I always respect your opinionn, no but's:
Alan Smith was superb. His best match in a black and white shirt by far. You might not see it as much on TV, but he is everywhere. He won nearly every header against Kolo Toure/William Gallas, held the ball up superbly and never stopped running.
And? should I do cartwheels.
I've never questioned his workrate or effort.
If talent was workrate, effort and such then he'd be a fantastic player.
Unfortunately talent is not.
The only thing he offers in the final 1/3 of any substance is that he's a composed finisher.
Martins, Viduka and Owen are all far better strikers.
Smith is not a midfielder either.
He's really a squad player who can be relied on to give 100% and provide a physical presence.
I'm not disagreeing with anything you've said.
And I'm not surprised it was his best performance in a Newcastle shirt. Considering how rubbish he's been every week.
For most players, turning up would succeed Smith's best effort of the season prior to the Arsenal game.
Pushing forward, with ambition he really isn't good enough to start for your team.
A decent player to have in your squad as I say but anything more?
Obviously not.
Struggles to get into goalscoring positions and offers nothing in the way of creativity.
A poor man's Joey Barton.
Milner was good, but he's a right winger, not a left. He is so easy to defend against because you know he's always going to cut inside onto his right foot.
Funny you say that because some defenders are just stupid.
It's like with Carlon Cole, every single time he cuts inside on his right. I noticed him doing this the other night against Tottenham. And the defenders were still covering the outside move. Why exactly? He can only go right and inside. He'll always go onto his right. If he's on the right, he'll cross it. If he's on the left he usually cuts in and tries to get a shot in. Ridiculously predictable yet Michael Dawson, Crayon Chimbonda and the likes sort of didn't get the message.
Defending is as much about quick thinking and using your brain as anything. If you know a player, have his strengths and weaknesses on file and the player is limited then he'll never get the better of you.
How a defender could fall for such moves when a player is one sided or too stupid to realise he's doing the same thing over and over always puzzles me.
And it annoys me when defenders also don't play the obvious percentages when it comes to certain things.
I could talk about this all day and specify. But I'll save it for another day.
Nicky Butt can have my babies!
Excellent player.
He's England's best tackling/defensive/holding midfielder. And if you're going on form then he's the best by that much it defies belief.
Should be in the England XI, let alone the squad.
Physical football can earn us very good points against sides more technically gifted than us. BSA has only lost 4 times in 13 matches against Arsenal, how you say? By playing physical football. If it works, why not play it?
Perhaps. As I said, play differently against Birmingham as they'll be looking for such an approach. McLeish knows all about physical sides and tactics and using the same ideas would only fall straight into Birmingham and McLeish's hands.
Brilliant battling performance. Every single player gave 110%. We were actually unlucky not to win against the league leaders. Fair enough they weren't at full strength, but neither were we.
True.
Damien Duff = 2 x Fabregas.
However, Arsenal probably don't have replacements for Hleb, Fabregas and van Persie.
Arguably their three most important attackers.
Point is valid though. No team had any excuses in this regard.
Two points:
N'Zogbia is not a left back. He always comes into the centre of the park, leaving the right winger from the other side all by himself. Better balls over the top and we would've bee undone for this reason.
Yep, as Bresh said in another thread.
Why not Milner + N'Zogbia.
I won't quote Sam 'Sunshine' Kekovich (for reasons obvious) but I'm tempted to.
When Duff's back just let him have the forward 1/3 to himself.
He'll deliver like the Milk Man. Knock! Knock!
N'Zogbia left wing, Milner right wing, Enrique left back, Geremi bench.
Geremi isn't great but Barton has been very average so far.
And was certainly more poorly performed than Geremi against Arsenal.
If you're picking on the new guy, at least pick on the other one who deserves it just as much. (remembering how much he cost, his recent comments etc.)
I think that's the talk your Dad is meant to give you before you reach puberty.
It's probably too late to tell you now.
Brum game tomorrow should be good too
It will be certainly that way if you lose.
The crowd will be a pleasure to listen to.
The atmosphere was cracking. Even as Adebayor scored, as we were putting the ball back in the middle a huge chant of 'UNITED' erupted from the whole stadium. No-one booed once. A standing ovation at the end of the match too.
You see, alot of clubs have United in their names and like to call themselves as such. The way I see it, the United club highest on the English League tables has the exclusive right to the name.
So effectively, your fans were cheering on United. Which makes sense because either way they were cheering on the Newcastle equaliser/winner.