sydneyneil

I hope he plays every game between now and the end of the season. A run of games could really help him. He has a lot of attributes.

He costs us the game on Saturday. I don't blame Silva, he cant be responsible for such errors by a goalkeeper. He acts so immature. He's 25 years of age now he is not young. I understand keepers play until they are 40 but that doesn't mean they are still young at 25. He has made so many errors this season. More than Howard was making towards the end of his tenure. He is so erratic and so is his personality. He needs so much to change to become a good goalkeeper in my opinion. All keepers these days are decent shot stoppers, it's the other attributes involved in goalkeeping which separate the good and the bad ones. We need a calm head at the back who exudes confidence in the back four. I think he makes them nervous. Even his kicking is dreadful. Many fans used the derby defeat to blame our quick demise, like the derby was some sort of unlucky result. Pickford cost us that game and some momentum with one of the worst shows of goalkeeping of the season. I dare say, he has cost us some momentum again on Saturday.

We need to get out of the mindset that new managers are put off by the sackings of recent managers. All the top clubs sack managers regularly. Just look at Real....and they can have whoever they want. Im not comparing us to them but for the managers that we can attract, it would always be a good proposition due to the clubs following and finances right now. Money talks, always has and always will.....when Marco Silva got the job Im sure we all agreed that he was a lucky guy to get such a good job and great opportunity.....there's not much difference one season later.

There’s no way Richarlison is a midfielder...but it’s a good return for a wide forward in a struggling team.

And I like lookman. I think he’s a good passer, tries to make things happen and has a shot. If he started the next ten games I’d fancy him to get a couple of goals, I wouldn’t fancy Bernard to get a league goal this season...

I just don’t see it. He’s far too lightweight to ever make it as a top player in this league. Silva and mata are both small too but they’re stronger. And also a different level of football player. Bernard falls over himself never mind when anyone comes near him. He’s been benched as often as he started and Fans have not really been banging the drum that he must start. And this team is really shit. That speaks volumes for me.

Bernard for me doesn’t do enough. Full of lovely touches but very little penetration. I’d like to know how many shots he’s had in what is likely over 20 appearances. Lookman has the most potential but for some reason Silva doesn’t fancy him either it appears. It’s like he needs to produce an 8/10 performance to keep his place when the aforementioned produce 5 or 6 and keep their place. Lookman needs a run of games in the team then we can judge him the same as the other two, who can count themselves fortunate to play so much.

I just don’t think he’s as good as what we thought. His passing is dreadful. He gets into so many good positions and then either loses the ball trying to beat a man or plays an awful pass....he’s a real scatty player

I must be watching a different game then...Michael Keane slightly (most of the praise had been way over the top) but I can’t think of anyone else. Walcott and tosun were better under allardyce. Schneiderlin was better when he arrived, sigurdsson I’m not quite sure when he’s played well, but he was certainly better at Swansea. The previous managers were also shit nogs. Koeman was dreadful, can we even remember a game when we thought we played well except the city 4-0? Let’s not even discuss unsworth and allardyce is well, Sam allardyce and I don’t want to give him more dicusssion time. The players did not get allardyce the sack. Bad appointments of managers with poor track records. Poor track records for where we want to get to. its ironic that we are saying we should give managers more time when we appointed koeman and Silva on the basis of short term success at their previous clubs.

Managers can’t physically control what actually happens on the pitch. However, they spend all week coaching and directing them as to what to do. If players are under performing, collectively like ours right now, then something isn’t right. It starts from above. Look at man utd, need I say more. Whether you like it or not, some players don’t perform under managers they don’t like, or when there is no team spirit, no direction and basically when they don’t like going to work. This is true in most walks of life. The biggest responsibility of a manager is to get the best out of his players. That is their key role within the club. Especially one with a director of football in place. Can you name me a player now who is performing to their best? Just one maybe?

