Rival Watch Thread Watch

Time to go !

 

He stood shoulder to shoulder with Fergie during Suarez/Evra, oh the ****ing irony.

 

Everton manager Roberto Martinez on his team only scoring three goals in their last six Premier League games: "Scoring goals are always important to win games but the responsibility falls to the whole team - not just the strikers."


Wow Everton finally understand how the game works? Is this the end of the Everton strikers vs Liverpool strikers comparisons by #bitters ?

 

Everton have clearly tried to tighten up at the back which has resulted in fewer goals. Problem is that focussing on defending hasn't helped as they're still leaking in goals.

 

Throwing Howard straight back in based on his reputation of over 6 months ago was particularly weak from Martinez

 

Agreed, the hype over his performance against Belgium (in which they still lost) has turned him into a terrible keeper. For a good three seasons I thought he was a great keeper so it is a shame.

 

Louis van Gaal news conference:

"Only Robin van Persie is injured. Last week, I had to miss three players. Now I only have one injury and that is Van Persie. That doesn't mean that all the players are going with me."

Wahay! Everyone take a shot

 

We'd kept 3 consecutive clean sheets until he brought this clown back;

please log in to view this image

 

You think its all down to him?

 

Most of it, He inspires zero confidence in the defence these days, flaps at everything and jumps at thin air.

Martinez should never have dropped Robles to make way for his return. Robles was starting to look less like Lurch and more like a half decent keeper after a run of games..........so he drops him for an out of form Howard

 

I think it's the same with us and Ming. He had no confidence which means our defence had none.

You've kept more or less the same back though haven't you? Surely things can only improve.

 

You'd like to think so, but we've only won 6 out of league games this season ffs

After winning 21 in 38 last.....

Something has gone seriously wrong and we're running out of games. Make no mistake Martinez is under severe pressure at the minute.

He needs a result at Stoke tomorrow, or there'll be the first real rumblings of discontent from Blues about his tenure.

 

Van Gaal admitted Di Maria is **** and he doesn't know if he'll ever settle at the club

"It is dependable, you have to manage so many aspects. Not just the game, but the culture," says the Dutchman.

 

Di Maria, sorry Dobby, will have to tap up Van Ghoul about his plastic surgeon

http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/row-zed/angel-di-maria-sold-real-5259262

 

After a bright start he's been a massive disappointment, given his previous proven quality.

Same as Ozil.

 

You shouldn't look for Stoke to be where you will turn a corner

You won't be relegated this season, and you won't qualify for Europe, so there's no hurry

Stoke are 4th in the form table and their 6 game home form is losses to Man City and Chelsea, draw with Man Utd, win the rest

You have 1 win away out of the last 6, a dodgy win over Palace when you injured their striker

A draw against Stoke would be great but a loss by a single goal wouldn't mean much

QPR, Burnley, Villa should give you enough points to be comfortably above relegation

 

For me ozil was great up to the points that Christmas period came and he was over played. At real he seemd to get 70 odd mins then taken off and arsenal expected him to play 90mins twice a week for the money.

If it is as van gaal intimates that Di maria is fatigued playing in english league for the first time and weight of games then ok.... but you'd want your manager to back his record buy and be more positive.

 

If Hull win tonight they go above us and Bruce described them as being in a 'desperate relegation dogfight' last week.

Meanwhile Martinez thinks we were great at Arsenal

We should stay up, but until the points are actually on the board there's no guarantee. He needs to grind out some results, starting tomorrow.

 

Van Gaal clearly hasn't learned Fergie's trick of pre-informing the invited hacks at news conferences of the questions allowed to be asked, if he'd followed that guideline the Di Maria question would have been verboten.

 

This season is a case of not needing to outrun the tiger, just outrun the slowest member of your group

The points gap is small, but there is just no movement at all from the bottom teams

QPR, Burnley, Leicester have been in the bottom 4 for ages and now Villa are right down there too

Hull making a sprint for their life doesn't mean much for Everton