ToonMarshy

Agree with monroes assessment of the subs. I could see why they were made, it was almost keeganesque in my opinion but we just didnt have the defenseive cover to fall back on. Shit or bust, all or nothing 1 goal behind with not long to go - lets throw on another striker and take the game to them cavaliers ahoy!!!!! Admirable in spirit and if we had a reliable back four we may still have been able to pull level - or even ahead. But they didn't work out, it just left us even more vulnerable and they had a field day with it - no lesson was learnt because pardew knew it was a gamble, a roll of the dice. If it comes off then it was a ballsy gut check and the players stepped up. If it doesnt then it was a desperate act to try and rescue a point that backfired. we got the latter. Taking bigi off was a mistake, most of our attacking presence was coming from the left hand side where obertan kept having wonderful balls sprayed up to him from the centre of the pitch over the top, all placed there by bigi. Bringing another striker on is understandable, doing it at the expense of the only bloke seeming to be able to get the ball into the final third is not. Simpson coming off? meh. In all honesty i didnt really see the young un after he came on, dont really think he had much of a chance to show that he was any better or worse than simpson because it all went to shit at about the same time - though if we had any kind of depth in simpson should have been off exactly before or directly after he decided to throw the ball to an arsenal player on the edge of our area for the 2nd goal. His retardation knows no bounds. Yeah theres a couple of shitty things about the game and things outside it that kind of annoy me - them skiving off and getting a weeks break whilst we were grinding out an all or nothing game against the league leaders 3 days earlier is a bit of a shitter. The fact that despite any angle that has currently been shown i STILL cant see santon playing walcott onside for their first goal (may be me at fault there) is also a bit of a shitter - but i'd be loathe to fall on them as excuses, sure they had an impact on the match but should not be used as a get out of jail free card to excuse the shambolic defence. What does it the most for me however is the scoreline - just the fucking scoreline. Spent all day today with cuntish gooner lads who didnt even watch the game chatting bollocks all day at work about how it was a thrashing and a demolition and all the usual bollocks that goes with a big scoreline. You know what, chelsea villa was a demolishment. that was a rout, that was a 'rape' as our manager likes to express. Last night was far far removed from that - it was 85 minutes of two teams fairly well balanced (would give us the tip of play in the first half as the better team) and conceding only by little defensive undoings. it was 85 minutes of neck and neck to me-to you football with any team likely to produce the winner. Then 5 minutes of something barely even resembling football. Those subs and the defense falling apart is something we've seen repeatedly this season - fulham and stoke for example. it's just not something we've usually seen when a team has brought on a fresh and determined attacking power at the same time - and against man utd and to a greater extent, arsenal - we see what happens. but we've already covered how the defense problem needs solving, it isn't worth a repeat. But yeah, the thing that's making me cringe is that for once - the high scoring result does not tell the game, it doesnt explain how on the edge it was for both teams, and it makes us seem like we rolled over and died for arsenal from the get go. we didnt, until the 86th minute anyway. After that? the game ended 4-3 in my opinion, anything else after that just wasnt important - not until goal difference becomes necessary if we are in relegation come 4 months time anyway.

I really hope he doesnt leave - or if he does we have somethign lined up. I shudder to think where we would be without his goals so far, god knows we aint got anyone else that can consistently score :/

This has pretty much been my argument with a couple of toon fans in the area as to where ashleys transfer policy has fallen flat for me this season. Whilst last season we weren't breaking the bank and managed a respectable finish - we were very lucky in the fact that we kept a pretty much core squad throughout bar a couple of injuries, and looking at the money spent by those in and around the spot we eventually finished in - it looked like we had found a good balance between money spent and ambition/performance. Fast forward to this year, and its been nothing but a shambolic disappointment! We've had no end of excuses out of the tail end - and whilst all of them hold some merit the one thing for me that really for me over-rides every single time we've heard 'the players are tired, busy schedule, no real luck on the day' is the fact that ashleys willingness to spend (or not in this case) WAS off balance last year, we were just lucky not to be found out. During the summer if the reports were to be believed we were close to signing this bloke, all but for the sake of another million or two. I'm not going to pretend to know anything about the bloke bar what i've read on these boards, i'm not even going to go as far as to say that he could be any better than anyone in our back four at the moment. But what i will say, is that right now we have a major defensive issue that isn't just pinned on underperfomance by individuals, I will be first to admit that i'm in every match thread screaming for walking penalty williamson or stand off simmos heads for their unbelievable inability to perform basic defensive duties, but when it comes down to it no matter what they decide to pin it on the answer can always be lay at the feet of the owner not covering the squad with at least a signing or two for depth. Whether its the fact the back 4 havent had much of a break - whether its personal life getting in the way of the game, whether it's having people playing with a knock/out of position or straight up they are playing shit of lately, the fact we were not willing to drop another million or two in for another player when it was painfully obvious we needed the cover is unacceptable. Not suggesting we need to be splashing out whatever the going rate is for players at the drop of a hat, but we needed cover and whilst ashley may be a business man first and foremost - surely even he can look at times when results havent gone our way due to pretty much individual defensive error and see that the points we have dropped can NOT be worth saving a million or two in the transfer window, when you are sat 2 points from the relegation zone. Despite the fact we are in this shite position i DONT think we'll drop this season, too many much much worse performers than us out there, and if we spend some cash this window and get that cover we desperately need in place, then fair play - dont leave it so long next time. Stoke, fulham, Man utd, Arsenal - all games that we played actually pretty decent in (compared to the first half of the season) and all games where we surrendered the lead/draw in the very final stages of the game to defensive cock ups undoing the hard work of the rest of the squad. I just hope we keep the players we need to and get the right cover in to start grinding some results out and seeing some games off til the end - despite the results i've quite enjoyed watching us for the majority of the last few games, we are getting there slowly but surely and even the pundits are saying we are not quite getting the return for all the effort we put in that we deserve - but right now we are in a worse spot than the relegation season, and as nice as the 'plucky newcastle entertaining games and they work really hard' image is? It doesnt give points, and i'll take that over anything else right now.

Whats with the aeris hate? never understood why a difference of opinion on team setup or mentality is grounds for 'wind up and ban'

First time in Premier League history a team has scored 3 (or more) goals in successive games and lost them both.

if we dont replace half our defence by the end of january you may as well call the season over now

simpson cant get out of the team fast enough

Wonderful!

oh darn

a new wengers jacket gif in the making

the biggest crime in this man city match isnt the nasri red - it's the fact i've had to listen to fucking norwich playing music after a goal 3 times

Bassong shouldve been off there as well - nasty tackle on nasri anarl

oh dear norwich - the phrase 'long 90 minutes' comes to mind

reading pull back 2 goals, maybe i spoke too soon?

arsenal doing a good job to keep teams below us at the moment, home crowd proper on readings back and all - poor bastards

CHRIST SAKE SIMPSON YOU ARE FUCKING TERRIBLE

GET IN BA!

Wouldnt feel half as sick if every fucking goal we concede this season being soft as shit primary school defending. AND CAN WE PLEASE STOP AIMING DEAD BALLS AT WILLIAMSON

and now we are gonna get tanked

not a terrible start

Fucking pathetic, battered them the entire 2nd half and STILL cant get a winner. This and the stoke game have hurt harder than when weve played shite, purely because it appears even when we play really well - we either get injuries or a loss, or mostly both

GET IN THE FUCKING NET! NOW!!

ben arfa off?! why?!?!

FUCK :/

WHAT A GOAL!!!!!