WTF was that from Stambouli?

#edit

.. as above for Vertonghen

Asleep at start of a half again. Will this team ever learn to stay awake? Lucky escape this time.

bullshite red card, little hip check and the guy falls down like a sack of potatoes!

Davies is going to have to play a lot better than he has done so far to oust Rose and that isn't a particularly high standard.

Twas rather. But to be honest, they deserved some luck

Of course Clarke Carlisle thought it was a stone dead penalty. What an idiot.

agreed. very harsh red indeed and i hope we appeal it.

scrappy game and same old problems in the second half so i'm glad we saw it out for the win. that result actually means we've qualified for the knockout stages I think, as the top two go through and we now can't be caught.

we just need to win the last game and hope besiktas lose, or score more goals than they do if they win to win the group.

Personally, I'm beginning to think that some of our players are deliberately under performing to put pressure on Levy to sack Pochettino. A similar thing happened with AVB, lack of effort, failure to adapt to his preferred system, etc etc

Not saying Pochettino is completely blameless either as some of his selections have been bizarre but he may be simply reacting to what the players are giving him in terms of attitude.
Some of those who played tonight know they are not in his long term plans and probably feel making any effort is just not worth their while.

Didn't see the game but read a few reviews and by all accounts we seemed to have switched off again in the second half.

There were some observation written about some of the players: Townsend is no inverted winger, when he plays on the his natural left side he is actually more effective and puts in crosses. Our centre backs lack the pace required to deal properly with opposition forwards. Fazio is not a cultured player and relies more on brut force so is going to give away penalties. And Harry Kane may be scoring goals but he is not the type of forward to lead the line or play a lone role up front.

A few people last night, Gordon Strachan being one of them, made the point that, rather than try to impose your system and philosophy on to the team from the start, you work out the system that works best with the players you have and only then do you start to make changes and try to get the team to play the way you want them to and I certainly have to agree.

That said, I suppose we're hamstrung to a degree though. A 4-4-2 would probably work the best for us at the moment to allow Soldado and Kane to play up front together, but for that to work, we'd need two effective wingers and we simply don't have them in Lennon and Townsend.

We'd also need to try and work in Lamela, Eriksen, Mason and probably Capoue, for his defensive capabilities, into a midfield two as well if we did play with two wingers.

You see that's what I didn't understand about the dislike of Sherwood. He discussed the attitude problems head on but fans didn't like it. He was bringing through the youth players which of course he knew well and generally calling it right but we got rid as the modern culture is to get rid of the manager.

Sherwood's main problem was that he was out of his depth. The fastest way to lose a dressing room is to publicly slate your players, which is what he did.

And when things started going wrong, he didn't have a clue on how to fix them. Throwing a tantrum on the sidelines certainly wasn't it.

My opinion is that he was just trying to deal with things head on. Why shouldn't players be slated publicly if they are not putting the effort in? They get paid enough and owe it to fans to put everything in every week, not just when they feel in the mood to do so.

Part of the art of management is to ensure people invest in your ideas and leadership, otherwise it's in the nature of people to give less than they might: witness Brian Clough.

Sherwood had no art.

If three successive mangers are playing variations of the same squad and the same attitude and concentration problems keep occurring, then someone has to point a finger at those players. Or does Levy keep the revolving door of managers going until the entire squad feel like they have a manager who they decide they want to give their all to. How about players giving their all to the club regardless as that's what they are paid to do and/or that's what the fans expect?

On a human level, they're just contracted employees. In any industry, i you can get 100% out of evey employee in a team environment, you're very skilled and valuable.

There's a right way and a wrong way to handle your players publicly and Sherwood got it wrong every time IMO, mainly down to his inexperience.

By all means criticize the performance if you've played badly, but don't come across as if you're actually turning on your players at a personal level. One thing I will always say that AVB did well was to include himself in the criticism if the team played badly - he'd often say "we should have done this" or "we should have done that". Things like that endear you to the players and make them want to actually try harder for you to get things right.

Sherwood would rarely do that, at least in the post-match interviews I watched with him.

But then I think we will have to agree to disagree Janet if that's ok?. I know you're a big fan of his and i'm certainly not so we could end up arguing the toss over this for a long time

This is what I was saying last year, and now another manager has the same problems. We have two teams of very similar characters, with no balance in terms of quality, and determination. It was a job finding a captain, and the current one hasn't been upto much so far.

I think Sherwood knew he was going to get the boot at the end of the season, so had his say before the day came, and he was right. Many pundits have said the same about us.

Our performances for the most part this season have been woeful, with the same issues we've had for the past two seasons. AVBs first season was seen in better light, because we had Bale who got us out of jail so many times.

We are heading in the only direction this group of players is capable of taking us.

Many of them have qualities that in a balanced team could be effective, but as a group, there seems very little in terms of a successful season.

Harry Kane is a trier, and so is Mason, and I'd have them both playing, but they're not the finished item that we need, not by a long way.

We need to be rid of a good few of this squad, and we need some quality bringing in, but that is getting ever harder to do as we slide.

No doubt Levy will be sharpening his axe at some time, and we start all over again. It would be nice to see him support the manager fully, and get the players he needs to build a team.

It will be interesting to see if Levy gives Poch a chance to build a team. I wonder how easy communication is in training as Poch's English isn't as fluent as you'd expect.

Re Kane, it's odd that Poch doesn't start him but maybe it's a sign that Poch has all but given up on the Prem and is instead looking for a cup trophy so we at least get some silverware in the cabinet.

To be honest, I wouldn't complain about winning a cup, but our performances in the cups have hardly been sparkling, and most of our opposition has been 2nd or 3rd rate.

We have two teams with little between them, but Kane surely deserves a start in the PL. He cant do anymore than he's done, and the other two strikers never look likely to score.

When Adebayor was clean through last week, I never for a moment thought he'd score, and that has become the norm.

Adebeyor has had a decent run justifying his pick ahead of Soldado and Kane, but it hasn't worked out, to little surprise to many. It would be good to see the other two pair up for an equal time and believe they would both feed off each other and be more successful. We can't rely on the midfield to do enough to carry us in games where we should expect success and the lack of goals then heaps pressure and panic at the back.

If the Mirror is to be believed, the players are revolting against Ade being picked over Kane as Ade was too friendly with French speaking Newcastle players after that defeat:

http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/footba...manuel-4594516

Interesting story about Ade, regardless of whether or not it's true, this part certainly is ..

Teletext gossip suggests Rodriguez is now a January target. Ex gooner Ade out, Rodriguez in sounds like a positive move.

Absolutely. Would be very happy with that move if it came off. Perhaps we could offer Ade as a part exchange ?