Bournemouth smashing Chelsea today, Leicester drawing against Liverpool, Newcastle beating city.....just thinking how we accept defeat by these clubs “as long as we put a good performance” ive heard so many fans talk about promising performances against Liverpool, Arsenal, Chelsea and man utd. We picked up one point from the games combined.

I appreciate the “he needs time to adapt to the English game” argument. But we generally can see the ones who are good players, and just need a bit of time to become even better. Mina doesn’t appear to be one of these. He’s too unsteady and rash and the way evertonians are with defenders who are clumsy, he’ll get annialated after a few mistakes....I remember our fans slating materazzi

I don’t have much confidence in him when he’s dribbling at defenders to keep the ball. He can be quite scatty for a Brazilian! He doesn’t have his head up either. There was a couple of times today where he let’s us down in good situations. He started well but looks a different player now. I think it’s hard to judge right now as there are so many players who seem to be underperforming. It could be they have lost faith in what the manager is trying to do. It’s like sigurdsson is playing as a second striker and we just have two players in midfield with 4 up front who never seem to get the ball as much as they should...

There’s not just rumours about Pickford, Michael Keane also...who’s not in bad form...

Nothing....I’d be doing the same...

I’ve heard Pickford is straight up to Newcastle for a night out after most matches. There’s a few other rumours knocking about too which ain’t good...

Can someone please tell me what is wrong with comparing Pickford to Southall anyhow??? Isn’t that what we are trying to achieve? They’re both goalkeepers who played for us....granted Southall was arguably the best in the world for a period when he played for us...but isn’t De Gea? Potentially Ederson, Alisson? Aren’t they in our league. We need one of the best to compete with these so what’s wrong with the comparison?

He doesn’t have anything to his game unfortunately. He’s not good enough for this level. So many English players fail to kick on....it would be interesting to know how dedicated some are off the field, or whether they are always out, etc, or whether they lose the motivation once nailing a big contract. You can’t have millions of Harry Kanes but we’ve seen so many just stand still

Even Silva admitted in his press conference when asked about pickford that it’s something they would look at and try to improve. Whilst nodding when asked if it was his fault...

At fault again for the goal today....should have come for the cross

I think it’s just a classic case of us all lavishing enormous praise on players after a couple of good games. Bernard against Leicester comes to mind. He’s definitely a good player, I think he’s just played too many games after such a long period out. The only thing that concerns me is to keep on buying players who don’t score. We need players who score goals. We have far too many with zero goal threat

Michael keanes fault for the goal today. I thought it was a poor attempt by Pickford to keep it out though. Seems to just get away with criticism for some reason...more mistakes all round today...

Great result today. As for the previous Pickford comments, keepers are there to make saves. It doesn’t negate the errors they make. Let’s hope that’s the last of them for the season but I have a feeling it won’t be.

Gueye's a good defensive midfielder. He didn't have a good game in the Derby but overall he's been good this season. He just doesn't have the quality on the ball required to get to the next level. It's more obvious with Gomes alongside him too. There's nothing more frustrating than giving the ball away under no pressure and he can epitomise that sometimes. The difference in quality players (or someone like Gomes) is that they keep the ball when they are under pressure. Unfortunately Gueye will never possess this quality but he is definitely the best we have right now and he will suffice for a push to the top 6. Beyond that though, we need an upgrade.

I dont want to brandish him with a whipping boy tag and I can see the qualities he has. He may well come good and he may ust need some time out the team now and a few sub appearances to get some confidence back. However, my point is that we all went a bit OTT on how good he was after the Leicester game and in 10 appearances he has not contributed much (the above two examples is not much in a ten game span of a team playing well). He's been no better than Walcott, who has become the whipping boy. The time out thing doesnt wash much with me either. Just look at Gomes - hardly played for a year then a bad hamstring injury and he just takes it all in his stride. He's a top quality player who can excel in all conditions (maybe Barca aside!). I just feel that with Bernard, he's going to be a 1 good game in 5 for us. I hope Im wrong, I just think when you are that small, you need to be exceptional. I dont think he is...but time will tell.