OTF

Ameobi

Tiote getting the commentators curse... has been playing well.

Jonas should have layed it into the path of Guthrie who can actually hit a shot, unlike the Argentine (bless him) .

Got lucky there... very scrappy in the box, somehow eventually cleared it.

Guthrie's playing very well. Mix up between Shola and Carroll cost us a good chance.

Their central mids have been rubbish so far, but looks like goals in their wingers and forwards if we keep letting them get in close to our box with space.

Krul just had a brain freeze... got away with it luckily..

Guthrie playing well. A zillion times better in central midfield unsurprisingly.

Concentration now... they are cutting through us relatively easy at times...

hahahahahah you beauty!!!!!

Captain Shola should have put it across the front. Tiote's wearing a scarf...

Their central midfield is not that good. That's where it will be decided.

Have to love how jovial Jonas always is before matches.

I don't like the whole system where-by the bigger clubs purchase large amounts of promising young players and then farm them out until they're ready to play. They may represent good short term value for the loaning sides, and good potential for a long term return for the bigger club but on the whole it aids to further reduce the tribalism of football teams. It's much better to have an attachment to a player, and if that can't be with a player who has come through the local ranks at least let it be with someone who is there for more than a season or two. Loaning out some players in the champonship to provide cover was perfectly acceptable in my opinion. Van aanholt came in very handy, and even Fitz Hall figured a few times. With the Ben Arfa deal if it's a loan with established terms for a purchase at the discretion of the loaning club then there's absolutely nothing wrong with that!

Damn straight.

Whatever your attitude to him he has the perfect chance now to come into the side and show us what he is capable of. Consecutive matches alongside Sol Campbell (assuming Sol stays fit for the entire time) is something he probably should have been getting 3 or so seasons back, but it's better late than never hey!

Lots of similarities between Spanish aand Portugese. The last Brazillian we had here was hardly a world beater, nor the last Portugese one. I don't like Anderson at all, seems like a raging tosser, but that would change if we signed him.

<hits head against desk> He actually doesn't make a massive number of challenges. Having to make challenges should be a last resort of a good defensive midfielder. They're not bad tackles, it's just plain ill discipline. If you don't think that can be taken out of a players game (thourgh coaching or maturity of the player) then you might as well say that you can't coach a player to do or not do anything. By all means make tackles when you need to, some of them might not be perfectly executed but DON'T simply stick your leg out when you're beaten and leave it there intentionally giving away a foul. You will get yellows for cynical challenges like these. I can imagine you saying you can't teach a goalkeeper not to handle the ball outside the box because he handles the ball a lot. Excercise judgement. Before you counter with some nonsense that you can't excercise judgement in the heat of battle in the midfield, know this, they aren't the challenges I'm talking about. And I'm out on this issue. Don't make me take pictures of some of the incidents I'm talking about.

Nicely romanticised . The challenges I'm talking about are simply a case of not needing to be made. They're not a feature of his game, and it's not even poor judgement on making challenges. These are legs that are left out with the express intent of stopping someone. These have a place in the game and can be important in breaking up the oppositions attack, but in these cases they're in very silly positions when the other team are going nowhere. He can eliminate them from his game. If he doesn't he'll pick up yellows in more than every other game. We can't afford to be routinely missing a player like him given the difference he makes simply because of lack of discipline.

No defense in Emre and inconsistent as, as well as injury prone. Would be a poor signing for Liverpool as Gerrard already offers them an inconsistent spoilt midfielder who doesn't play in any particular position. Gerrard though is certainly capable of better than Emre, and gets away with all sorts of shit because he's England's Stevie G.

The others certainly take the cake, don't get me wrong, but at least 2 or 3 or Tiote's yellows have come from him leaving his foot in when he should be pulling it out. It's a nasty habit that will have him picking up loads of yellows. It could be easily avoided if he curbs his behiour slightly and it will have no negative impact on his style of play. Conversely for the team it will be of benefit as we won't need to defend as many set pieces. Fantastic player who has very good positioning, but that in my opinion is a weakness in his game. Thankfully it's one that can easily be coached out of him.

