has got the lads in the right frame of mind for the visit of Bournemouth. It's about time we gave somebody a walloping.
and no he did not get them in the right frame of mind. We made an ordinary side look like champions. With the possible exception of Grant, every Stoke player had an off day. What can you say in our defence ? This referee was trained by Wenger. He allowed no physical contact ( by a Stoke player ) to go unpenalised. Bournemouth played the time wasting card to the ultimate. The number of times a Bournemouth player went to ground without being gifted a free kick, you could count on one hand. Having said all that, I am coming round to the belief that Nickyb is correct in thinking that Sparkey is living on his reputation, and is not as good at his job as a number of other managers could be with his ( Sparkey ) resources. OK Bojan narrowly missed a penalty, but 1-1 would have flattered us. Over many decades I have witnessed many poor performances at Stoke, this one has to be in the top ten, or is it bottom ? Many more like this and the threat of relegation will become worrying. Sparkey can only work with what he has got, but it is his job to get the players he needs. So it is no excuse for him when he makes changes during a game which have no impact on the performance and result of the match, like today and some previous matches.
