The Fish

Familiarity breeds contempt.

Obvious one, but I regret dicking about at high school and Uni. Could have left a good Uni with a good degree in something I cared about. Regret not going to a better school when I was small. Passed the entrance exam thingy, but chose to stay in the village school instead. Dumbass. I regret jumping off off a fence when I was a teenager and fucking my ankle up. It's so weak now, that the kinds of exercise I enjoyed (football/basketball etc.) are fraught with the risks of spraining/knocking it again. I'm similar to CT though, if I'd gone straight to Uni from school I wouldn't have met a lot of really good friends, I may not have ended up in london, and so on. The ankle thing is different though.

I can only imagine it getting worse for them on that score.

Hard to get a decent metric on "applying pressure", but Perez consistently is among the players with the highest number of tackles for us. He he gets a decent number of touches and passes for us and while this is less a defence of Perez and more a defence of the system, he's the best we've got to fulfill that role; that of a harassing pest who can also be a bit of a threat going forward. Certainly better than Diame. Also, his passes and overall contribution were, stymied by Diame's poor performance. Diame just doesn't seem to win, keep or use the ball half as well as the other 3 CMs. His touch is heavy, his decisions are often wrong, and always slow to come to him. Tbh if we had a better #10, the role of the #10 would likely change. We'd be better on the ball, better at controlling the tempo of the game and get more out of our wide men.

I know Diame was a passenger in the game, but I don't think playing 2 in midfield with Hayden would have seen us wrest more control of the centre. Perez puts pressure on their CBs and CMs and were we to play with 2 up front, the gap between the forwards and the midfield would increase the amount of long balls we'd rely upon. I don't think the wingers were restricted in attack, and even were we to play 4-4-2 they'd need to have shouldered the same defensive responsibility they do in a 4-2-3-1, perhaps even more. We put in 16 crosses, but most of them were shite. I think the tactics were right, but we were undone by a combination of a momentary lapse in concentration at the back, the opposition's specific qualities, a poor selection choice (Diame) and wasteful play by the wide men. 4-4-2 repeatedly gets unravelled by 4-2-3-1 as the midfield gets swamped, the wide men rarely get 1-on-1 and the two strikers get starved of possession. Meanwhile the team playing 4-2-3-1 can overload the midfield, the #10 finds holes and channels or pulls CMs and CBs out of position. With the squad we've available I get why we play it.

Think people are happy to criticise Rafa when he gets it wrong, but I can't believe the amount of moaning I'm seeing on twitter. We're a newly promoted side that's spent bugger all compared to most teams in the league. We were without one of our better players in the centre and for justifiable reasons Benitez prefers Joselu to Gayle or Mitrovic. Personally, I would have played Hayden ahead of Diame as the latter doesn't really do anything better than Hayden imo. That aside, we played the way we did because; a) Rafa is a pragmatic tactician, 2) he only has a certain caliber of player available, iii) Burnley are a resolute defensive team. If Benitez had more strength in his squad, and more depth, he may have set us up differently, even then I think the tactics we employed would have won us that game. As it stands, we are 9th in the league after 10 games, we've a good home record a good defensive record and we're getting more out of the players we have than I expected. Last night was a game that could have gone either way, it was very finely balanced and it was one lapse in concentration at the back that did for us. Most clubs will find Burnley a tough nut to crack at Turf Moor, and all but the best would be happy with a point. You say don't start Diame or Perez (and ignoring your assertion Perez doesn't contribute defensively for a minute), so who would you start instead? What system do you think would have got a better result?

Can they split the incident? Like the ref saw Deeney hold Allen, but as he didn't see the gouging he could be punished for that separately?

This time last year, we were top of the league, 10 wins, +19 GD and 30pts They're 2nd bottom, 1 win, -10GD and 9pts. Oh a lovely coincidence, they've 9 from 14 this season, we've 14 from 9.

You could understand if it was some League 1 side's poky old corrugated-iron shed, with open corners and a factory car park out back, but this was (up until recently) a Premier League ground.

England u17s have come back from 2-0 down to lead Spain 3-2 in the U17 World Cup Final.

Look at the amount of litter on the pitch man. Do they not have bins?

Losing now, aren't they?

"27,317" allegedly

Aye, but it's not as binary as he makes out. The managers who use analysts and go into the minutiae of everything aren't ignoring the importance of hard work, personalities, and so on. Souness' issue is that he doesn't get it. He talks about Gross not providing many assists, but how many assists has Shelvey this year? He's vital to our side, how we attack and so on. It's myopic to disregard him. Also, if Ritchie is putting 18 great crosses a game, but Joselu can't hit the back of the net, it's daft to gauge Ritchie's competence by the number of assists. The man is a dinosaur.

1-0 to them. They're a decent PL side, hard working, efficient. Like us and while we've the better manager, I just can't see our forward line scoring against their back line. Unless Mitro plays

Wylam brewery has a couple of top beers, Jakehead and Bohemia.

Just wish people would hold people like this to account; him, Merson, etc.

Probably one of his biggest fans when he was here (and since then too), but we should stay well away. I loved him because he could get us out of trouble and create something in the absence of an actual game plan. With Benitez, I'd rather have Jonas-type wingers to be honest.

Players shoulder some of the blame, but there's a fundamental problem with the way he sets his team up defensively. Too often his centre backs do t seem to know what they should do, or where they should be. Midfield isn't helping them out either.

Probably why you lost you fucking moron

KILL IT, KILL IT WITH FIRE!!

Never really minded him on MOTD2, but others seemed to fucking hate him.

Aye but what's honestly more likely? the Maktoums taking us over and flooding the coffers with £1bn worth of playing staff, or something more modest? Those top clubs already have top managers too.

from Whoscored.com Team News Newcastle United Few changes are expected from Newcastle when they host Crystal Palace this weekend. Mikel Merino is pushing for a recall after dropping to the bench against Southampton last time out. Paul Dummett and Massadio Haidara are still sidelined, while Dwight Gayle is struggling with a groin injury. Crystal Palace Wayne Hennessey missed Crystal Palace's shock 2-1 win over Chelsea through injury but will return in goal this weekend. Ruben Loftus-Cheek is also fit again. Roy Hodgson is not expected to make any other changes to the starting XI after Palace earned their first points of the season last time out. Christian Benteke and Connor Wickham are still sidelined for the away side. Match Facts Crystal Palace have failed to score in their last 6 away matches (Premier League). Crystal Palace have lost their last 6 away matches (Premier League). Crystal Palace have been losing at both half time and full time in 5 of their last 6 away matches (Premier League). Newcastle have kept a clean sheet in 5 of their last 6 home matches against Crystal Palace in all competitions. Newcastle have seen under 2.5 goals in 5 of their last 6 home matches against Crystal Palace in all competitions. There have been over 2.5 goals scored in Crystal Palace's last 3 games (Premier League). Newcastle are undefeated in 11 of their last 12 matches against Crystal Palace in all competitions.