Monroe Transfer

Pardew seems to play players on his reputation, not on logic (as in what you've just said yourself). Like he has to fit Jonas in somewhere, Tiote has to play regardless of the match or his form etc. He doesn't adapt the team a lot. Only Krul, Colo, Debuchy, a fit Ben Arfa, and Cisse should feel they will start every match. The rest shouldn't be guaranteed a.place in the first 11 at the moment, although that's a bit unfair of me with regards to Yanga-Mbiwa.

You're joking. That is shocking. We must average a good 4-5 corners a game too. I just don't think it gets any attention whatsoever on the training field. I don't get the impression Cabaye practices corners at all. Marveaux is a little better at them but not massively so.

The set piece thing is beyond a joke now. Like I said in the match thread I expect nothing out of set pieces unless they're free kicks in goal-scoring range. Never feel excited about corners or free kicks in threatening positions. I struggle to understand how the likes of Cabaye can mess them up so much. Ryan Taylor is the only set piece taker I trust to put in a good delivery. And it's not just a delivery thing - outside of floating one to Williamson and Steven Taylor winding keepers up we appear to have no discernable specific tactics for certain scenarios outside of hoping someone gets their head on it. Off the ball movement is lacking. When was the last time we scored from a corner (even on the second ball)?

And people call me melodramatic

I feel less comfortable about our chances now than I did 2 years ago when I got stick from all corners for worrying about our chances of staying up.

I don't dare look on there. I imagine this is the best day in many of their lives.

Pardew isn't good enough but replacing him will always be a risk because there's so few options to replace him.

We're going down aren't we edit; please kill me

Experience. Has to be.

Out for the season.

Yup. Caught them on a bad day (for us).

Needs a rest I think. Nowhere near as effective as he looked like being.

We shouldn't be. The right attitude and the assistant ref having a clue and we probably wouldn't be. I look at our players - on paper - and can't believe they're players playing for safety in this league.

Would have gone 11th with a win today, and from that you'd say we'd be one win or two draws away from safety. We were in good form, upcoming fixtures all somewhat winnable. Now that positive feeling will have been eroded 5 games left, you'd think that's enough to get out of trouble but a run of negative results together and it really isn't. Wigan are currently 5 points off us, but have 2 games in hand.

There were masses of posts on here about nerves pre-match.

How can he be exempt from criticism? He got things wrong, as did our players, as did that assistant ref (again, if that goal had been given, I'd have stuck my life savings on us going on to win it).

Just want this season over and done with man. Will worry about outgoings and Pardew in the summer. Losing to that lot when we've got little to play for is bad enough, but we - and they - had plenty to play for today. Honestly, the momentum is now with them. Another bad weekend next round of fixtures and we're the ones looking relegation in the face, not them.

Didn't stick around to see the post match stats but for the most part I'm aware that we had more possession than they did. That counts for fuck all when you get to the final third and don't have a clue what to do next outside of hoping for a bit of Cisse magic. Sissoko seems to have regressed significantly since his explosive start.

I've spent a portion of my weekend debating to myself what games we can get something out of to confirm safety. Had this one down as a win and in all honesty could not contemplate losing it. Got 5 games left in which we need to win 2 to be safe. A big ask, to be honest.

It's not all Pardew's fault, of course, but I can't get my head over a team with the (on paper) quality of ours looking so inept and clueless in the final third (save for a couple of Cisse chances and the 'offside' goal).

David Vaughan for fuck's sake.

Do we practice set pieces at all? I have zero sense of anticipation before one unless it's a free kick within scoring range. Just pathetic - we have the players you'd think with the ability to put good balls in the mixer, and tall, strong players to get on the end of good service.

I'm just playing devil's advocate and hypothesising why Pardew might have started him. Like I said - he's been abysmal. He should never ever play in that position again. Pardew might say he played there for Argentina but he looked bad playing LB for them too.

Oh and Jonas Gutierrez can do one for what it's worth. One of the worst performances by any of our lot this season.