OTF

I'll keep this as simple as possible. You know nothing about football. ... and now I'll take it into more detail. There is absolutely nothing at all to indicate that Enrique is on the 'wain'. For something to be on the wane would indicate that it was on a slow gradual decline towards it's eventual end. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt here because you can't even spell the word so it's unlikely that you even know what it means. I don't think you actually mean he's at the start of the end given that he just turned 25 last month. The discussion should end there. He's obviously not on the wane. Now, I was singing Enrique's praises in general. When he first played for us to me it was clear that we had a player who had the fundamental skills to be a great defender. He was strong and quick two areas where our defense was lacking. He stays on his feet and doesn't give up. Where he was lacking however was in his link up play with the rest of the team. Defensively he still had plenty to learn in terms of positioning and the like, but the fundamentals were as clear as day. In getting forward however he struggled, he seldom had a short passing option to play to, or at least felt he didn't and so resorted to the long ball far too often. When Jonas arrived in his second season he did start to form a good relationship with Enrique that gave Jose a direct short passing option. They were able to link up and this allowed Enrique to get further with much more frequency than his first season, though ultimately not a great deal came of his attack. Part of this was down to the players that he was crossing to and the general negative feeling at the club. Part of it was down to him missing a fair few games with injury. Part of it was that his crosses weren't that accurate. Certainly in direct contrast to Jonas, Enrique gets a lot of pace and movement on his crosses. If you can get these sort of balls into the right areas then you'll be a goal keepers nightmare. Unfortunately Enrique's crosses weren't consistent (they're more consistent now, but plenty of room to improve) and so not a lot came from them. Last season in the Championship the area where Enrique really developed most in my opinion was in his possession of the ball. Defensively he wasn't often tested in the Championship. In attack he should have been getting even more involved in my opinion, because he quite clearly was better than the players he was coming up against. Back in the top flight and he's now confident on the ball and will take players on on the dribble. When he does he routinely beats his man. If he stays on the dribble he'll often get closed down by second and third men coming in, or will be limited in his ability to get off a shot courtesy of being quite heavily left footed. Now you try to cite a few points to carry your paper thin argument - one being that Enrique doesn't do many slide tackles. That's been busted already by many others in this thread. On top of that you try to claim that he should have tried some sort of slide tackle on Damien Duff in the Fulham game. This is further evidence of your lack of knowledge. Whilst that was a horrible bit of defending from Enrique there was no way that he could have at any stage made a tackle of any sort on Duff once Duff had the ball. If he did he would have received a straight red card. I don't know why you've brought Danny Simpson into it at all, because frankly he has extremely little to do with the way Enrique plays. Simpson has been having some good games of late which is excellent to see. I think he's a good player with a consistent cross who reads the game pretty well. Even still 10 times out of 10 I'd rather have Enrique defending than Simpson. Has Enrique had a bad game and an ordinary half in his last two starts? Yes. Does it need a thread of its own to bring it to everyone's attention? No.

You do realise that most of them are me wanting Enrique to attack more to give us more options in a desperately weak attack? Not actually me saying that he is attacking? Do you also realise that that season was incredibly shite and our attack was incredibly weak so any semblance of a flea on a crumb of attack was something to cling to in a desperate hope that we'd somehow score enough goals to avoid relegation? Back in those days also I was singing the praises of Enrique at every chance because it was patently obvious how good a player he was. Not saying I was the only one, but there was plenty criticising him at the same time, yourself probably one of them. One thing those quotes do show is that you were a wanker then, and you're still a wanker now.

That's because he's already a permanent fixture of the first team squad having being on the bench for the last 5 or 6 games....... Not to open a can of worms but that's because there's nee fucker else who can play wide left in the squad. Dont disagree and I appreciate he may be a few years off getting a regular start (if good enough), but currently, when Jonas is having an off day, I see no harm in letting the lad be an impact sub as Ranger has been. Youth doesnt have to mean no good. I think as sure as eggs are eggs, Lua Lua will be the permanent left winger next season. I've seen him play for Brighton - if he is our permamnent LW then we will be in trouble Why do you say that? He has had rave reviews for them, they are desperate to sign him and he's scored some screamers apparently. Because unlike you he's actually seen him play. Scoring 'some screamers' does not suddenly make him a good footballer. Ryan Taylor's scored a fair few 'screamers' in his time.

This. Enrique barely got forward in his first season for us where he was inconsistently played by Allardyce. In his second season (though he missed a fair bit due to injury) he also rarely got forward. He always had the pace, strength and defensive ability but rarely used his pace to get forward. The season in the championship helped to encourage him getting forward and improved his ability to beat a man (he's one of the best we have at this, others in the side beat a man by retreating, spinning where-as Enrique shows a little bit of the ball then uses a touch and some pace to pull away towards goal). Not only do you look like a moron for creating this thread Christmas Tree, but you continue to drag yourself further down into full on retardation by trying to fall back on your own bullshit facts that anybody who watched us play knows are just that - bullshit. It's mildly entertaining for just how senseless you are, but this sort of shit won't be tolerated around here for long.

These sort of threads make this place look bad. Christmas Tree should have a ban on making new threads. They're pointless anyway because everyone knows that next week after Enrique has a blinder he'll create another thread with his brand new incisive opinion, then claim that anyone else who states the bleeding obvious is guilty of plagiarism.

Anyone?

Yeah unless we're in for anyone decent I agree. Last thing we'd want is for some past it bastard to come in, score a few flukey goals, have Pardew blow smoke up his arse and see the club turn around in the summer and offer a contract whilst saying they now don't need to look for strikers.

nee mention of Ferguson in there, yee must be heartbroken.

Ranger off the bench for sure. Lovenkrands could also have an impact off the bench late in the match. Nolan behind Best. The primary concern I have with that is that it's more than a little bit shite having a lone striker who can't head the ball.

They've got to be kidding. Surely not. Two steps forward, eight steps back.

Thinking about watching it now, whatever the fuck it is

I want to see the write ups of this game. I'm sure they all would have been just about written at half time... and heavily edited at full time.

That Tiote goal man. What a beauty. First time left footed volley from outside the box, swinging away from the keeper into the bottom corner. Goal of the season.

and that's in 4-4. Fucking unbelievable. Amazing stuff.

Best scored.... Scored twice... But only 1 counted.

Nolan... a yard away from scoring..

5 minutes stoppage time....

Astounding. Push for the win, but don't push too much.. 1 point is a miracle after the first 30 minutes.

Belter from tiote!!! 4-4

...corner

3-4

Second penalty.

Leon Best is possibly the worst header of the ball I've seen up front.

Ranger forces a save.

A minute later and Best has another, this one counts and it's 2-4.