I've just read Ledley King's views on the match and he said we deserved to win but must step up our game and improve. Now for me there's something fundamentally wrong if ex players and we supporters talk about we "Deserved" to win against relegation fodder. There should be no "Deserved" against bottom clubs, that should be kept for when we play top teams. Ledley's remarks are on NewsNow, a big source of my information.
I don't understand that? Surely he's just saying on the evidence of the 90 minutes, we were better than Sunderland? Whoever plays better deserves to win, regardless of the relative positions of the 3 teams.
I have just read his comments through a link on our official site and as far as I can see, he is praising the teams strength of mentality and physical fitness. He liked the way we perseverd yesterday, and he is correct, we did deserve the win.
The part about we need to improve is why I posted his comments, it's something I posted yesterday and I was surprised by the number of disagreements I received. I'm disappointed about how we struggled to a scratchy 2-1 against a team I feel we should have had something like 4-0.
Did you want us to lose yesterday? The posts I've read from you since we WON the game yesterday have nearly all been negative...
No Moorpheus I didn't want us to lose, I just wanted us to win by a lot more than we did and I'm unhappy with the manner of the win. On paper we should have done a lot better.
What should happen on paper frequently does not happen on grass. If it did football would be boring because there would be no surprises. Wimbledon would not beat Liverpool in the Cup final. Wigan would not beat Man City in the Cup final. We should not have got to the quarter-final s of the Champions League. But they all happened and similar things will happen in the future. It what makes football the best game in the world and why we get so excited and so frustrated at the same time.
It's interesting to think that someone was being paid--quite well,actually--for absolutely nothing other than to raise a flag if there was an offsides, and he either a. hadn't read one of the, what, four sentences describing what offsides is in the rule book, or b. was so visually challenged he could not see Vertonghen was three yards inside his own half. You raise a good point, and make me want to see a replay of where the ball was placed, since it would clarify that.
Yeah - I was just about to nag people again with that question. Was the ball put down and the free kick taken?
We cant always expect to trounce teams that are near the foot of the table. Time and time again we see shock results in the premier league. Until we sign another top top striker we will continue to scrape past teams like Sunderland.
We've been mostly scraping wins - many of them last minute Eriksen specials. We've scored 32 goals ( 5 of those against the Chavs! ) and conceded 30. Those figures point to weaknesses at both ends of the field. Ok, we have Kane, who is currently in red hot form, but he can't do it all. Neither am I entirely convinced about Fazio, Vertonghen, or Rose, defensively.
LVG still wants Bale, hmmmm, he goes for the really big names doesn't he so I don't know how many chances youth players will get under him. Sorry, posted this in the wrong thread.
If we want top 4 then we shouldn't be scraping wins against the likes of Sunderland and losing to Palace, we should be thrashing them. Liverpool and Arsenal are now getting solid wins against teams mostly that they should be winning against. Arsenal 3-0 and 0-2 against Stoke and City, I hope we do similar but I doubt it.
Times are hard when your uncertainties, defensively, lie with the three players out of the back four who are NOT Kyle Walker. Rose can be a bit dodgy defensively and I do think that fullbacks really need to be able to defend but I actually think he's really improved in recent times and deserves his place. Would like to hope that Davies can be good enough to displace him, mind. Vertonghen is looking OK with all the usual caveats about how he can be a bit crap in the air now and again and has a little bit of a temperament but he's made some great challenges recently. Don't want to judge Fazio too harshly as CBs from other leagues often need time to adjust but he is certainly horribly slow. Overall I'm glad that a pairing has been decided on in general and settled. When there's more of a settled unit it's easier to introduce players like Dier who maybe could get more games next to Vertonghen. Or allow us to rest him. All in all, though, I can't imagine that there are many attackers in the Prem who look at our defence and think "It's gonna be scraps for me next game".
Having now seen the full analysis and comment on the offside goal, I have to say it's the most ridiculous decision I've ever seen. The officials aren't blind, so you have to conclude that they don't know the laws of the game. And how, after some discussion on the pitch, did the ref not realise that the offside call was wrong and allow the goal?
If this had been a Chelski goal ruled out, the officials would have apologised by now because the media would not have shut up about it.
It's more likely to blow over because the outcome of the game wasn't affected. 2-1 or 3-1 isn't hugely significant. But there should still be a big song and dance made because this raises questions about the competence of the officials when such a basic mistake is made. I have sympathy for officials when they err having had to make difficult split second decisions without the aid technology, but this was just rank incompetence.
