You forgot to mention we were down to 10 men in both games. Arsenal have just beaten an 11 man Chelsea 3-0 and looked like the coasted during the second half. Leicester City shipped 8 goals against Liverpool and Manchester United. We shipped 9. Its puts our last two results into some sort of perspective.
So Liverpool score 4 against the present Premier League Champions, 4 against the present Premier League Runners Up and 5 against newly promoted Hull City who finished well in 4th position in the Championship who failed to invest in the team until the last few hours of the transfer window, have two long term injuries to two key members of the defence and the poodles want Mike Phelan sacked because he isn't good enough - pathetic! We were also down to 10 men and Liverpool are on fire at the moment. its difficult enough with 11 against the top half of the table type teams never mind 10 Lets see what Saturday brings, Chelsea are playing badly in comparison however I expect to lose by 2 or 3, anymore and it will be disappointing but none the less its not Arsenal, ManU, Liverpool or Chelsea that we will expect anything from at all. its the Sunderland, West Broms et al where we should gain points. even West Ham are struggling and the were flying high this time last season, points against those teams are a bonus. Its a long season, lets see where we are at Christmas before you want the interim manager and half the playing staff sacked
I think we all make the odd mistake, but we usually acknowledge it and apologise, but there are some who do it regularly and think it clever. You might not be so impressed now you're 52 - Happy Birthday.
Is it worth trying Robertson at RB and playing Tymon at LB? I know we have Weir, who will probably be the RB of choice, but as a full back , A-Bob must have a bit of versatility? We saw it with Rosie when he shifted to LB.
My expectations have been exceeded already this season, I felt like many that we would get nothing against Leicester and we would be hammered by ManU. That said, I have to say that I feel that for whatever reason, our starting line up was wrong against Liverpool. But I am not posting this as someone who knows the ins and outs of football management, it is simply my opinion, that I expected a different starting 11. Perhaps if we had been walloped in our first two games, I would have felt different, but we didn't and there lays the problem. How come when we struggle and have players on the pitch for the full 90, we win and when we have numbers in the squad, we do not turn up. How the **** does that work? Is it the players or the coach? Something changed and it wasn't in my opinion for the good.
ManU only just beat us. Arsenal and Liverpool we had ten men. August was tight on numbers un the dressing room but we kept 11 on the pitch were it matters. Nothing hugely unexpected under the circumstances. I certainly would have preferred 3--5-2 in September when we had new larkers, but fitness no doubt an early issue. October should be a different matter. Think Chelsea will be hard though, but there will be no easy games.
We were a "good team" for the first 3 games. We were still a "good team" against Arsenal. Man U and Arsenal beat us because they have better players, but it did not stop our team work and spirit. At Anfield we struggled from the start and I believe that we had the wrong starting 11. I don't mind losing to teams like Liverpool. Lets see what happens against Chelsea. Another good team?
We're currently on course to finish with 44 points. No team has ever been relegated with that and so far we have played 4 teams who finished in the top half last season, Swansea who finished 12th and Burnley. In the next two months we play Bournemouth, Stoke, Watford, Sunderland and West Brom and I'd expect us to have a good go at all three points in every one of those games. Give the guy a chance!
Just got back from my hols, so trying to pick through the Anfield ashes at the moment. A couple of questions: How did Marshall do? - I know that's not easy to judge after shipping 5 on his debut, but stats don't always give the full story. Also. Did we seem to go into the match with any positive intentions or was it purely damage limitation (park the bus) from the start? Clearly it was always going to be a very tough game, but for me Phelan's post match comments were almost as depressing as the result. He said; ""We have to look forward to what's ahead but we've had two disappointing results. We have Chelsea to come and then we go into 'our league' and we'll be judged on that." I would rather have heard a more defiant 'war cry' from him than those uninspiring words. It almost sounds like Chelsea has already been written off instead of using that game as a spring-board to ignite our season and boost the player's self-belief. We all know Chelsea will be bloody hard to get a result against, but Phelan needs to instil a more aggressive attitude into the players. We need to become known as a team that doesn't respect reputations and fights like a pack of wild dogs for 90 minutes +. If Phelan aims for that standard we will have a fighting chance this season.
I thought MP had instilled that attitude - so we beat Leicester and Swansea, fought back against Burnley and 'only just' lost to Man U....
Those are decent results, but seasons can turn on a single outstanding win, so Chelsea is a big opportunity and I think Phelan should be treating it as one.
Only seen the highlights, which was the goals basically but personally think that Jak would have stopped some the goals, easy to say sitting here though.
Don't think I've ever seen a more one sided game tbh .. Liverpool were several classes above us on the day .. losing Elmore only compounded it .. As for Marshall he did ok .. nothing out of the ordinary tbf.. but then again same could be said for all those on duty
