verlaine1979

Attacking performances have been really poor for several games now - four shots on target against that defence at home is shameful.

Need a more progressive AM than Davis IMO. Hides a lot with his passing. Tidy, but pretty much a third DM, making a side that only have attacking presence on the flanks. Not saying he's a bad player, just not the right player for the role he's been given.

Far too conservative in a side that already has two DMs. Also increasingly error-prone this season. Rarely makes a telling contribution, which is pretty much his main job.

Davis is a coward on the ball.

Surely no one genuinely believed we were the second best side in the country? Man for man, City are better than us in almost all areas of the field - to beat them, they'd have had to have an off-day, regardless of how well we played. They didn't, and they won.

City have paid us the compliment of turning up and playing well in this game, rather than assuming they could walk it. We haven't been great, but this is a team with world class players throughout the spine of their side - even if we'd played our best, we'd have struggled to go toe to toe with them.

Reminds me a bit of the Tottenham game - under a lot of pressure receiving the ball out of defence, so MF not often able to turn with it.

Yup, a few weeks ago Ruud Gullit was asked about Koeman and the Holland job on MOTD, and said that it was already agreed Blind would get the job after Hiddink.

Two composed finishes from Long, but VW probably deserves the MOTM plaudits. At times it looked like he could have played their midfield single-handedly and still come out on top. Can't think of a more physically dominant player for us in my lifetime, and nothing wrong with his passing.

Hull look a decent side, two CMs who can pass accurately, and a fair bit of pace and power in Diame, Brady & Hernandez. No surprise they are causing a few problems.

Aside from a weaker central MF, I think the front four of the latter years team alone are enough to guarantee that they'd pretty much trounce the early years one.

Poor performances all over the pitch. Constantly slow to the second ball, conceded possession cheaply from almost every one of our attacking throws, Adebayor bullied our back line like he'd been possessed by the ghost of mid-2000s Drogba, didn't ever get close to moving the ball quickly enough to evade the press. Should've nicked a point through Mane, but would've been largely undeserved. As an attacking, creative force, Davis is having an absolute shocker of a season.

Thought VW was immense when he came on (as he was in the first two games). Morgan and Cork both have much to recommend them at DM, but for the sheer destructiveness of his play VW is unequalled. He just seems to glide in, and with minimal effort encourages whoever was on the ball to move to one side. Every bit as lovely to watch as a 40 yard pass. If there's one player who disappointed yesterday, and in previous games, it's Davis. He's been as energetic as ever this season, but I just don't think he's used the ball well enough.

Sublime goal

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qopmd7uaVJs Second goal is missing a nice first-time pass out onto the wing that Mane made earlier in the build-up.

And an assist just now too, nice passage of play. Only watched the last few minutes but he's stationed furthest forward on the right, as Botswana are pouring forward.

Not sure Newcastle have really got the players for a defensively sound, park-the-bus type approach. Since Koeman's approach already seems to place less of a premium on maintaining maximum possession, it should inevitably draw the opposition out a bit and encourage them to play, leaving gaps for our quicker players (of which we had pretty much none last season) to exploit.

I did always like that quote about training to play from a position, rather than in a position.

Mhmm, for big clubs it equates to bringing on one of the good players they couldn't fit in their first XI to see if they can do better. For smaller clubs it either equates to... ahem... bringing on the big man or the nippy wide man and trying to get it in the mixer.

Better defensive options and the potential for more pace in the first XI than at any time in the last five years, both things the squad has probably needed stretching back as far as our relegation season. Disappointed at some of the departures, and certainly a bit disillusioned about the possibility of ever really building and keeping hold of a decent XI for more than a year or two, but looking forward to seeing Aldeweireld's range of passing to Tadic and Mane on the flanks.

Bah, that's really taken the shine off. Ramirez a much better option than JWP or Davis at no. 10.

Glad Villa didn't get Canales - really good player.

Hmm, created nothing so far. There aren't enough goals/assists between Davis and JWP to justify both of them through the middle.

In an attacking sense, the game didn't seem too dissimilar to several games last season where we were over-reliant on attacking down the flanks with no one prepared to drive forward with the ball through the middle (unless you pass the ball incredibly quickly, you still need players to run with the ball occasionally to commit opponents and create opportunities for overload). I also remember Lambert struggling more than once last season to win much in the air all game against industrial-strength CBs - more worrying was the fact that Pelle's touch on the ground looked ropey, which was very rarely the case with RL.

Neither Davis nor JWP playing with the courage in possession required by their positions.