I was one of those calling for him to play today. When I saw that he had been selected I said that this was his chance. I felt that he looked clumsy and nervous throughout the game and his distribution was poor. I can't fault his effort. he comes across as a very intelligent guy with real leadership qualities and I am unsure if this causes me to be biased for him. Is he rusty and needs games to bed in at centre back or is he simply not good enough for the Premier League? We looked like we missed someone like Dunne at the back today who is a leader. What are others thoughts?
Agree he usually looks rusty and nervous wherever he plays. Not sure he's really good enough for the PL sadly. I'm not sure that Dunne would have helped that much, his positioning would probably have been better but their speed would have given us problems anyway. I thought we missed Sandro's physical and mobile protection in front of the 4 more than anyone. Strangely in his absence Henry seemed to play more further forward, and Barton playing hopeless catch up when they countered.
He's the one that was dragging us through the final games of last season. He must have 100 prem games to his name - plenty good enough if given just 2-3 games on the bounce. Wasn't that bad today either but that's just my view.
It worries me that he always looks like he's doing this: [video=youtube;vimP4UKuZt4]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vimP4UKuZt4[/video]
Ned was absolutely terrible. However, I think he needs a run of games, but he won't get them as Dunne will return, quite rightly. Ned did do a couple of last ditch tackles near the end and always gives 100%. I have to say that the crowd were actually laughing at some of his play yesterday!
Worth sticking with the same central pairing for a few games We all want it to happen We can't all be wrong
