Football 2011-2012

[thetime]

Man utd other thrashings.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2052741/Manchester-United-thrashed-Manchester-City-dreadful-days-Sir-Alex-Ferguson.html

Just look who won the title in those years....

Little crumbs and all that.

[eFestivals]

Man utd other thrashings.

http://www.dailymail...x-Ferguson.html

Just look who won the title in those years....

Little crumbs and all that.

yeah, but if you want to take things from that page as how things will pan out, the closest it gets is....

Man City 5 Man Utd 1, September 23 1989

Both teams finished the season in the bottom half of the table - a whopping 31 points off top spot.

Title winners: Liverpool.

It'd be dead funny if that happened.

Rather impossible tho.

Edited October 24, 2011 by eFestivals

[The Nal]

Rather impossible tho.

[pink_triangle]

Liverpool weren't great at the weekend. Lots of chances but they need a finisher. Very telling, the last few minutes. Brought Carroll on, put Enrique out wide left to try get a cross into him.

Thats all Carroll is, an option. A 35 million pound option. Just as Cascarino was and just as Crouch is for England.

[eFestivals]

Liverpool weren't great at the weekend. Lots of chances but they need a finisher. Very telling, the last few minutes. Brought Carroll on, put Enrique out wide left to try get a cross into him.

I saw the first half, and to be fair to Liverpool it was one of those days where they were being unlucky, with the ball bouncing off the bar and post quite a few times. I left the pub thinking that if Norwich could score one it'd probably be a draw.

But yeah, I agree, they do need a finisher. I was hoping in the summer that they'd get Sturridge for Mereles cos I thought it was obvious that's what they needed back then.

Even so, I reckon they'll buck up a bit and start winning games like Saturday's before the end of the season, where they've often been losing or drawing them up to now. As much as they over-performed in the 2nd half of last season, I reckon they're under-performing now.

[kaosmark2]

Liverpool weren't great at the weekend. Lots of chances but they need a finisher. Very telling, the last few minutes. Brought Carroll on, put Enrique out wide left to try get a cross into him.

Thats all Carroll is, an option. A 35 million pound option. Just as Cascarino was and just as Crouch is for England.

[eFestivals]

I think Norwich may be my favourite premiership side, I love their team spirit. Suspect they will take points off a lot of big teams this year. Amazing that Ruddy was on loan at wrexham and useless and Holt always looked a lower league journeyman and both now in the premiership.

the half I saw on Saturday is the first I've really seen them, but I've got to say they looked solid, organised, and unflappable. I don't think they'll have any problems staying up this year.

[modey]

Calling him a "blind c**t".

Nothing really wrong with that,

Edited October 24, 2011 by modey

[modey]

100%. Vidic should've started. Evans is a total liability and Rio is finished. His "movement" as you said was a disgrace, for a couple of the goals.

You know your 6ft 4 central defender is finished when hes losing 50/50s (headers too) to a 5ft 7 player (Aguero).

[eFestivals]

Interesting to see Henderson's been benched with Gerrard fit again. £55mn of overrated young English talent on the bench...

Some were always going to be with that many midfielders, unless the opposition was going to allow Liverpool more than 11 on the pitch.

Given his performances so far I'm not surprised - at best he looked (only) capable and at worst well out of his depth ... tho having said that he's been noticeably better when played in the middle to on the right. He'll probably be OK, but needs more experience to play at this level.

I feel sorry for poor old Maxi. Played out of skin at the end of last season and can't get a kick now. But I think, given the performances, his time is coming soon.

I'm not sure that Kenny has a particular plan in mind for how to use the players he has, it starting to look to me as tho he's going to fiddle with them until a formation &/or players clicks. I'm quite surprised if that's really what he's doing, but alongside that I do think he's probably got the right sorts of players to do that with, cos they're mostly quite adaptable players.

Whether they'll be good enough when they do find something that properly works tho is another matter.

Edited October 24, 2011 by eFestivals

[pink_triangle]

the half I saw on Saturday is the first I've really seen them, but I've got to say they looked solid, organised, and unflappable. I don't think they'll have any problems staying up this year.

[The Nal]

Obviously that's not the racist commment i was talking about...

[kaosmark2]

Some were always going to be with that many midfielders, unless the opposition was going to allow Liverpool more than 11 on the pitch.

Given his performances so far I'm not surprised - at best he looked (only) capable and at worst well out of his depth ... tho having said that he's been noticeably better when played in the middle to on the right. He'll probably be OK, but needs more experience to play at this level.

