James

Unfortunate but probably the best move we could make. We’ve gotten even worse under him.

Yeah we really ought to be able to judge how it works on 4 minutes of evidence...

You can say that again.

We just aren’t very good anymore.

If calling someone weird isn't an insult then I clearly don't understand the English language and bow to your superior intellect.

I just don't understand the manager's decision making. Gabbiadini - scores in our first three games = dropped. Long - hasn't scored in 18 games = keeps his place. Redmond - consistently crap = automatic starter, Boufal - crap in a game where the whole team were crap = instantly dropped. Change or go for me, this guy is Puel MKII.

You realise that saying its meaningless (i.e. likely won't affect the result as we won't score) isn't the same as saying he'd have preferred he let it in right? Some people need to learn to read posts before dishing out the insults.

FF saves! Unbelievable.

Another loss as no way we'll score here.

So having a different opinion is being a t*at? Got it. For what it’s worth, your assertion that he had no service is wrong. He missed a header in the second half which went miles off target (quelle surprise) and there was one moment that sticks in my mind when Cedric got he ball over and Long was nowhere near it as he hadn’t anticipated it. Had Austin or Gabbi been on then it’s one one. Bluster and call names all you want, it won’t turn Long into a better striker. There’s a reason he rarely gets over ten goals a season, it’s because he can’t finish and doesn’t have a goal scorers instinct. You strike me as the kind of fan that just loves players who run around a lot and get “stuck in”. Long has that in spades but goals win games and in a lone striker system you need a reliable player who can actually score. Long isn’t that man unfortunately. If we want a front man who runs around, wins a few headers and wins the ball back then we may as well play Yoshida or Van Dijk up front. There’s a case for Long being on the pitch (hence the earlier comment that, if he were a midfielder, it would have been a decent performance) but in a team that struggles for goals you can’t have a non scoring striker as your main man, no matter how good they are at “hassling”.

Yet he never looked like actually putting the ball in the back of the net which is the primary job of a lone striker. He’s pretty “pony” at the job he’s primarily paid to do, scoring goals.

I remember going to OT in 1999 and the same thing happened. Didn’t delay kick off and we arrived at half time.

Dripping Gabbi just shows me that MP has fundamentally misunderstood why we are struggling to score. If it works, hats off but I bet it won't.

Absolute madness. Replacing Gabbi with a striker even less likely to score when we can't score is just ridiculous.

Absolutely bizarre selection. If VVD is fit enough for the bench he should be playing and Gabbi on the bench is just ridiculous. It's as if he's been ordered to play this formation and never change it. Very unhappy. All fans in the pub outside the ground utterly baffled by that.

That side shows MP can't change it. Long up top on his own cannot and will not work. Dropping Gabbiadini is just ridiculous. If we lose I'll start losing confidence.

Will be interesting to see if there's any press reaction re MP if we lose tomorrow. Given FDB came under pressure after three games it wouldn't surprise me to see a few stories...

You make a good point here re style and approach. After the Swansea game I came away feeling positive and saw some good pressing to win the ball high up the pitch. Was disappointed by the result but we battered them and should have won comfortably. Same against West Ham, UNTIL we let them back in. Since then, against Wolves, Hudds and Watford we've been all over the place. What worries me is that our "positive" performances have come against teams that are quite clearly absolute ****e and we couldn't even take maximum points from those. MP needs to roll us back to how we started off against Swansea and stick to it for a while. The most worrying thing for me is that MP hasn't yet shown he can change a game for the better during play. Against Watford it was clear we needed more muscle in midfield as we were getting overrun. So what does he do? Bring on Tadic... Also, he appears to be hell bent on subbing Gabbi in every game, in a similar vein to Puel, unless there's an underlying fitness issue I don't understand that at all.

De Boer sacked so they'll likely have the new manager bounce and beat us. It's inevitable, feels like it always happens to us!

You really are one of the most patronising, boring posters on here. I'd recommend learning to read before criticising other posters for things they haven't written.

That is shocking from Forster. If he can't get to a shot like that what chance have we got? Awful.

I didn't claim that Silva was rejected by the entire fan base (only a portion of it), nor that he would have been received without fault and I certainly didn't claim that I was the only one that was concerned about MP. Why is it that every time anyone says anything on this board they are picked apart and insulted by irritating keyboard warrior know it alls like you? It's seriously tiresome.

What I'd give to have Pelle back....to think we sold him for £12m is so infuriating. We've had a good quality target man during all of our recent success and we are suffering for not having one now. We played so many long balls forward today but they just came straight back.

Agreed - when Forster came back from injury we were given a lift, didn't concede a goal for something like 11 hours and went on our supreme run to sixth.

Exactly. The club reportedly asking him to change his style and he wouldn't. Fair play to him sticking to his principles but the club made the change. As things haven't changed under MP, it stands to reason they aren't happy with what they are seeing at the moment. I do worry that the board and club believe this squad to be better than it is though.