As we continue on our great journey this season with our new found confidence I was hoping we would not show the big teams too much respect on the day. We do tend to do this too often! We seem to have a style of play which suits us by playing to our strengths (pace), however when we play the big boys we seem to be a little star struck by them and play more like a rabbit in head lights. We are high enough in the league now to be a big team so although we must show some respect on the field of play to the others around us in the league. But not enough to stop our normal style of game we must start believing in our own abilities and stop looking into those head lights anymore!
I think you make some fair points but I see things a little differently .. At the start of last season I think we mighthave set out a little in awe of the 'big teams' ... but certainly were not like that once we found our mojo in the last third of the season ,, indeed we took the game to Chelsea before eventually losing to a very good side ,, but remember we lost tow players injured before half-time and also had the brain dead Paul Konchesky playing due to an injury to Schlupp ... no complaints This season I don't feel we have been in awe of anybody .. we took the game to arsenal, deservedly went ahaed and if not for a mixture of bad luck (hit the woodwork twice) and inept refereeing (their second came following a blatant trip by Cazorla on Okazaki which extinguished our attack and ley Cech feed up field for Arsena;s second) we might have gone in 3-1 up rather than 2-1 down at half-time - w e then gave away a rather poor third (Sanchez should not have been able to out jump Kasper in an aerial challenge!) ... but we still refused to lie-down (respect?) a very good Arsenal side and went hell bent trying to pull further goals back leaving ourseleve open to their, let's face it, fabulous counter attacking that resulted in a scoreline that did not reflect the real contest of the game ... naive? yes ... awestruck? not for me .. Against Man United we were still going for it ... if anything, the way Van Gaal set his team up to counter us was showing us the utmost respect because he feared our particular strengths ... I'm loving every minute - win, lose or draw tonight (and Chelsea are dangerous - they will click at some point) I am actually loving our approach to games and we should fear nobody ... in contrast, our free flowing attackng football is enough to cause opposing managers sleepless nights as they prepare to play us .. Forza Claudio!
Im not sure that we give any of the bigger teams respect, im certainly glad we didn't change our attacking mentality against Arsenal. I'd much rather we try and match teams like them and get battered than change our style of play to park the bus. Our pacey style is one that bigger teams find easier to stop (LVG came with 3 CBs and parked the bus), but lower teams don't have the quality to stop it, as long as we keep winning games against sides outside of the traditional "top 4", then we can win the league no problem
