All Rafa decisions. Just thinks Gayle was worth more. Same with Darlow. Mike said he could have any money generated and has been true to his word. Rafa thought Gayle and Darlow were the answer. Everyone makes mistakes. Rafa more than most.
Mike is a man of his word and hasn’t lied for years now. He’s backed all the managers after Pardew as best he can. They’ve just not spent it very well.
I think, rather than beelin', a few are just facing a little taster of reality - this was one of our few remaining potentially winnable games. We are still well shy of a safe points haul, time and games are fast running out, almost all opposition squads are going to be better than us and we can't win at home so we need to pick up 3 points in fixtures like these. Failing to do so thus invokes a stronger reaction than would perhaps be usual if circumstances were less dire. Certainly, having dropped 2 points in each of the last 2 fixtures I'm feeling quite pessimistic about our survival chances now. Perhaps - Rafa hasn't the powers of Pardew when it comes to ruining a player though, he requires injuries to help the process along. Pardew just had that magic touch regardless of circumstances.
No mate, it's Diame that's been Rafa'd. Merino just isn't as good people hyped him up to be and is just a young lad adapting and learning in his first season in England.
WE got a very soft penalty against us, however, Shelvey is just a nutter blatantly pulling at the shirt for all to see but the ref. That was a stonewall penalty and could easily have cost us dearly.
Just watche MotD and seen it was Benteke who committed the first offence Typical BBC highlighting Shelvey pull of shirt but not the holding back on our players
Shelvey and the marker were both at it. Clark has no such defence for his two stonewall pens. It is of course unlucky because you don’t always get them. We’ve got away with as Clark did yesterday, we’ve had others get away with them against us. One thing for sure though there is no point whinging when they get given because it is a pen. I think Clark’s problem is he wasn’t exactly cute about it, he made it so obvious he gave them the option.
There was a freekick given to us right on the stroke of half-time if I remember rightly, i was fuming at Shelvey for floating it in and straight out of play, TV replays however showed Lascelles being blatantly blocked off in the box by one of the palace defenders with the linesman in full view. The very same linesman that gave them their penalty in the 2nd half. Not sure how that incident is any different to the penalty incident. That being said Shelvey got away with it later in the game. Rafa needs to hammer the message home that these ****ing stupid and mindless mistakes could potentially cost us our league status. I'm sick of seeing us go to pieces after scoring, you watch most other teams and it has the opposite affect. Hopefully Clark will be dropped in favour of Lejune for our next game.
Aye but that's Lejuene who gave away a pretty stupid penalty himself this season. I'm all for dropping Clarke, he's a decent player but often gets caught out by entering into pointless tussles and I'm sick to death of seeing him aimlessly punt balls forward, just not sure Lejuene will solve much.
We have this lad Chancel Mbemba. Doesn't play much. Looks the best of a middling to poor bunch of defenders. Had a great partnership with Lascelles under some bloke named Rafael Benitez in the last 10 games the season we went down. Supposedly left out because of English problems and communication. Given there appears to very little of that with Clark or Lejeune, I think he might be worth a go. Big ****er, strong, quick. Should be well suited to the league. Just an idea mind
I also seem to remember him giving away a whole bunch of needless free kicks in very dangerous positions. It’s that time of the season now where these stupid ****ing mistakes need to be stamped our, otherwise it’s gonna cost us big time! We can’t seem to score 2 goals at the moment so this is even more important!
