It looks like they're deciding which game against us has blown their season up, league or cup http://rokerreport.sbnation.com/201...hich-hull-hell-stalled-our-momentum-the-most?
3 mins into that league match vs Sunderland is what I consider to be the most defining moment (on the pitch) for us this year. I think that Sunderland were only about a point behind us at that time, and Wes Brown's sending off and the subsequent win put good distance between us and the bottom 3, if he hadn't gone and Sunderland kept with 11 and possibly won the game, it could be us who may have gone on to a poor run of form, esp given the few matches before that we'd had some bad results
1-0 v 9 men, 2-0 v 10 men, 3-0 v 11 men. They needed 2 more players sending off to beat us. It's that simple like those Maths things you get when your a kid. If....
For me, the cup game with the sheer lack of ambition, motivation and the total collapse into a convincing defeat. Sunderland looked like a championship team, even after the subs took away the "weakened" excuses.
There's someting in that theory as before they had two sent we were over-running them and looking like getting 3 or more goals in the match. After the sendings off, the 9 man defence killed the match and we embarrassed ourselves eith our lack of ability to score. Sunderland seem to enjoy blaming Steve Bruce for their demise. This season it has come true as he's architected 3 easy wins over them and crushed their confidence at least twice.
Remember just before we played them last, a few of us did some online predictor thingy? I forecast they'd get another 2 or 3 points by the end of the season and would end up in 19th. I got some dogs abuse for that. Remember their "form?". I wish I could find the thread with it in, I'm not often that spot on with my predictions.
Maybe if Poyet started his best XI against us in the Cup (and also in their recent league games) they might have done better. Adam Johnson is their main threat going forward yet he continues to start him on the bench. Football is a simple game made complicated my supposedly competent managers.
From the outside I'd say the Cup. From the League games (yes both) they always had the belief they could beat us 11 vs 11 and that the red cards cost them to fall back on if they (the players) wanted an excuse to keep their belief up. The Cup game we were without £14M of our £34M squad (if they want to talk weakened sides) and the manager brought questions on himself about his judgement by not selecting what was seen as his strongest side. He either missed the opportunity to hurt a weakened (relegation) rival by playing the strongest team, or he genuinely believed that side was good enough to beat us which casts doubt on his ability rate his players accurately. Cattermole's collapse for the second and third goals in that game also won't have helped much in terms of belief/trust in each other's abilities.
I think that is an excellent poll and it gets you thinking. I believe it was the league game that did the damage, the League Cup was, for them, a wonderful event and achievement and they did themselves proud; the FA Cup was a huge distraction but they committed nothing to it, not less than us in selection terms, but in commitment terms much less, very poor. I think the damage was done in the league game not because of the Wes Brown sending off, as they have shown their resilience under those circumstances, but because the manager made an unnecessary knee-jerk substitution; he should have tweaked and left Borini as a credible threat - I believe we would have prevailed, but have got more of a run for our money. Some managers are good at substitutions, some are not.
A case in point: Their biggest game of the season, West Ham, a few days ago, AJ on the bench. They looked a totally different team when he came on, but it was too late. Good riddance tbh.
Depending if Sunderland go down, depending if we stay up, depending on the outcome of the Allams ballot, depending if they're prepared to invest next season then Johnson is exactly the sort of player we'd need to strengthen the squad.
I believe there are doubts about him lasting the full game and a strong substitution is the preference - that makes sense to me. The fact is he is one of ten outfield players and it was a sad case that, on Monday, only Cattermole was up for it. The squad is shot, the last three regimes have seen to that, but the real culprit is an owner who fires from the hip; too much money and not enough football sense.
Our general record against teams with players sent off is absolutely appalling, and I know it was Man City so it's a bit different, but that's yet another game where we've played against fewer players and not managed to even score. They even had De Michelis at the back and we didn't manage it.
Neither. Since the 3-0 to us they have Only drawn @ home to Crystal Palace, Lost @ Norwich and @ home to West Ham on monday. The 2-1 defeat last week @ Liverpool was actually there best performance for a while. I just dont see where SunDerland will get there next point from and certainly not expected in the next 4 games they have. Spurs(a) Everton(h) Man City (a) Chelsea(a). After that they finish with Cardiff(h) Man Utd(a) Wba(h) and Swansea(h) on the final day.
