Sunderland (H)

[Dalziel Kane]

That's Cuellar ?

 

three minutes remaining now plus added time. And something always happens in the closing minutes...

 

Please let it be in our favor. Feeling nervous now and optimistic in equal measure.

 

Time should just be up about now..

[Mirallas]

hip hip hurray!

[Avinalaff]

Hopefully our luck is now changing.

[Avinalaff]

Arsenal v Fulham 3-3 FT

[Steve_E]

Shit performance, happy with the result.

[Dalziel Kane]

I don't give a fuck what Arsenal or any other clubs are doing...

 

Full Time and we have a first win in five games, but it's a win and we came back from a goal behind. On balance of possession and chances created we probably deserved it.

 

Just feel relief right now, above all else.

 

Well done Toffees, but you gave us another nervous afternoon.

[Mogsy]

Phew thank Christ for that!!! Think we need to sell Heitinga and buy a quality right back and have colman as backup along with Hibbert, and also a good defensive midfielder with gibbo as back up, and put Phil Neville out to pasture

[Peter H]

Neville wasnt awful today. Very good 3 points. Much needed. Good that everton didnt give up. They kept going and 2 class moves by Fellaini got us the 3 points.

Baines was brilliant today. Coleman was faultless. Jagielka had a good match. Hard to pick motm imo

[Sideliner]

a WIN is a WIN - no matter how - turning point of our season - Moysie takes Neville off ( att last ) and within 2 minutes we score 2 goals - i rest my case ........

[Avinalaff]

I thought we needed to keep Sessignon quieter than we did. He would be a superb aquisition for us.

[MikeO]

I thought we needed to keep Sessignon quieter than we did. .

 

Rate him a lot but thought he was average today.

[CMorley91]

So thought the whole back four took a while to settle but after they did looked solid.

Was worried about Coleman against a direct winger like McClean but he came out well on top.

While he scored, Johnson was owned by Baines for much of the game. Am somewhat worried that Pienaar and Baines have looked a little out of sync recently though.

Mirallas looks better all the time, a real threat and pray hes not out for long.

Fellaini was not at his best for long periods today, but maybe thats because he just normally plays to such a high level. Does leave me wondering that if his two moments of magic both came after he reverted to a deeper role in Pips absence and could time his runs more, should we keep him there?? A great team wins when not at their best, a great player changes a game when not at his best. And thats what Felli did today.

Better performance from Jelavic too. Goal aside, it was still a more busy and effective performance than the last few weeks.

So overall, happy enough. Made harder work of it than we should, and cant keep relying on the big man, but 3 points are 3 points, no matter how you get them.

[MikeO]

Martin O'Neill though they could have been three up at half time .

[Mirallas]

Guess who's climbing up the top scorers list

 

 

Michu is the only other non-striker in the list.

[Guest blueboy122]

Neville isn't even that bad today.

 

Naismith is though. Every time he touched the ball he lost it.

[Dalziel Kane]

I hope the rat Suarez can fall away some time soon..

 

Isn't Berbatov an attacking midfield player primarily than center forward ?

 

Fellaini certainly is impressive with his goals to games ratio for his actual position, but like Ferguson, is such a threat in the air.

 

And if O Neill thought todays opposition could have been well ahead by the interval, isn't that fair enough ? From what I can ascertain, they just may have done that.

 

We have to be a bit realistic by saying, although we are still in a very good position, it was a first win in five games, and it was a bit of a struggle to finally see off opposition today that many thought, before time, would be a straight forward win.

 

But as mentioned before, 3 points is ours, maybe we didn't quite fully deserve it, but getting back to winning ways was imperative today and we managed to do it. But it was a bit sticky at times today.

[MikeO]

And if O Neill thought todays opposition could have been well ahead by the interval, isn't that fair enough ?

 

They had three chances in the first half....if they'd scored them all they'd have been three up yes.

 

We had thirty shots against Swansea but I don't remember DM saying we could have won 30-0 .

[Fearthainn]

That was great, shocking first half but we had the quality to turn it around without being at our best, which is what the top teams are able to do. Not much more can be said about Fellaini but he is a monster.

 

Thought the ref was one of the worst I've seen.

