acrossthepond

That was truly dreadful. It could've been 5 or 6 and we've been lucky to escape with 'only' a 2-0 hiding. You can't even try to explain why as it's, by and large, the same players as last season who are playing such shit this season.

We are such rubbish. Completely bereft of quality in midfield, two strikers who play as though they've never seen the other, and a suspect defence. Something else that continues to irritate is our reliance on this "floaty back-post" free kick routine with Williamson. As far as I know it's never worked and we just concede possession over and over again.

We are pretty woeful and have been all season.

Cracking goal. We looked very dubious for the first 15 minutes but have grown into it a bit now.

It sounds like your problem was that you spent time in Tennessee. Don't go south of the Mason-Dixon line except to D.C. and all will be well.

Cheers LTB. Midtown will be and probably is already getting hit hard I reckon. Nothing like buildings floating away or anything but it'll not be fun down there for a while. Still only high wind up where I am but the hurricane hasn't technically hit yet so fingers crossed.

Nothing but high winds so far here in northern Manhattan, but all reports indicate the lower end is getting flooded pretty brutally. Not expecting much up here. Plenty of yuppies turn their noses up at living in the Heights "with the immigrants", but I think they'll be laughing out of the other side of their mouths tonight in their underwater $2500/month Chelsea two-bedrooms.

I recognise that, but what I'm saying is that it should've been academic since Gera should never have been given the time to deliver the cross.

I don't think that goal had a lot to do with Shola. Three men on Gera and nobody really attempted to close him down. He's 34 or whatever and can't run, but giving him that much time is only going to create problems.

The dire standard of the opposition?

Pretty flat game, but considering the mix of first-team and fringe players and another clean sheet, it's job done. Good work lads and Pardew.

Never meant that.

I think we're about to get destroyed. That defence looks incredibly dubious. If we win the midfield battle we might have an outside chance, but if we try to play hoofball and keep turning over possession to them, we're in for a long afternoon.

You reckon it was a joke? I don't. He didn't even know what they were doing, that's why he said "I'm not aware of every player's religion." I don't think this is anything "offensive" (extremely overused word), I just find myself dismayed at the ignorance of people who get paid to talk and haven't the faintest what they're talking about. P.S. There haven't been "huge riots" or any riots at all over this as far as I know.

http://www.quickmeme.com/meme/3r7j7z/

Can Waddle literally not say 'penalty' or does he think he's being cute?

Did anyone think Cisse was going to score that penalty? Never looked likely or even possible. Jonas was acting captain, he should've sorted that and given the ball to Ba or Ben Arfa. Either way we got the win but continue to lack consistency. We have bright spells that last 5-6 minutes sandwiched between 10-minute spells of utter dross. Injuries, yes, but I think the increased game load is taking its toll as well. On the plus side Harper looked solid and Ba, Ben Arfa, Jonas, Taylor and Williamson all had good games. Anita is a bit dubious at right-back for me. Plays in good balls but offers little in terms of defence.

Awful. Anita is a walking red at the moment, need to get him off for Ba. Can't get much worse than that first half, so let's hope for improvement in the second.

Yes, obviously Jonas is our issue, not shit performances from central midfield, additional midweek fixtures, several disruptive injuries, two strikers who're playing like they've never seen each other before (no knock on either Ba or Cisse, they're still working out their partnership), and a shift back to a much more restrictive formation than the one we succeeded with at the end of last season. I'm just going to put this out there now: Ferguson is a nothing player. He is never going to make it at PL level. He has nothing at all to recommend him over our Argentine international vice-captain who has been once of our most consistent performers over the last 5 years. In a year or two he'll be turning out for Preston or Oldham. An argument can at least be made for Marveaux, who looks talented, but blows a bit hot and cold. Against the Greek team in the second leg he was really nowhere to be found and put in a pretty lacklustre shift. I'd keep him as an option off the bench for now as he certainly has the skills to come on and change games, but I have some doubts over his fitness still. We're facing a very tough match tomorrow and we will need to win the midfield battle to have any chance, considering our weakened defence. Jonas is the man you want in your midfield when you're looking for ball retention.

Saw a post about it on BBC live deadline thingy. No doubt just fans putting 2 and 2 together and making 5. Richards would be a class signing for us and I'd think Pardew would be savvy enough to realise that - question is whether Fat Mike would sanction it.

Very, very poor. This transfer window has to go down as incredibly underwhelming. We had a real chance to make a statement and we've let ourselves down.

We'll still have a very good first XI. Scratch the surface and we're getting into real problems (in some areas, like full-back and striker.)

Fair enough on Douglas, like. But you really do have to wonder what the rationale on failing to stump up for Debuchy is when he wants to come, we need strengthening in the position, and Simpson could walk for free at the end of the season. Then there's the striker issue. We desperately need at least one striker. That really isn't open for debate. I understand wanting to get the right player in, and we seemed ready to spend good money on de Jong if he had wanted to join, but we simply cannot entertain going into the new season with 3 senior strikers, one of whom is Shola, and two of whom are ACN candidates. Nobody is saying we should blow stupid money like we used to, but Rhodes, Sinclair, Konate, Mayuka, Lukaku, and Mirallas, for example, are all available or have moved for under 10m this summer, and all of them would've, in my opinion, improved the squad in an area in which it critically needs improvement. If we end the window without losing anyone but without getting anyone else in, I will be forced to conclude it a failure, considering the increased match load from the Europa League and the squad players who left over the summer compared to those who came in.

Really didn't think Chelsea were anything special and on another day we could've beaten them. Where is the 4-3-3? It was so effective last season. As it was, HBA was too far wide to pose any real threat and our midfielders were losing out constantly. Anita looked pretty poor to be perfectly honest and Cabaye's set pieces were utter rubbish. We also need a new right-back. All credit to Simpson, but I can't count the number of times when we've found ourselves in a good position on the right wing where any sort of attacking right-back could really do some damage, only to watch Simpson lose possession, turn back to the keeper, or put in a shite cross. This isn't to make Simpson some sort of scapegoat as he has other positive qualities but on attack he really is a weak link.

Ominous lack of Tiote....