WOW

Is there any way to get rid of this red font? its so offensive to my eyes!!

vis i agree with everything you said. gio was very disspointing. he look like he couldnt run. wp kept given the ball away
pav as much as i love the guy i noticed it in the last 2 games hes so greedy and just shoots. and your right he would of been taken off if defoe hadnt of got hurt.
i hope we rest king sat for next wednsday

i would def start crouch on saturday but start with pav next wednsday.
i think pav plays bettter at home then away. hopefully save king for next week

i think harry made a mistake not starting with hudd. hes the 1 that you new could play on a plastic pitch

both Jermain Defoe and Luka Modric have picked up injuries.

I agree the game isn't over yet, but we have to beat this type of opposition if we are not going to embarrass ourselves in the competition. Remember this was Young Boys not Barca or Inter. We panicked big time when they went 1-0 up and looked liked frightened rabbits in headlights. Our defence was exposed as slow and lacked any communication between them.

Corluka was time and time again caught out of position and his passes were going to them every time. Gio did his usual busy runs with no end product and was a waste of space in the 2nd half.Palacios has always been lacking top class to me and last night showed it again. There were several normally reliable players well out of touch as in fact was the whole team.

Maybe going out of the CL and going into the Europa league this year might be a better option as this side on last nights performance is going to get hammered by the big boys.

I hope this isn't a taste of what to expect in the Prem. when we play the likes of Chelsea and Utd.

I know it's early days but to many players came up short when more was needed.

Like the rest of us I'm very disappointed not in just the result but in the way that we capitulated after the first goal.
I don't think that performance will attract any big names in the transfer market, do you.


Mikey M

i think that performance was a one off. young boys are already 5-6 weeks ahead of us in there league which gives them a slight fitness advantage. also that pitch got into the minds of some of our players i reckon and they panicked.it will be a different story back at ours i think, and if we get through the tie it will bring a huge confidece boost to the whole team and we can move on from that starting point. the pressure is imence on them to get into the group stages and nerves got the better of them imo.

The big worry for me was how the defence were caught time after time for pace the second goal being a classic example. However remember we lost the first leg of our game 50 years ago 4 2 but won the return 8 1 against Gornik. Not saying it will be that score but as our friend Ion would say the planets are aligning.

I dont like to pick out individual performances when the team performance is so way below what is expected ..... But if I were pushed to pick one individual out for criticism it would have to be Harry ..... I know its in hindsight & I dont know all the ins and outs regarding injuries , but I just didnt see the need for the four changes from the Man City game apart from the obvious Ledley King/Sebastian Bassong one.......

I also felt we didnt give them the respect they deserved ........... Often teams in Europe, when away from home make sure they have bodies in the midfield , playing deep too ....Many of the top teams at least start a game with five in the midfield before being more adventerous as the game progresses and after getting to know the opponent .... The idea is not to lose a game in the early minutes and I know many of us dont like this defensive talk , post World Cup too but this is the reality of tournament football ... Also it was an artificial pitch that we needed to get used to playing on, so it could be argued even more so the necessity to be cautious in the early stages ... Why were our players so high up the field on numerous occasions in the first half when we wernt putting pressure on our oppponent with the ball? ... Also the front two were holding on to the ball maybe one out of the five times they received it ...Pav loses it and two passes later their forward is sliding it past Gomes ..

Keane should be picked for European nights , in fact as long as he is showing decent form it should be him and one other, as he is the only one that seems capable of forming a strike partnership and Pav seems the obvious one to me ....

Also , rumour has it ....Keane also had a serious verbal with Harry in the dressing room prior to the game and was not his usual, gee them up great to have around the dressing squad player, that we often get told about ....

Oh well least we get a second chance to put it right next week...COYS!!

Good post Arnie, Rep for you.

thanks Bart dude lol

Completely agree with all your points Arnie, rep point from me too.

The team did play way to high up the pitch, and playing away, we shouldnt be doing that unless we're 2 or 3 up! But we learnt from the mistakes in the 1st half and were a bit more organised in the 2nd, and starting zipping the ball around a bit more, but the defence was still all over the place, they could have scored another 2 goals.

Lennon must have picked up an injury against City, hopefully he'll be back for the next game.

We should beat them comfortably at home although my only worry is if they pack their midfield it could be another Stoke or Wolves game like last season and we know what happened there. We do find it difficult to break those sort of teams down.

Mikey M

why did they play so high up the feild when our defenders had no pace. and the 2nd goal was why didnt corluka see the danger and get back quicker when daws got turned

[quote="DJSR"]Completely agree with all your points Arnie, rep point from me too.

The team did play way to high up the pitch, and playing away, we shouldnt be doing that unless we're 2 or 3 up! But we learnt from the mistakes in the 1st half and were a bit more organised in the 2nd, and starting zipping the ball around a bit more, but the defence was still all over the place, they could have scored another 2 goals.

As you say DJ, we did play better in the second half and they couldve scored another couple of goals ....Before Pavs goal... I were thinking I be happy with a 3-1 loss.....Pavs goal was a bonus ...

Lennon must have picked up an injury against City, hopefully he'll be back for the next game.

From what I heard ,,Lennon didnt fancy it, after training on it the night before and Harry thought best not to risk him as he is still fragile from his past injuries...

The Hudd didn't start because the last time he played on a fake pitch his knees blew up like balloons.


That was a good result for us guys. Scared the bejesus out of the players and reminded them that they have to concentrate from the first minute to the last or we'll get punished.

A big lesson and an important one in their learning curve. If they have learned from it then we're in the CL proper, if they haven't then we don't deserve to be.

It's not just this game is it guys. It's how we play against the bigger and better teams. Sure we will win the return leg.....if not then as Ion said we don't deserve to be there.....but how will we cope with the more experienced and stronger sides. I suppose only time will tell and at least it gives us something else to talk about.


Mikey M