 

Oh and with Naismith it was worse than playing with 10 men today, he kept gifting the ball back to Sunderland.

Edited November 10, 2012 by Fearthainn

[Dalziel Kane]

Heh, every match we are involved in, regardless of outcome, the referee gets berated or has 'a poor game'

 

They do have difficult jobs to do in their defense, but seriously, when was the last time I saw that the main match official was outstanding, or competent, or performed very well etc.

 

They're only human after all, and being human, mistakes will happen, but poor referees have really been getting it a bit recently ?

[Fearthainn]

Heh, every match we are involved in, regardless of outcome, the referee gets berated or has 'a poor game'

 

I don't think I berate refs every game, but the ref today was the worst I've seen in a long time, and I've seen a lot of poor refereeing displays in Portugal. One second he doesn't give an obvious foul, the next second he gives a foul for something no one really understands. He was all over the place.

[Dalziel Kane]

We can't really compare match officials in Portugal or any given overseas league to this country, and furthermore aren't EPL referees supposed to be the best in the business, these people are supposed to be the cream of what the game can offer ? No funny business.

 

Maybe all this recent talk of being replaced by modern technologies has unsettled a majority?

 

To settle this, I'll risk a viewing of MOTD later, or at least, our game, and see how they fared today.

 

Maybe only get a few minutes viewing as the BBC invariably favor the usual sides and saturation coverage, but as in fourth place still, maybe get a few extra moments of highlights ? I'll have a watch later.

[pete0]

Heh, every match we are involved in, regardless of outcome, the referee gets berated or has 'a poor game'

 

They do have difficult jobs to do in their defense, but seriously, when was the last time I saw that the main match official was outstanding, or competent, or performed very well etc.

 

They're only human after all, and being human, mistakes will happen, but poor referees have really been getting it a bit recently ?

I complimented the ref last week, was the first ref to go unnoticed this season but 1 in 10 is not good enough.

[Pearso]

I thought whilst he was letting a lot go foul wise, he was consistent in doing so to both teams. There were a few times, especially in the penalty box that I thought how is that not a foul? But I felt comfortable that unless there was a stonewall penalty that he wouldn't give one of the same nature against us.

 

That said, the decision to book the Sunderland player at the end was very strange. He almost gets sandwiched by two blues and gets yellow carded?

[pete0]

That said, the decision to book the Sunderland player at the end was very strange. He almost gets sandwiched by two blues and gets yellow carded?

Think he got the call wrong, but he'd given him a lot more than he should have in the first place, 2 wrongs make a right logic. As for the yellow he got that for dissent.

[Kohen]

 

That said, the decision to book the Sunderland player at the end was very strange. He almost gets sandwiched by two blues and gets yellow carded?

 

I think it was for his protest afterwards (probably warranted, the protest that is)

[Hafnia]

Poor first half, thought when Mirallas went off that it would mean a loss, certainly Naismith contributed to that, he was poor and has absolutely zilch mobility. I think he is way off the pace for premier league.

 

Fortunately felli had a great say in the game, we do look a bit dodgy at the back and we need to stop inviting teams to attack when seeing the result out.

 

Is 4th a possibilty??? I think so.

[Avinalaff]

If we can stay up there until the next window I'm sure we'll see the midfield get strengthened.

[Hafnia]

Gibson coming back will be a massive help, we look likely to concede as the team is at the moment. Not enough steel in midfield.

[SimonButtle]

Poor first half, thought when Mirallas went off that it would mean a loss, certainly Naismith contributed to that, he was poor and has absolutely zilch mobility. I think he is way off the pace for premier league.

 

Fortunately felli had a great say in the game, we do look a bit dodgy at the back and we need to stop inviting teams to attack when seeing the result out.

 

Is 4th a possibilty??? I think so.

What i don't get with Naismith is, the more games he plays in the worse he seems to look. Is he actually 100% fit?

