Footsoldier

Aye and we wound up with Andy Faye. :'(

While we all appreciate Rafa and his good points outweigh the bad by far, I still think he's guilty of poor man management with Mitrovic. Almost to the point he has a mind block. If we had viable alternatives then I'd see where he is coming from but we don't. Watching Joselu is painful bordering on the ridiculous. Putting weak as piss Perez up front is a joke. And yet we see it week after week. Acquiring an injured player is laughable. Getting rid of Mitrovic in this situation was a mistake and doesn't make sense in footballing terms. He was another option, now we have none. OK. Now you can close this thread.

You're comparing Rafa and Fergie even though they couldn't be any more different from each other? That includes anything from football philosophy, to transfer budget to control of the club. Doesn’t make any difference when you are circling the bowl what your philosophy is. You use every resource available to you and you certainly don’t get rid of options now, you wait until the summer. While I’m not saying Mitrovic could save us, Are you happy that we could be relegated on Rafa’s point of principle? It might be Rafa's point of principle that keeps us up yet. All you can do is hope he knows what he's doing better than we do, and you are talking about one of the most highly respected managers in recent history. I hear you and I keep trying to tell myself the same thing. Week after week.

30 yards or not, e wasn’t actually playing though was he?

You're comparing Rafa and Fergie even though they couldn't be any more different from each other? That includes anything from football philosophy, to transfer budget to control of the club. Doesn’t make any difference when you are circling the bowl what your philosophy is. You use every resource available to you and you certainly don’t get rid of options now, you wait until the summer. While I’m not saying Mitrovic could save us, Are you happy that we could be relegated on Rafa’s point of principle?

Rafa, the coaches, Joselus teammates and some supporters. If Shelvey see that Mitrovic is being picked ahead of Joselu when Joselu out performs him in training, maybe he too will put in less effort because he knows he will get picked anyway. Lascelles see that Shelvey and Mitro are picked ahead of Joselu and Merino/Hayden and puts in less effort etc etc. Joselu gets angry that he is not picked and stops making any effort because why should he if he isn't getting picked anyway. Poor training results in poor match performances and we go down. One of the few advantages we have this season is fighting attitude and team spirit. I don't see why Rafa would risk spoiling that in order to accommodate one player. I wonder how much it helped team morale to see a striker picked every week that never seemed to trouble a keeper. I would assume it was a feeling of collective responsibility that nobody did good enough rather than players pointing at individuals. I’m inclined to think that team morale with an extra six points in the bag would be a tad higher than it is now. I am willing to bet when a player looks at their pay packet at the end of the season if we go down they may not take the simplistic view that you have. I’ve never heard the likes of Alex Ferguson say Give me the player who runs around in training but can’t hit a barn door on Saturday afternoon because its good for morale. FFS. Do you honestly think that if Ferguson or any top manager was staring relegation in the face they wouldn’t use every resource at their disposal to try to avoid it? It made no sense to get rid of Mitrovic and persist with the others up front. Even less if the reason was he didn’t train hard enough. And then to panic and bring in a player with what could be a long term injury?

Spoke to my man at the club and he reckons he should be back for Huddersfield. Back? He hasn't arrived yet!

Do you want to enlighten me?

Rafa, the coaches, Joselus teammates and some supporters. If Shelvey see that Mitrovic is being picked ahead of Joselu when Joselu out performs him in training, maybe he too will put in less effort because he knows he will get picked anyway. Lascelles see that Shelvey and Mitro are picked ahead of Joselu and Merino/Hayden and puts in less effort etc etc. Joselu gets angry that he is not picked and stops making any effort because why should he if he isn't getting picked anyway. Poor training results in poor match performances and we go down. One of the few advantages we have this season is fighting attitude and team spirit. I don't see why Rafa would risk spoiling that in order to accommodate one player. I wonder how much it helped team morale to see a striker picked every week that never seemed to trouble a keeper. I would assume it was a feeling of collective responsibility that nobody did good enough rather than players pointing at individuals. I’m inclined to think that team morale with an extra six points in the bag would be a tad higher than it is now. I am willing to bet when a player looks at their pay packet at the end of the season if we go down they may not take the simplistic view that you have. I’ve never heard the likes of Alex Ferguson say Give me the player who runs around in training but can’t hit a barn door on Saturday afternoon because its good for morale. FFS.

Especially if they came up. But fat mike would cash in. So every cloud has a silver lining. Just not for us.

Essential that he is back. We need to win and he gives us more going forward than anybody else. Bottom line.

Well thats alright then. I feel much better.

Given that two or three goals at the right time would've made a big difference to our position, you have to wonder at Rafa's man management with Mitrovic. If we go down and Rafa walks, then this may prove to be a self-inflicted nail in the coffin. Who really cares if joselu runs around like a blue arsed fly in training?

p*ss off, you blatant WUM. I beginning to think you most of you on here are seriously deluded. The statement is absolutely correct. Harping on about Shelvey not working hard enough, not tracking and creaming your pants over Ben Arfa is such a double standard. Perez's miss was as bad if not far worse than Shelvey's and yet its getting nowhere near the attention. Probably because people know Perez is shite but the clique on here don't want to come out and say it in case it upsets somebody. There's a difference between calling it as it is and being a WUM.

Funny how there's people still cracking on about ben arfa who disappeared in many more games than he was any good and never tracked a runner in his life.

Total cock up. Ashley has a right to be pissed off at whoever assessed slimani's injury and advised him to make the deal.. Looks like we'll pay to get him fit for his holidays.

You didn't watch the game. Or if you did you have no idea what was going on. I think it is probably the latter. Most of your post doesn't make sense. But hey, this is a forum for opinions regardless of your level of intelligence. I'm sure all are welcome and you may learn something.

Anything you disagree with?

Pretty sure he did. Unlike Begovic, you can't slip anything past you.

You can't say that on here. Perez is a lot of people's ideal #10. Apart from the fact he doesn't score or create goals he runs around and falls down. He played one decent pass today and that was it...apart from missing a very easy chance. For those of you who think he created the second, it was actually a relatively weak shot that keepers would normally save comfortably. Begovic deserves all the credit for making an arse of it but he would've stopped that 99 times out of 100. Bigger problem is that I don't think Rafa will learn anything from this game about the subs. as he is just as likely to do the same thing again. Bringing on Atsu at that point is just absurd in my opinion as he just doesn't understand what is needed at that point. I'm sure Rafa must tell him but maybe he is just fucking thick.

Unbelievable some of the comments here. Perez will be Maradonna next. Joselu runs around. Perez runs around. Gayle runs around. You know what they don’t do? That’s why we are in the position we are in. They aren’t good enough and Perez certainly isn’t. Most of the games he plays he just does not contribute enough where it matters in such a key position. Running around isn’t enough. Holding up the ball and then losing easily is not enough. FFS, Too many people on here are frightened to state the obvious

I B calling it as I C it.

That's your answer?

Perez is probably the weakest link in that team. Hence the reason we were desperate for a 10 in the window.

OK....what did he actually do that made him excellent today?