Jon Posted October 13, 2012 Posted October 13, 2012 Bale has the cheek to moan about Adam and his challenges.
Fierce_LiNk Posted October 13, 2012 Posted October 13, 2012 Bale should be showed up for that. Ramsey was throwing himself to the floor throughout the game, as well. Interestingly, I explained the rules of Rugby to Ine the other day whilst we were watching highlights of a game. I explained the time-keeping and video referee, to which her reply was simply, "why don't they just do that in football?" Had to laugh. This is somebody who doesn't watch the sport as religiously as I do, but even she could see things are a mess at the moment. Put video replays in, catch the divers out, let us talk about the game as it should be talked about. Wales are going down the pan anyway. Wrong manager, not a good fit for the team. The team is not improving. Thought the England game against San Marino was interesting at times. I didn't think much of Kyle Walker's performance, I kept questioning why he didn't just destroy his man for pace and just cross the ball in at the by-line. Instead, he kept coming in field and giving the ball away. England need a bit more pace in the attack, at times. It was quite slow, and I imagine against a better organised team, such as Italy, it will be a struggle to break them down. Still, once the first goal went in, it didn't seem as hard to create chances. Carrick should have had 2 goals, Welbeck could've had a hat-trick.
MadDog Posted October 13, 2012 Posted October 13, 2012 Glen Johnson is better than Walker. He's so underrated, it's sad. He's not the best defender, but he's competent. Going forward he's brilliant, and adds alot to any team. I honestly don't get why people say he's a liability. He's not making mistake after mistake.
Ellmeister Posted October 13, 2012 Posted October 13, 2012 Glen Johnson is better than Walker. He's so underrated, it's sad. He's not the best defender, but he's competent. Going forward he's brilliant, and adds alot to any team. I honestly don't get why people say he's a liability. He's not making mistake after mistake. Think you answered it for yourself. If he was meant to be great going forward he should be a midfielder. We don't need no maverick defender leaving the back exposed.
MadDog Posted October 13, 2012 Posted October 13, 2012 My point is that he isn't a bad defender at all, he doesn't make more mistakes than anyone else while defending. He just excels going forward, which is a bonus. Your point is silly anyway, the best right backs in the world are great going forward. That doesn't mean they are automatically midfielders.
Nintendohnut Posted October 13, 2012 Posted October 13, 2012 Yeah but the best right-backs in the world can also defend much better than Johnson, that's why they're the best defenders in the world. You just said yourself he's not the best defender, but is better going forward. I'd say the same about Valencia, Adam Johnson, Ryan Giggs... Having said all that, I thought Walker was awful last night. Went forward, got the ball...stopped. Passed it backwards. I think he put two crosses in all night, when it was in crossing positions repeatedly. At one point I literally shouted "CROSS THE GODDAM BALL" at the TV because I was so infuriated.
MadDog Posted October 13, 2012 Posted October 13, 2012 I never for a second said he's among the best in the world. Just because you're not the best in the world, it doesn't mean you're shite.
Ellmeister Posted October 13, 2012 Posted October 13, 2012 No-one has said he is shite. You literally brought this whole conversation on yourself by saying people said he was shite. I do not think he is shite. I just think there are better defenders than him in that position and therefore deserve the place over him. They don't have to be the best in the world either.
Nintendohnut Posted October 14, 2012 Posted October 14, 2012 I never for a second said he's among the best in the world. Just because you're not the best in the world, it doesn't mean you're shite. I never for a second said he was shite. However, you said that he is great going forward, and that the best defenders in the world are great at going forward. What I was pointing out is that the best defenders in the world are brilliant at defending, AS WELL as excellent going forward. To me, Johnson is not good enough at defending. You were making out that just because he is good at going forward it makes up for his inabilities in defence. I'd much rather have a right back who can defend brilliantly and is terrible at going forward than the other way around. Our winger can go forward - we might have less overlaps, but at least we are confident that we won't let in goal after goal because of mistakes from the right back. Do you see what I mean?
MadDog Posted October 14, 2012 Posted October 14, 2012 Ofcourse. But it depends on what system the team plays and who is playing ahead of him. Barcelona get away with playing Alves who is rarely not in the attacking 3rd. England playing 442 with Johnson at RB would be fine.