There is a lot ot be pleased about - namely the form of Andy Carroll and the difference that Cheick Tiote can make in the side. There has been some wonderful victories. However, at this very moment there's also a lot to be concerned about. There's a definite downtrend in our performances. Sure, a significant proportion of blame can be levelled at the absence of some of our key players, however the fact that those players are missing is down to the players themselves and not some external force or injury (or combination). Barton got himself chopped for three matches for stupid behaviour, Tiote got himself suspended for one game for constantly leaving his foot in in challenges that are well lost and now Coloccini and Williamson have done themselves for three matches each for some more idiotic on-field tomfoolery. Tiote coming back against Chelsea should make a huge difference, however with all the negative publicity they've been garnering of late they're due a good performance. They'll have to do it with plenty of their key players missing - namely Lampard and Essien (Terry's past it, his image having previously been enhanced greatly by having the likes of the Essien, Makalele and Lampard in front of him). Another loss in this one and we'll have picked up just 1 point from four matches - three of them being at home. Connecting the dots that doesn't paint a pretty picture for our next two fixtures West Brom away or Liverpool at home. Failure to pickup points in this tricky run will leave us dangerously close to the drop zone, a position where we obviously don't want to be. Connecting the dots is all. All said and done we have it in us to continue Chelsea's current woes - but honestly how likely will that be with an ineffectual Nolan in the middle and Guthrie down the right?

Barton and Tiote will definitely help. I think with Barton though people are making too mucch of his form. He's not a right mifielder and can't beat players on their outside, so he's getting by on guile and good off the ball movement. He's also being made to look better than he is because of picking up frequent assists from free-kicks where he's floating the ball into good positions. I'd rather see him olay in the middle alongside Tiote with a proper right midfielder on the right. Nolan deviates from wonderful instinctive finishing to complete anonymity, with the latter coming to the fore recently. Last season he was the same - having a horrible run through the middle of the season. Hughton didn't drop him then, and looks unlikely to do so now, bu the big difference is that we were playing Championship sides then, so even if we struggled to score we weren't conceding so it was manageable. Nolan for me has precious more than zero value when he's not scoring. Smith is complete and utter rubbish. His positioning off the ball was infuriating against Bolton. Guthrie though is a decent player. Never a world beater, but when playing through the middle he can pick out a pass and can occassionally crack a good shot when given space. He flat out should not be cconsidered to play down the right though, because he's lost when used there. The problem with our dip in form, even if it is largely based on some key players being not available, is that bad form can be highly contageous. With some very difficult matches coming up (Chelsea and Liverpool at home) it's entirely forseeable that bad form turns into low morale. With a manager who doesn't have a good (or long) history with backs against the wall if the going gets tough we could easily get succked back into the tail end of the table. The January window is almost 6 weeks away, and it's unlikely that much (if any) strengthening will be done over that period so if we leave that crucial junction with the lack of true first team depth that we have available now in certain positions I wouldn't be confident of us finishing outside the bottom three just because there's three or four teams on paper that are worse than us. Ciritical that we get at least three points out of our next three games. Four would be very good any more would be fantastic. If we come out of that three back in some modicum of form we have a very winable match at St Andrews, before we host Man City. Enacting some sort of revenge in that match would leave a very sweet taste in my mouth.

Smith... (fingers crossed) If we did by some small miracle manage to get rid of Smith in January there would be no excuse for not strengthening. With Hughton showing no confidence in Routledge we don't have a natural right winger/midfielder which is quite astounding really.

It was hard to tell with the Williamson one, it wasn't blatant, more of a collision. I hope we appeal Jose Enrique's yellow card. The card itself won't mean much because Jose doesn't acrue a lot, but on principle alone we should appeal because they got it blatantly wrong and a successful appeal will officially point out that the linesmen/ref got it wrong and the mark will be against them instead of Jose.