I think AW will learn from our mistakes. 75% of our goals conceded have been from Set-Pieces and I think he should now recognize that Per will be best equipped to deal with them. I'm still pissed, but I think today will just be a bad day in a long season.
After West Ham next Saturday, we have a TWO WEEK international break. It's going to be painful if we go into that having not repaired the damage from today. Need a win, so need Per Mertesacker to start.
At least you have relatively okay games. Spurs and Shaktar away are our first two games back and no doubt we'll probably have our South American players flying into Heathrow on Friday Night.
I'd like to congratulate Ryan Bertrand for being the first player to get past Carl Jenkinson this season.
And I think if Mannone had some hopes for No 1 shirt, it evaporated with Chelsea game once and for all. Three crosses - bad positioning, lack of communication with the defense and hesitation both times. He did not even try to go for the first cross even though it was in his zone of responsibility, and he failed to track the second, low cross and let Kos know that it was his ball and his position for the second cross was really bad. The more I think about it the more obvious it is that both goals are a combination of individual erors and total lack of organisation form the keeper. I start thinking that our defense needs a proper, experienced, commanding keeper. There are lots of great shot stoppers in football, but this is not what defines a good keeper. The good keeper is the one who makes right decisions in a situation which needs a decision and can organize the defense. And Mannone fails here totally. Now Lloris looks like a real bargain that we ignored because we had this cocky Pole who stopped progressing and thinks No 1 shirt is now his for life.
