Lets be honest now

rep for my man mike lol, thats a good point tho we aint beating the rest as comfortably as we should be. we need to change our mind set when going top 4 because i dont believe they could handle us if we did. but i think patience is the message people are delivering and i do agree with that.

[quote="totalytot"][quote="ionman34"]

YID FROM DAV wrote:ion we aint beat the top 4 away from home in over 60 games, im happy with our defence im happy with our personel to a point but im not happy that, every time we go to one of the so called top 4s ground we dont win.

It's rare for anyone to go to a top 4 sides ground and win, even another top 4 side, that's why they're top 4 mate. It's only in recent years that Chelsea have managed to go to OT and get some wins.

Did you know that the goons away record, against other top 4, is pretty terrible as well? Winning the league isn't about beating the teams around you on their own patch, it's about winning more points than them. Full stop. We are now WORKING TOWARDS the higher echelons and are not established just yet so being concerned about that little bit of trivia is, IMO, focussing on the wrong objective.

forget what we do against other teams for a minute and look at that statistic. then tell me that aint an issue.

OK. It ain't an issue. We lose at their place, they lose at our place, that gives us parity. Then it's all about how we do against the other teams. That's 15 other teams to put together enough points for a title tilt.

See what I'm getting at? Winning away to top 4 is a luxury. They're not top 4 for nothing. They win and lose against each other all the time, but it is the points gained against the other teams that decides the title races.

if we want to be amongst them, we have to go there places and win, and win well to send out some messages to others

I don't disagree with that Yid, having teams worried before you play them is a the first step to beating them, they're partly defeated before you've kicked a ball. All you have to do is lean on them a bit.

It doesn't happen overnight though mate and you have to break that mental handicap that you have yourself. We've done it at home to Chelsea and the goons, I believe we'll do it this year against Utd and, eventually, we'll do it at their place too.

But this expectation that you have of us going away to, let's face it, 3 of the best teams in Europe and turning them over. Come on mate, be realistic. Look for a win sure, but expect one?

What I saw at Utd was a team that went looking for the win and lacked the firepower to do it. That can be fixed. Even without the firepower they still needed a dodgy ref to keep them comfortable.

It's not the first time Clattenburg has done that for them either is it? Ask Pedro Mendes!

Our time is coming, don't rush it.

That all makes sense Ion if we were beating the other 15 teams on a regular basis but we we are consistently dropping silly points to teams that on paper we should be taking comfortably. So something is wrong somewhere is it not.
If we could play like we did on Tuesday against the top prem teams or in fact any prem teams we would win the league no problem.


I agree mate, which is why we need the therapist! LOL

I've already said that we're not quite there Mikey and, for me, it is the lack of truly class strikers that is the reason. It's not like we're not creating plenty of chances in these other games, it's that we're not finishing them well enough. Our current strikers have weighed in with virtually zero goals in most of our EPL games, I believe Bale and VDV are our top scorers.

I truly believe that it really is as simple as that. Get in 2 class strikers and we see far more of those chances in the net than wasted. Missed chances pile pressure on incrementally, making it even harder to hit the target. At that point you start losing faith and your creativity goes out the window. Bury those chances and you play with greater confidence and freedom, thereby creating more chances and finishing them. The confidence compounds in the entire team so the creativity remains. When you believe that it's only a matter of time before you score then you make it happen.

The therapy is winning but we need the last 2 pieces to make it work. I've put up on another post who I think 2 likely candidates are, what do you reckon?

Sid wrote:
small point. Did anyone go out and buy a class striker last summer?? Maybee we didn't because their wasn't one available?????
Sid may have a point about there not being the right signing for our club and Ive said similar in earlier posts ..Also with the way things are economicaly all over, this has drastically cut down the transfer activities of many clubs and in a World Cup year too where prices of players are often inflated ....
Having said that , we're one of the richest clubs in football ( Doolitle 2009 figures I think have us 10th ) and in our first ever season with having to cope with a CL challenge with what we'd all hope would be progression in the premeirship, the fact that so few deals were done by other clubs this shouldnt mean we follow suit and perhaps we should've viewed it as an opportunity to get one step ahead of our rivals ?

German club Schalke bought in Huntalaar and Raul both were said to be targets of ours ..Total transfer outlay was £10million for the two...

Goons added to their firepower with Chamakh
ManUre with the mexican kid
Even Sunderland handed out £12mill for Gyan..

Even if say we outed Keane at a loss and bought in someone like Raul on a free wouldve been better as clearly our options upfront were in need of a shake up ...

Beating the weaker teams has often proved difficult for us if they're set up to stiffle and content with a point or possibly try to sneak it against us .... Wigan , West Ham and Everton all had this mentality and were rewarded ... For me, our faliure in beating such opponents is down to our lack ingenuity and belief that our skills can get us over the line ..... This is down to Harry , who must abandon his idea that to beat a well set up defesive unit , we bypass our quality midfield in favour of the direct Crouch approach .... The premeirship has the best defenders in the world for dealing with expectant crosses and high balls into the penalty area and it's not the way the top teams pick up points against these so called weaker teams .....
Wigan come to WHL and go away with 3 points and yet we soundly beat the CL Champions on our turf and we all wonder why ...
For me, at WHL we can beat anybody who wants to take the game to us and I were a little suprised Benetiz didnt have a more cautious approach on Tuesday ... I dont think it were out of disrespect to us as they're champions and thats how I like to see champions approach the game but had, Jose still been in charge of them , Im pretty sure he wouldve had a gameplan to kill and then put Bale in a taxi first and fourmost before thinking about outscoring us .... Even ManUre on Saturday, on their own ground , especialy once going a goal ahead made sure they had ten bodies inbetween the ball and their goal and looking to counter attack us ...
Harry has to get the better of those tactical managers with a keep it tight gameplan and with the likes of Joe Jordan , Les Ferdinand and Clive Allen on our coaching staff , we should have our strikers aided by our fine midfielders the nous to get the job done ...

yes thats a brilliant post mr ardilles, we are so close now that we are really just trying to smooth the edges, but when we play the lesser sides and it aint all going our way, we do abandon our football, and go direct, i think this ploy could even be encouraged by harry to an extent. with players like bale,lennon,modd,hudd,vdv we should keep that ball on the deck as much as we can. we can kill teams wide and thru the middle, absolute madness when we by pass them. even crouch himself would rather it rolled into his feet or the cross to come in from the by line.

Thanks Yid ...Our counter attacks are good and getting better , will even further improve with a returning Defoe ...Reminds me a little of dare I say the Goons from a few years back when they had Llunberg and Overmars out on the wings with Berkamp behind Henry.... ..We just need to find a Henry and we'd be as good as they were !

I'ts braking these solid 2 banks of four we have to master but then Harry has said in a recent interview, 'that sometimes you have to go long into the box rather play perfect football'.......Getting to the by-line and putting in a cross is fine with me , it's those crosses from out on the wing from 35 yards out Im not liking.. Granted , recently it bought us goals and the points against Villa but it so rarely does ....