I feel sorry for poor old Maxi. Played out of skin at the end of last season and can't get a kick now. But I think, given the performances, his time is coming soon.

I'm not sure that Kenny has a particular plan in mind for how to use the players he has, it starting to look to me as tho he's going to fiddle with them until a formation &/or players clicks. I'm quite surprised if that's really what he's doing, but alongside that I do think he's probably got the right sorts of players to do that with, cos they're mostly quite adaptable players.

Whether they'll be good enough when they do find something that properly works tho is another matter.

[pink_triangle]

I think there's enough goals in the Liverpool team to get 4th spot. Suarez, Gerrard, Adam, Kuyt, Bellamy, Carroll. All of those could quite conceivably get 10-15 this season.

[modey]

Which one have you seen? Thats the only one I was aware of.

[The Nal]

The video that's all over the Internet, Terry has even come out and said he was only telling Ferdinand he would never call him a b*** c**

[Jaybles]

As others have said, Utd losing was coming. Maybe not so much in the dramatic fashion it actually happened but it had definitely been coming.

I am not trying to overplay Cleverley here but since he has been injured we lost creative pull in the middle of the park. Yet after having such a free scoring start to the season, it seems the mindset of the players is to keep attacking, and not worry too much about defence. Which is why teams have been having so many chances against us. Full backs have been flying forward, defenders have gone on attacking sprints up the park. This was fine when we were controlling the games in midfield but we have not been since the loss of Cleverley.

Then we came up against a resolute City defence who are deadly on the break. Utd kept pushing up too high and the last few goals conceded were against tired legs whose defensive positioning was all over the place. You cannot win every game 8-2! So Utd need to adapt to the defensive mindset which saw them hardly concede any goals last year.

[The Nal]

Take that Sparky!!

Ouch..

[kaosmark2]

Its early days, spurs are in pole position but arsenal have done well to catch liverpool up after a dreadful start. I think the 3 teams have pretty similar chances. From what I have seen so far spurs seemed to be less wasteful than liverpool but Im not sure how much its related to spurs players being more clinical or maybe a bit luckier.

I think the names you mention are hard to predict, the only one Im confident of is suarez. Gerrard hasnt scored 15 goals the last 2 seasons combined, its too early to say if he will ever be the same player of a few years ago. Kuyt is one of those players who can score a hat trick one game and then go 10 without. Adam wont score that heavily if gerrard takes free kicks and who knows how carroll will turn out.

I think the media were too quick to proclaim liverpool as favourites for 4th after 2 games and think they are more likely not to finish in the top 4, then they are to finish there. However I can see Arry doing something really stupid like bringing in beckham in january and completely disrupting the team.

[modey]

The only one I've seen is him calling Anton a "faacking blind cahnt".

Edited October 24, 2011 by modey

[eFestivals]

with Modric reignited and Parker signed, Spurs' first 11 look better than last year,

nah. They've got the same problem (and perhaps worse) as last year - a problem scoring goals.

They've had a lot of luck help their goals go in so far (and which it could be equally be said that luck has gone against Liverpool with getting the ball into the net). I can't see that sort of luck keeping going thru the season.

[The Nal]

You can actually hear him saying that? I'm only going on the video I've seen ( no sound) and the media reporting it, and terrys comments after it came out

[pink_triangle]

As others have said, Utd losing was coming. Maybe not so much in the dramatic fashion it actually happened but it had definitely been coming.

I am not trying to overplay Cleverley here but since he has been injured we lost creative pull in the middle of the park. Yet after having such a free scoring start to the season, it seems the mindset of the players is to keep attacking, and not worry too much about defence. Which is why teams have been having so many chances against us. Full backs have been flying forward, defenders have gone on attacking sprints up the park. This was fine when we were controlling the games in midfield but we have not been since the loss of Cleverley.

Then we came up against a resolute City defence who are deadly on the break. Utd kept pushing up too high and the last few goals conceded were against tired legs whose defensive positioning was all over the place. You cannot win every game 8-2! So Utd need to adapt to the defensive mindset which saw them hardly concede any goals last year.

[eFestivals]

.... in typical style the media went way too ott because of a few good performances from a young Englishman playing for Man Utd.

Corrected for you.

Cos he wasn't getting the same things said about him when on loan at Wigan last season.

[eFestivals]

Sven has been sacked.