arsenal.

World class. Get in.

Strike.

Arsenal gone to utter shit.

Oh, do fuck off.

http://www.nufc.com/html/2006-07html/2006-10-19fenerbahce-h.html I miss European nights. :'(

It's almost like there isn't a gargantuan gap in quality between us and them and morale isn't a factor whatsoever.

Cabaye Robert Emre Shearer Solano Townsend Viana? Struggling after that.

Solid off the ball. Horrendous on it.

When? Gayle's header. Aarons' chip. Gayle deciding to go down instead of getting a shot off. The pressure on their goal in the last 10.

Man City are far better than Man United. They're world class. One of the favourites for the Champions League ffs. Tonight is what we have to do in order to give ourselves a chance of getting a result. Don't like it? Don't go to the game or watch the game then. It was obvious how we were going to play and we could've gotten something from the game. I'm proud of the team and Rafa for that. Man City will hammer far better teams than us before the end of the season.

It's so f***ing weird man. Wanting us to "have a go" and get embarrassed and take a huge hit to GD and morale amongst the players and the fanbase going into Brighton. A 0-1 loss in which we could've nicked something is far far better than a 0-5 or 0-6 humbling. If you don't get that, you don't understand football.