Newcastle 0 - 2 Manchester City - 02/01/08 - post match reaction from page 24

[Ember]

I blame the players, not the manager.

[Taylor Swift]

When Everton, Villa & Spurs appointed Moyes, O'Neill & Jol, despite not pulling up many trees and finishing mid-table, they did show almost immediate signs of improvement and looked as if, long-term, they'd improve. We've shown nothing this season that sets us apart from the Souness & Roeder teams.

 

Everton nearly got relegated the season after they finished fourth iirc, Spurs have suffered for 10 or so years and I'd say their improvement is more down to the players recruited by Comolli, actually their improvement began several seasons ago and Ramos might be the manager to capitalise on all the investment in the past couple of seasons. Ramos didn't turn a mid-table team into something better, he's managing a team that has finished 5th twice in a row. Hardly a spectacular achievement that he's now getting them to play football again, is it? And Villa? They ended up in a decent league position last season only because they had an unbeaten run to end it, but before that, they were very shite for a very long time after the initial honeymoon period ended. O'Neill certainly didn't look like the saviour that people seem to think he is now during the middle of last season.

 

I'm not saying Allardyce will turn it around. In fact, I'd bet on him not making it but I'd rather give him the chance because there's a body of evidence out there that time and stability will lead to a general improvement in the team. For fuck's sake, we gave Souness a year and a bit, Roeder a similar amount of time. Now why can't we give someone else, who's better, an equal amount of time to try and implement his ideas? And that's what Allardyce is suffering for atm; he's implementing ideas that the players aren't familiar with and he's gotta decide whether to stick with those ideas or abandon them. That's why our players tend to look clueless and our attack is inept at best, but it may all change with time and that's why he should be given the chance.

[ChezGiven]

That booing sounded like nowt compared to Liverpool/Pompey.

 

I videod the end of the match to record the reaction. There was a very small amount of booing, hardly any tbh.

 

Decent performance from us, unlucky to go a goal down and had a few excellent chances to equalise. If Owen had scored with his second touch (one inch further to the left and it was in) then we would have won the game.

 

For the record city were boring as fuck and played it long most of the night.

[ChezGiven]

We lost because of the players, not the manager. I think thats the first time I've thought that this season.

 

Martins, Zog, Duff, Owen and Milner all had opportunities they squandered, Man City had far fewer chances but took theirs. Simple as that.

 

we lost because of the players and the manager.

 

oh, and all of those fans who were getting onto their knees to suck Viduka off when he arrived - despite ALL of us slating him when he was at the Beasts - he's NOT a great player, he's not even a particularly good one. Its about time Newcastle fans realised that just because a player signs for us, it DOESN'T make him great.

 

one last thing - Cacapa: not good,. He got away with a few things last night, but he's a liability.

 

You could also say Cacapa made two good recoveries from slips on a horrible surface.

 

Agree about Viduka btw.

[Taylor Swift]

I blame the players, not the manager.

 

This. As well.

 

Given hasn't looked himself for quite a while, our central defenders keep fucking up and our strikers continually put in inconsistent performances. Has Martins even improved one area of his game in a season and a bit at the club? What's going on with him? Does he need the equivalent of toilet training with his first touch? How can most of them keep coming out with the same bullshit that they're trying their best and our luck will change etc. etc. when they're fucking lazy shites on the pitch. God knows what they're actually doing in their own time on the training ground. It isn't all the manager's responsibility you know? A manager can't forcibly make a player run more, tackle harder, work on his game etc. Some of our players need to behave like men and do the fucking jobs that they're handsomely paid for. The malaise began during SBR's last season here and since then I don't think I've seen our team consistently put in the necessary effort in games. It's always been one good effort followed by a couple of shite ones, and then a good one then another couple of shite ones. Four managers and none of them have been able to correct this. The players have to take a large part of the blame as well.

[Skirge]

I agree its hard to blame Sam for the last two defeats, I blame very poor officials, robbed by shocking mistakes.

 

 

 

Anyone watch match choice on Sky? who was that Jockaneze c*** commentating? He was watching a different game I'm sure..

 

[Yorkie]

The players were more to blame than the manager last night in my opinion. No one could finish, Viduka wasn't laying the ball off well (to be fair, he had three men around him whenever the ball went to him, and if you keep playing it to his heed, you'll get absolutely nowhere), Milner seemed to decrease even further in speed, Butt couldn't keep the ball to save his life, and the centre-backs were ropey.

 

The tactics weren't bad in my opinion. It was refreshing to see a 4-4-2, i thought we might do that and i was pleased when we did.

 

His subs had me aghast, again, though. I was surprised he'd taken Duff off, i thought he was doing alright, but it allowed Zog to push up which was alright. The one i couldn't believe was Faye. I thought that was absolutely mental, especially given the contrast in centre-mid performances. Butt couldn't keep the ball to save his life and although Faye dallied at times, he was instrumental. He held the team together from deep. I said as soon as Faye went off, they'll score another, and of course they did. We lost all defensive protection.

 

On the other hand...

 

/ Beye was absolutely brilliant tracking back again, poor going forward (infact, i noticed on several occassions that the full-backs simply wouldn't support). 

/ N'Zogbia was excellent once more, until he was pushed forward atleast, by which point we'd lost the cohesion altogether. 

/ Enrique was impressive on his little cameo - so very strong on the ball. I'd definitely have Enrique at full-back, Zoggy on the left, Duff on the right for Stoke.

/ Duff looks in decent form.

/ Owen is back.

 

Where we go from here though, i'm honestly not sure. It's going to be a bit grim for a few weeks, i reckon.

[Guest Phil K]

Gutless is the one word you can use for the players.

Money's there, no need for effort.

[Spider Jerusalem]

I agree its hard to blame Sam for the last two defeats, I blame very poor officials, robbed by shocking mistakes.

 

 

 

Anyone watch match choice on Sky? who was that Jockaneze c*** commentating? He was watching a different game I'm sure..

 

 

Just watching it now on Sky.  The commentary is unsurprisingly appalling.  Made a big thing of Martins taking a dive in the area but had the gall to go on about Butt's 'foul' on the flouncy haired number 16 even through the replays were showing that he must have taken him down by invading his personal space. 

 

Linesman deserves an assist for the first, as well as helping to keep 22 men on the field.  The ref must have been inspired by his linemans generosity a few minutes later when he failed to give Elano a red.

 

The next couple of matches should be good for us though as it will all even itself out won't it?  Even though we've got to play Man Ure and The Arse, where we've played 13 men for the past few years....