Will gladly take any help that comes, but apart from the goal mouth scramble that Hernandez should have put away just how many shots on target did we have? They could play without a goalkeeper. I know Jelević hit the woodwork.
The obvious problem with a 3-5-2 is the glaring hole in the backline at FB when the Wb goes forward. Most sides in the PL play with pacy wingers who can exploit this space and have done on several occasions. The 3 centre halves when being ran at seem to struggle to understand who's supposed to be where and on what side, evident by Spurs first goal (and a fair few others this season). I've been saying this for months, but you can't expect to win PL games if you just play the same formation week in, week out because there's this magical thing good managers do called "scouting the opposition". Other teams when they come to us know exactly how we are going to play and set up accordingly; pacy wingers on the break, double up on Huddlestone and stop him playing and it's worked every time. The best managers (I'm aware Bruce isn't exactly an all time great, but he's been around long enough) know that you set up according to your opposition. If we smashed Burnley 8-0, I'd still expect us to change it round for somebody like Chelsea or Arsenal because their style of football is totally different. I think Burnley fielded the same team 21 times in a row or something to that effect and look where it got them. Most teams in the bottom half should play 4-4-2, because it's got very few weaknesses and while there's an air of predicatbility about it, it's safe and every player knows exactly how it works. I like the idea of Robertson playing LW and I think we'll need to double up on the wings if LVG goes 3-5-2, as matching them man for man would be suicide, so for me: Harper Rosenior Dawson Chester Brady Elmo Quinn Meyler Robertson N'Doye Jelavic Although I think N'Doye has dropped off a little since Palace, he looks like a confidence player and he doesn't have an awful lot of it. Maybe Hernandez or Aluko instead. And for those of you saying you hope that Falcao plays, you've obviously not been a City fan for very long if you don't know the tale of the striker who hasn't scored for 20 games before visited the KC, or the team that were bottom without a win in 9 before they played Hull City. Falcao would breeze into our team with his hands stapled to his arsecheeks.
Yep, just as I posted Sterling. As a manager you cannot afford to get tunnel vision with regard to your favourite formation and hope that it does the business each week against differing opposition. How many times have we heard Bruce say that he can't change a winning team? Not very often, but only because we haven't won that many games, I'd say that he's said it more often than not after each one of those rare wins. Surely after the years that he's had in the game you would have thought that the manager realises that he has to provide a team to match up against differing opposition each week, and you can't possibly do that by fielding the exact same team on the odd occasion that they manage a rare win, and that has played a major part in our current predicament. I like Brucey, it's very difficult not to, but as a hugely experienced manager he appears to have made far too many rookie mistakes this season, predominantly around formation and selection. I'm now pretty much resigned to Championship football next season, and let's face it things could be far worse, think Grimsby. Only a minor miracle can save us now but I think that we all know, supporters, management, playing staff and owners that it should never have come to this.
It's not hard not to, it's easy. He's a fat, lying ****. Look at his comments about Allam and protesting fans. Need anymore convincing, look back to the Altidore/Hutton incident and the stream of bullshit he came out with in defence of the play acting, cheating horrible little twat Alan Hutton.
I don't think he's Marmite like Phil Brown was, I think most of us like the bloke Bob. He usually comes across as honest in his pressers to me, it's just, for me anyway, that he's majorly ****ed things up with his formation and selection policies.
This is sort of what annoys me about our fans a bit; we'd rather have a player with zero technically ability but tries hard for 90 minutes and a manager who is **** tactically and wins a handful of games a season but is at his core a good. honest bloke. It's like we're so used to being **** that we accept it as the norm. Winning in football is pretty much the point of the sport, you don't get trophies for trying really hard and not winning, you get relegated. Bruce should have gone at Christmas when we were languishing in an area of the table we shouldn't have been in. Or when we only signed 1 player in January having struggled for months before and then loaned out Ince to a Championship club. But it's almost like the FA Cup final and promotion have made him invincible in some fans eyes, so where do we draw the line? If we're bottom of the Championship in November do we still give the man time because he's our 'greatest ever manager' (who for me is Warren Joyce, btw)? I'm fed up of huffing and puffing and trying hard and not winning. I want to see City winning games, because we're capable of it.
http://www.goal.com/en-gb/match/tottenham-hotspur-vs-hull-city/1704229?ICID=FX Some interesting stats here. Were their goals really a result of weak defending on our flanks? If you were to consider the number of shots we took inside their box and also recall the total attack against Burnley, just how is a change of shape going to change the results?
What really really ****s me off is that I like many, think that in Robertson, we have got a potential star player, someone capable of playing for a top 6 club and being subject to mega bucks bids, but I can't remember the last time he started a ****ing match for us, can't be arsed to look it up be surely he's not played a full 90 since before Christmas, what is the ****ing point, he's now gunna get snapped up for about 5m plus some add ons when we go down and we'll watch him become a star for some other team who actually play him.
We certainly need two defensively minded and capable wing backs on Sunday, Rosy and Brady for me must start. I would also be inclined to Start Robertson wide left in midfield, without any pace in the team we are f**ked! As for the rest I've given up trying to understand Brucey's continued use of square pegs in round holes, and consistently selecting players who simply haven't done it this season, Livermore being the prime example!
Actually he hasn't been that good at all. He's still very young and very raw, but also makes a lot of mistakes. Nobody will pay our valuation for him this summer and I'd expect us to keep him. A year in the championship would do him the world of good.