[Romey 1878]

The first half we dominated possession but at the same time we were incredibly poor. Partly through our own doing and partly because Sunderland had a good game plan. In regards to ourselves we were over playing it, always looking to make an extra pass, and more often than not that extra pass would be a loose one or the wrong one entirely. It's all good and well looking pretty in the way you play but if you've got no cutting edge then it counts for nothing. It didn't help that once Mirallas went off injured we had zero tempo, which crippled our attacks because Sunderland had a good, solid gameplan; defend in numbers, wait for the mistake and hit on the break. If you've got no tempo then you're going to struggle to break a gameplan like that down, because you need to move their players about and make your chances. But we seemed happy to wait for something to happen instead. This meant that for all of our nice play Sunderland actually had the better chances of the half and deservedly went in at half time ahead. However, once again, it was another goal that came from lapse defending. Im not sure what Osman was doing as that ball came back in, daydreaming probably. All I do know is that he should have done better. It's a wonder we hadn't conceded before then though because for that 45 minutes our defence, particularly Coleman, was a liability. Twice they exploited Coleman's shoddy defending but fortunately he didn't cost us this game.

 

For most of the second half it was the same I thought. It wasn't until Fellaini was moved deeper when Vellios came on for Neville that things changed IMO. Once that change happened it was like a transformation in our play took place. Jelavic looked brighter, Fellaini found more space, Vellios' energy, aerial ability, and neat touches gave their defence a torrid time, the midfield looked energised, and the defence got a break because we kept hold of the ball better and were spending more time down their half. Fellaini exploited the extra space he found himself in brilliantly to play a part in both of our goals. For the first he found himself unmarked on the edge of their box, turned neatly and powered the ball in. Then for the second he showed his elegance once again with a classy flick to put Jelavic in on the keeper to finish coolly.

 

It was a bit of a smash and grab but this type of win is pleasing because if you can win when you're not at your best then you'll do well in this league.

 

What this game showed me is that Fellaini should be played in the deeper role more often than not. Coming from deeper, and therefore later, means he's harder to pick up for the opposition because he's not the spare man, whereas when he's already up there they know exactly where he is and can keep an eye on him. Also, I think having Fellaini further up the field is detrimental to Jelavic and I think that is a big reason for his barren spell before yesterday. With Fellaini up there we do go to a longer game and that doesn't suit Jelavic. He's no good outside the box with his back to goal. His game is all about getting the ball infront of him in the area. Both of our goals yesterday highlight these points. I'm not saying Fellaini should never be used upfront, because it quite obviously has it's advantages, but he should mainly be used in his natural deep lying position IMO.

 

 

 

Howard - Made some crucial saves in the first half to give us the platform to be able to turn the game around.

 

 

Coleman - He was McClean's gimp, all he was missing was the gimp mask. He was good going forward but a disaster waiting to happen defensively.

 

Jagielka and Heitinga - Started out looking shaky together but I thought the longer the game went on the better they looked together. And Heitinga very nearly got himself a goal after a powerful header that Johnson cleared off the line.

 

Baines - The effort and his willingness to give every drop was there but I think he struggled to click with Pienaar and his final ball was often disappointing.

 

 

Mirallas - For the time he was on the pitch he looked like the only player capable of breaking Sunderland down and making something happen. He was pacy and direct and we lost all direction when he went off. I hope his injury isn't too serious but I wouldn't risk him against Reading and Norwich either, just get him fully fit and raring to go for the three massive games following those.

 

Osman - I thought he was average. He just sort of plodded through the game. Didn't put a foot wrong but didn't really influence things like he has been doing either.

 

Neville - Apart from that long range effort in the first half I barely noticed him in all honesty, he just wasn't involved.

 

Pienaar - He was better than against Fulham but it was another poor game by him. I don't think it helped that he kept swapping wings during the game, meaning he couldn't really build up a rhythm, and also meant he was often out of sync with Baines too which was the partnership we needed to get going big time after Mirallas went off.

 

 

Fellaini - For the majority of the game I was disappointed with him but once he was pushed back into his natural position he improved no end. Before then I wouldn't have minded if he'd been substituted but once the change was made I thought he looked a different player entirely. He well and truly turned the game on it's head and got a goal and an assist for the winner. He changed the game and for that reason he got my MOTM vote.

 

 

Jelavic - He looked better than he has done in recent weeks but he was still pretty poor. And him going down too easily is really grating on me! That being said he can do nothing all game as often as he likes as long as when he gets a chance like yesterday he puts it away.