aimaad22

Just a ton more of the usual excuses again today then.

Joe Hart What an absolute blow that must be to Man City who on the whole shaded it imo, cracking goal from Aguero as well.

Aye I often wonder how different things would be if we had even one of Nolan and Barton still at the club.

Putting Cisse on the wing to keep Ba happy has to be one of the worst managerial decisions ever. I mean, did he not know, which player had the buy out clause in his contract?

I said somewhere in this thread before the game I hoped Tiote and Cabaye would keep their lids on. Always had the tendency to bottle it in games like these.

Why would Ashely do that? We are tenth. Thats more than good enough for him.

Xavi

We were caught out, it was a silly challenge. Im not blaming Tiote for the defeat, he was better than most, but he never seems to learn that there are times when you just cant give stupid free kicks away.

Which is what makes that moment or two of pure stupidity so frustrating.

And I dont see anyone blaming him for that. There's a fair amount of other things though. I've generally been in the give Pards some time camp. Mainly because we aren't likely to get anyone better, so we'd at least have some stability. Its painfully clear though he'll never be anything more than below average at best. Just enough to not get us relegated, which all his boss wants.

Agree. He was pretty decent up till the last 20 minutes, lost it after that. The needless giving away of freekicks. Then failing to clear the ball in dangerous areas and trying to hold onto it as if he's, like you say, Xavi.

Im saying its not really an excuse seeing as we dont seem to fare a lot better when our first choice are playing. Colo would have made a big difference today, perhaps, but on the whole we're always liable to doing stupid things at the back no matter who's playing. Injuries are never an excuse anyway, especially when you fail to strengthen areas that obviously need strengthening.

Yeah because otherwise we're always so solid at the back arent we? Like at Everton with our captain and our 7M pound signing.

He just loses it, after playing a decent game too. Can turn into a liability at any moment.The one thing you want from your DM is dependability.

Not defending Pardew here, but should you really have to be motivated ahead of a game like this? Dont the players get newspapers? Watch the TV, or browse the web. Dont they bloody live in the city? Bunch of heartless wretches the lot of them, like their manager.

God its an expression. They were more arsed than we were, they get the points, same as last time. Nothing unfair or unlucky about it. As for who suffers well thats the way the world works doesnt it? Pointless getting philosophical about it.

Would have fit right into the heartless display today

We werent up for it. Serves us right.

What rubbish. Had to resort to long range shots throughout the game against the worst team in the league. Difficult to pick out players in such a rubbish performance but Remy and Gouffran need a kick up the backside in particular. Its funny because Gouffran usually puts himself about, didnt give the slightest amount of shite today. Not that Cisse was much better after coming on. And Tiote(who I thought was our best player up till the last 20 minutes), handing out fucking cheap freekicks. Got away with the one Fletcher took but not the second one. Cracking strike and all but the amount of times Tiote has given away needless set pieces that have cost us is hard to remember. Fucking liability. Good way to atone for the performance in the last derby lads, well done!

I think of lack of quality rather than effort is the issue here.

Thats kind of what 'cant do anything with the ball as usual' implies.

Think we've put a few decent balls into the box but noone's been there to attack them. Even after the formation change Remy has hardly been where a centre forward should be in such situations.

Scandalous we arent up for this considering what happened last time, must get better in the second half.

Only Ben Arfa and Tiote seem to be aware of what's at stake here. Sissoko is trying but he cant seem to be able to do anything with the ball as usual.Remy and Gouffran completely non existent. I'd put Cisse/Shola on for either of Remy/Gouffran.

I think if we can get past the first 20 minutes without incident we'll be okay. Need to stop anything stupid happening till then. I hope Tiote/Cabaye in particular understand that.