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*** The Official 'How do you stop Emirates Marketing Project?!?!' OMT ***

If you watched tonight, do you think that starting a specialist DM alongside Bentaleb/Dembele would have made a difference for us tonight, in hindsight?

Not much really, did it make a difference at the Etihad? Every player on the pitch had far too much space. That has to be down to the manager to some extent but I don't buy that playing a DM would have magically made the difference.
 
I thought Lennon and Sig were appalling tonight. Lennon was utterly anonymous and Sig didn't give Rose any help whatsoever on the left hand side, in fact, I don't think I ever saw him on the left.
 
How about Capoue do the tackling and then give it to Bentaleb who does the passing?

Then I think that we would have lacked someone to carry the ball forward.

I think that you need to watch the game and make your own mind up. I think that we were always likely to lose tonight. We weren't disgraced despite the scoreline.

Silva found plenty of space and maybe Capoue might have helped close this but I think Emirates Marketing Project are good enough that they would have found spaces elsewhere to exploit, if this had been the case.

Hopefully, Bentaleb can learn from tonight and grow as a player. He will certainly play against few better central midfield pairings even if he goes on to play at the top level for another 20 years.
 
Not really fair to judge the lad on tonights game, he was monstered by a superior unit.

I thought Naughton did ok at LB when he came on though, which is nice.
 
Bentaleb might be good at a lot of things, but his positioning and tracking of runners isn't good enough.

Thank you. I like Bentaleb, but we have a squad and should use different players for different situations. You can play without a DM against say Swansea an other lowly teams, but even against West Ham that backfired
 
So what went wrong aside from the obvious?

For me our use of the ball in the first 30 mins was appalling. Yes we were pressed high up the pitch and pressed well, but that's twice now we have been humiliated at home by teams who press us high.

We were absolutely shambolic with the ball and we looked petrified of them.
 
Bentaleb might be good at a lot of things, but his positioning and tracking of runners isn't good enough.

Possibly but how many games has Capoue had this season where he has looked the equal of Toure, Fernandinho and Silva?
 
Bentaleb might be good at a lot of things, but his positioning and tracking of runners isn't good enough.

He did have to deal with partnering Dembele, who was an absolute liability given his senior position and level of skill. I suppose he was injured, but it would be very hard to play alongside a player who does not know when to release and when to drive forward, let alone one who's passing is inconsistent.
 
Possibly but how many games has Capoue had this season where he has looked the equal of Toure, Fernandinho and Silva?

Another talented player who doesn't give enough IMO...but there were a few tonight who need to think about matters. Sig was woeful, Eriksen lightweight and nowhere, my mate Danny...despite all that, for a while I felt we could recover!
 
we gave them to much time and space, no one shadowed silva, when we did have the ball we were lazy with our passing
 
Thank you. I like Bentaleb, but we have a squad and should use different players for different situations. You can play without a DM against say Swansea an other lowly teams, but even against West Ham that backfired

Like I said. I do not see how you can comment on the performance of a player that you have not seen first hand
 
I thought Lennon and Sig were appalling tonight. Lennon was utterly anonymous and Sig didn't give Rose any help whatsoever on the left hand side, in fact, I don't think I ever saw him on the left.

The left wing is a real problem. At least Lennon pulls out an attacking performance 1 out of 3 games and tracks back well the rest of the time. But the left hand side we don't seem to have anyone who will stamp their authority on the position. I would be tempted to play Eriksen there. Or give Chadli a proper run of 5 to 10 games. Hard to know without seeing training.
 
Possibly but how many games has Capoue had this season where he has looked the equal of Toure, Fernandinho and Silva?

He's only made 9 appearances in the league, some of them at CB, and not really had a good run in the side, so hard to say.
 
Re watching Jovetic's goal, why oh why did Walker not show him down the line?? The guys obviously didn't want to sue his left.

RE Rose's red card: If anyone can remember the Etihad game and Sandro's tackle on Nasri, it was no different from this challenge. That was celebrated as a great tackle, this one is called a foul
 
So what went wrong aside from the obvious?

For me our use of the ball in the first 30 mins was appalling. Yes we were pressed high up the pitch and pressed well, but that's twice now we have been humiliated at home by teams who press us high.

We were absolutely shambolic with the ball and we looked petrified of them.

1) Lennon was anonymous

2) Sig kept drifting inside and left Rose isolated when attacking

3) Started slow again and never got going, we've managed to turn it around before but it was too late by time we eventually got going.

4) We came up against a team that are in **** hot form, it happens, AVB wasn't entirely to blame when we lost 6-0 and Sherwood isn't entirely to blame tonight either.

5) Eriksen never got into the game despite some outstanding set pieces.

6) Bentaleb looked out of his depth which isn't a disaster at this stage of his career.

7) Appalling decisions by the linesman.

8) Didn't close them down and they exploited the space we gave them.
 
One thing that is certain in my mind is that Sherwood will go back to 4-4-2 against all teams at home from now on.
 
He's only made 9 appearances in the league, some of them at CB, and not really had a good run in the side, so hard to say.

I agree. I thought he looked good at the beginning of the season but has looked a little off the pace since coming back from injury and a liability at CB. I don't think that we can criticise Sherwood too much for showing faith in a young player who has done mainly well so far. I am not convinced that we would have faired radically better with any of the (match fit) alternatives playing in his place.
 
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