Re: The Football Chat Thread : Sun Sep 25, 2011 11:41 am  

Ajw71 wrote:

I thought Everton were a joke. Parked the bus from minute 1 and had 10 men behind the ball almost every City attack. So negative. It's hard to break a team down when they do that.

Your last sentence is exactly why Moyes went to City with the set up he did, had we gone and played 442 or some other fancy attacking formation City would've done to us what they done to Spurs, Swansea and everybody else this season. He packed the Midfield to stop City creating chance after chance and for the majority of the game it worked, Rodwell done a brilliant man to man job on Silva, he didn't get anywhere first half and only got away twice in the second, not many teams have kept Nasri, Dzeko, Aguero and Silva as quiet as we did yesterday. Ballotelli made a huge difference, his movement from the left stretched us bigtime and we couldn't handle him, that's one of the best appearences I've seen him make for City he changed the game.

Moyes made the changes when we went behind but before that things were going as well as we probably could've hoped. The only thing I'd liked to have seen different would've been Saha, if he's ready, upfront with Cahill behind, he's much much more effective playing behind a main striker and has a solid scoring record at City. Vellios and Denis aren't ready to be playing the lone front role yet and Drenthe is still finding his fitness so it's the best Moyes could've done with Saha having limited game time this season, we had a gameplan to stop City playing and until Ballotelli came on we'd more or less done exactly that. Had we still had the likes of Areta and Pienaar in our squad or maybe even a fully fit Drenthe then I think we would've have set up differently but we are not in that position yet. It's not negative, it's using what you have to get a result at one of the league's best teams.

Re: The Football Chat Thread : Sun Sep 25, 2011 11:51 am  

Newcastle grap another win, with another impressive performance.

Ive said it all along, their building a quality young side there. Still lacking a quality striker to be alongside Demba Ba but their aren't many other weak areas.

Re: The Football Chat Thread : Sun Sep 25, 2011 11:58 am  

As some e noted yesterday, Andy Carroll sold for £35 million and Demba Ba brought in on a free. Mike Ashley must be laughing all the way to the bank.

Re: The Football Chat Thread : Sun Sep 25, 2011 12:16 pm  

Saddened! wrote:

Went to the City v Everton game today. Very, very strange refereeing from Howard Webb today. City are obviously a more talented team than Everton but I lost a lot of respect for David Silva today. He is the football equivalent of Sam Tomkins, determined to cheat whenever possible. He was diving today when players were a good foot or two away from him. Whenever anyone did put a tackle in on him, he did the rapid spin on the floor every holding his shin, even though none of the tackles came anywhere close to hurting him. With the class he's got, why does he need to descend to that level? Webb's performance was shocking, clearly focused on protecting City when he's meant to be impartial.

The Phil Neville booking was ridiculous. That was right near us and it was utterly stupid. At worst he accidentally knocks his heels, but I don't think there was any physical contact at all, hence his bemused look. Silva's breakdancing didn't help. Cahill's booking was also very harsh and I'm not so sure the stamp on his shin was exactly accidental either.

Then Webb goes and really winds me up by letting the worst challenge of the day go without even so much as a warning. Balotelli deliberately raking his studs down the back of Jagielka's leg as he cleared was a really sly challenge and he ignored it. Then Saha skins Kompany right on the edge of the box with a full on body check, a tackle Adrian Morley would have been proud of, and he sees no wrong in it.

If City are going to win the league they'll have to play better than today. Nasri was never in the game and they didn't come close to breaking Everton down until Balotelli's fluke. His shot was awful, heading straight for Tim Howard. Yet after the deflection he peels away like he's Messi and he casually bent it into the corner. It would be interesting to see City without Silva at the moment, he is everything to them, a fabulous player when not trying to cheat his way through the game.

You've written some whoppers over the years on here, Saddo, but this one get's you a gold star.
Silva playacting? He's had someone's studs down the back of his calf/achilles, what do you want him to do?
Diving when there's no-one near him.....when?
Phil Neville clipping Silva's heels, when the ball is NOWHERE near them....Webb got that spot on. It was premeditated...booking, end-of.
Cahill's booking harsh? COBBLERS. Lescott made a monkey out of him. He's obiously 'a little vexed', so he went in, studs showing on Kompany. Please explain how that's harsh.

The only thing Webb messed up on, was (as you correctly pointed out), was Kompany's block on Saha.

If you want to watch the match again for the Everton highlights, just fast forward to the 55th minute when you got three corners in a minute . Well, that and watching your bank of eight defenders, every time City had the ball within 30 yards of Everton's goal.

POOR EFFORT.

Re: The Football Chat Thread : Sun Sep 25, 2011 12:31 pm  

100% Wire wrote:

Nice to see Hargreaves settling in at City already, learning how to be classless must be one of the first thing they teach, especially if it rubs dirt on Utd

Plank

Complete cobblers

All's Hargreaves has said, is he felt like a guinea-pig. Is he not allowed an opinion on his own body.

I've seen NO QUOTES where he's 'had a pop', at United, in fact, he was complimentary to them, so I'm struggling to find Hargreaves' classlessness.

I think the United loving media, have made a mountain out of a molehill. Especially when it was the lead story all day on Friday, on Sky Sports News. Sad, really.

Re: The Football Chat Thread : Sun Sep 25, 2011 1:14 pm  

lefty goldblatt wrote:

POOR EFFORT.

Looking at the huge bite you just took I'd say that was anything but a poor effort

Re: The Football Chat Thread : Sun Sep 25, 2011 1:19 pm  

Ndamukong wrote:

Looking at the huge bite you just took I'd say that was anything but a poor effort

No bite, sunshine.
Saddo's got a plate of chips on his shoulder's ever since Stains' grip on SL started to slip. Now it's on footie.

desperation

Re: The Football Chat Thread : Sun Sep 25, 2011 1:54 pm  

David Silva is the best player in the PL. Fact.

Re: The Football Chat Thread : Sun Sep 25, 2011 2:22 pm  

Lord Tony Smith wrote:

David Silva is the best player in the PL. Fact.

Well not fact.

But an opinion that is also shared by myself!

Re: The Football Chat Thread : Sun Sep 25, 2011 3:16 pm  

Ajw71 wrote:

Well not fact.

But an opinion that is also shared by myself!

Me, too.

Different league, so far

In RL terms, he's like Alan Langer, a couple of moves (in the head) in front of the rest of his team.

A pleasure to watch him play.
Spain must have an incredible midfield, for him to not be getting regular starts