Match Reaction Vs Newcastle away

[She Wore A Yellow Ribbon]

think we played alright seeing as all of our creative CM's were injured/not available (nascunt, cesc and jack). rosicky was good but doesnt have the intelligence nor tenacity to open up defenses. with jack there we would have won the game no doubt.

we were very good defensively, looks like we may have worked on that over summer which is promising.

i would have bought on chamberlain instead of theo, and sooner than what wenger did.

overall not as bad as i thought we'd be, especially with everything thats happened so far in the summer transfer market.

[Darth Vela]

4-4-2 isn't a formation that's successful anymore as everyone uses 4-3-3.

Do it and we'll be outnumbered in CM, that you can cope with if the players are good enough and you're playing in Spain, in England there's no chance.

In a normal match, sure. In our matches, it's a viable option, teams attack us less and with our more fluid attack we have the bodies in the right areas, it just means we have another guy making runs in the middle instead of milling around in midfield, that's a benefit in some games.

[Power n Glory]

think we played alright seeing as all of our creative CM's were injured/not available (nascunt, cesc and jack). rosicky was good but doesnt have the intelligence nor tenacity to open up defenses. with jack there we would have won the game no doubt.

we were very good defensively, looks like we may have worked on that over summer which is promising.

i would have bought on chamberlain instead of theo, and sooner than what wenger did.

overall not as bad as i thought we'd be, especially with everything thats happened so far in the summer transfer market.

Come on now. Oxo Cube has never played at this level and it makes no sense to bring him on instead of Theo.

As for Jack making the difference....last seasons stats say otherwise. He doesn't score or assist much. Too early to make him the saviour of this club and I think we all may expect a bit too much of him this season.

[Power n Glory]

4-4-2 isn't a formation that's successful anymore as everyone uses 4-3-3.

Do it and we'll be outnumbered in CM, that you can cope with if the players are good enough and you're playing in Spain, in England there's no chance.

Man Utd still use it and that's because of the type of players they have. It makes more sense to play a formation where you get the best out of your key players. Ramsey and Wilshere aren't our best players and not that creative. One of them should be on the bench.

Arshavin, RVP, Gervinho and Walcott are the four players most likely to create chances and score goals and the problem we had yesterday was that we didn't have enough creativity in and around the box because Ramsey and Rosicky couldn't thread through the passes or get shots on goals.

[Darth Vela]

It makes sense to move back to 4-4-2 now. Our two most creative players are wingers and number 10 type strikers like RVP and Arshavin. I saw a load of chances created from the flanks but we had nobody running into the box to follow up and that's what Cesc was good at doing, arriving late in the box. It may take some time for Ramsey or Wilshere to get that down but to be honest, we don't have the time to see they get it right. Just play the strongest formation against the right opposition. I can understand playing 4-3-3 against stronger teams, but not against every team.

For me, I'd play Arshavin with RVP as a pair with Gervinho and Theo on the flanks. We have a load of options but I doubt it will happen. It took Wenger a very long time to switch us from 4-2-2 to 4-3-3 and even when he did it, we were playing Cesc too high up the field with Denilson and Song holding behind him. Tactically, he's slow and it takes him a very long time to try something different.

Yeah, look at the pass Arshavin knocked through for RvP, with another guy in the middle making runs we'd get more penetration imo, ofc we need to keep the solidity but you gotta take a few risks to win matches, right?

[She Wore A Yellow Ribbon]

Come on now. Oxo Cube has never played at this level and it makes no sense to bring him on instead of Theo.

As for Jack making the difference....last seasons stats say otherwise. He doesn't score or assist much. Too early to make him the saviour of this club and I think we all may expect a bit too much of him this season.

sorry maybe i should have made it clearer, i was watching the game with friends from southampton who had seen oxo play a lot and kept saying how he should come on as he'd tear the full backs apart. hence why i wanted him to come on. and the way theo played oxo couldnt have been much worse.

jacks looked class in pre season, slicing the defenses apart a number of times. thats what we lacked yesterday. if it had been jack in djourou's position in the 90th minute im sure jack would have slipped rvp through, or at least got the ball in front of theo and not behind him on that counter we had. a number of times rosicky was in a position where he had to make a decision, often making the wrong one or his pass not coming off. jack would have been totally different, we would have had a sense of control and audacity in the final third.

[Olivier's xmas twist]

It makes sense to move back to 4-4-2 now. Our two most creative players are wingers and number 10 type strikers like RVP and Arshavin. I saw a load of chances created from the flanks but we had nobody running into the box to follow up and that's what Cesc was good at doing, arriving late in the box. It may take some time for Ramsey or Wilshere to get that down but to be honest, we don't have the time to see they get it right. Just play the strongest formation against the right opposition. I can understand playing 4-3-3 against stronger teams, but not against every team.

For me, I'd play Arshavin with RVP as a pair with Gervinho and Theo on the flanks. We have a load of options but I doubt it will happen. It took Wenger a very long time to switch us from 4-2-2 to 4-3-3 and even when he did it, we were playing Cesc too high up the field with Denilson and Song holding behind him. Tactically, he's slow and it takes him a very long time to try something different.

Nah play AA just behind the stiker where he can put those balls in the box for him.

[Darth Vela]

sorry maybe i should have made it clearer, i was watching the game with friends from southampton who had seen oxo play a lot and kept saying how he should come on as he'd tear the full backs apart. hence why i wanted him to come on. and the way theo played oxo couldnt have been much worse.

jacks looked class in pre season, slicing the defenses apart a number of times. thats what we lacked yesterday. if it had been jack in djourou's position in the 90th minute im sure jack would have slipped rvp through, or at least got the ball in front of theo and not behind him on that counter we had. a number of times rosicky was in a position where he had to make a decision, often making the wrong one or his pass not coming off. jack would have been totally different, we would have had a sense of control and audacity in the final third.

Yeah, Jack's improved even further over the summer, plus even if he doesn't assist he's one of, if not the best guy we have at making space, doing his little jink and sprint combo to create opportunities.

[Power n Glory]

sorry maybe i should have made it clearer, i was watching the game with friends from southampton who had seen oxo play a lot and kept saying how he should come on as he'd tear the full backs apart. hence why i wanted him to come on. and the way theo played oxo couldnt have been much worse.

jacks looked class in pre season, slicing the defenses apart a number of times. thats what we lacked yesterday. if it had been jack in djourou's position in the 90th minute im sure jack would have slipped rvp through, or at least got the ball in front of theo and not behind him on that counter we had. a number of times rosicky was in a position where he had to make a decision, often making the wrong one or his pass not coming off. jack would have been totally different, we would have had a sense of control and audacity in the final third.

Again, I'm not so sure about that because Wilshere and Ramsey played together in the last month of last season and it wasn't much different. We won the game against Manure but didn't really slice them open and then lost to Stoke City, lost to Villa and drew against Fulham, a game we would have lost if Theo hadn't have been subbed on. It's worth remembering Theo's contribution last season and reminding your friend that Oxo Cube has never played a Prem game. I only saw the highlights but Theo was one of the few players that got a shot on target and put in a good cross for Gibbs but Gibbs got his header all wrong.

I'm just against this idea that one or two players with very little experience would have changed the game for us. If it was Wilshere and Rosicky playing in the middle, a few voices would have called for Rambo or Chamberlain to come on.

[Power n Glory]

Nah play AA just behind the stiker where he can put those balls in the box for him.

Yeah that's what I mean. Like Bergkamp.

Plus I think this Campbell kid will work better in this sort of system as well.