Fierce_LiNk Posted October 14, 2012 Posted October 14, 2012 Ofcourse. But it depends on what system the team plays and who is playing ahead of him. Barcelona get away with playing Alves who is rarely not in the attacking 3rd. England playing 442 with Johnson at RB would be fine. Barcelona can afford to do that due to their solidarity in the middle of the park. England cannot. If one of the fullback areas is breached, I do think it generally will result in a problem for England. Johnson has a place in this team, mind. He'll be insanely useful in games where the opposition pack everyone behind the ball. So, having another attacking/overlapping player will help to break teams down. In a game where you need to be more defensively solid, I wouldn't have thought he would be the first name down on the teamsheet.
ipaul Posted October 14, 2012 Posted October 14, 2012 (edited) "As he's now the greatest diver ever & performs superbly when there's no atmosphere, Liverpool FC have made a £67m bid for Baumgartner." Edited October 14, 2012 by ipaul
Mokong Posted October 16, 2012 Posted October 16, 2012 I know I'm prolly the only one here who cares but I need a place to vent. Just seen the starting 11 for Irelands game with Faroe Islands tonight... Few changes from the German game but there's one non-change that is just pissing me off. Trap is again being stuborn and starting Darren O'Dea in centre defence. Why? How does someone who the only team that would sign him was bottom of the MLS, Toronto FC getting a starting position in the Irish national squad. If he was scotish, welsh or Northern Irish he prolly wouldn't even get a look in and rightly so if you have other centre backs who regularly play Prem football week in week out. He's also bringing Robbie Keane back who is apparently recovered from his injury.... I have a feeling it might be too soon and Trap is just hoping Keane is ok but I worry Keane will end up with a worse injury by the end of this match now. Plus I don't think he should be starting Keane anymore anyway. I have great respect for Robbie for what he has done in the past for the team but he is past it now. At best he should just be used as a sub and I think Robbie himself needs to accept that himself. A starting combination of Long and Walters would cause more trouble for defences than Keane, he just doesn't have the pace anymore to really run at defenders like he once did. He's brought in Marc Wilson (Stoke) to left back replacing Stephen Ward which I think might work (but would work better had he also taken out O'Dea and put in Clark instead) And Robbie Brady from Man Utd on the right wing replacing Keith Fahey. Not sure what to think of that, Brady is a young player (20), not yet a regular at Man U (so far only played 1 game as a sub in the Capital Cup) but there's a lot of high hopes for him as he had a good record with the U-21's team and became the record goalscorer for the Irish U-21's. Would prefer to have James McClean on the right wing but he is injured.... don't know if either of those two could also play on the left, if yes then I'd be interested in seeing an Irish team with both those wingers one on each side. Although the news papers are saying that the FAI will be having a meeting this week anyway and likely no matter the result tonight Trap will be sacked. I hope that is true cause that would then give a new manager time to get organised before the next qualifiers next March. And and with us only 3 games into qualification 2nd place would still be reachable.
Mr-Paul Posted October 16, 2012 Posted October 16, 2012 Situation in Poland right now is a joke. Why build a roof on a stadium if you can't close it when it's raining? They aren't doing anything to get rid of the water on the pitch, yet they keep insisting on more pitch inspections? The next one will be exactly the same as the last, with 30 more minutes of rainfall on the pitch. Getting bored now. Don't think it should be played tomorrow either, play it in place of one of our pointless friendlies we're bound to have some time. Feel sorry for the fans and the players.
Mokong Posted October 16, 2012 Posted October 16, 2012 OK Ireland game is over despite a poor 1st half where I thought the Faroes were the better team, Ireland came out and went 4-1 in the 2nd half. Mixed feelings to be fair, glad we won but worried this might have saved Traps job. The FAI and Trap better not kid themselves with this result, Trap will try to vindicate himself with this result and I think that will be delusional. He made some changes yes and they worked tonight granted but there were still issues with his team selection (as I talked about in my previous post) and how he conducts himself with players that could cause us lots of trouble in future games against better teams like Sweden & Austria which will be our next competitive matches. If Trap is allowed to stay on he will feel vindicated by his decisions and will then move on to the next set of games and go back to his own ways and continue to pick MLS & Championship players ahead of those playing for Premiership teams. He would take us into the Sweden game making poor selections and using his poor long ball tactics and Sweden will probably beat us. And once that happens it will be a hard struggle to take 2nd place in the group.
Fierce_LiNk Posted October 16, 2012 Posted October 16, 2012 That was such a farce. What a mess. No point in having a fucking roof if you're not going to use it.
Platty Posted October 16, 2012 Posted October 16, 2012 What a joke that was. Best bit was the ref coming out 3 times to test the pitch by rolling the ball around. WHY?! the rain has not stopped it's only getting worse you pleb. Only plus point is that Adrian Chiles (or however you spell his name) didn't annoy me half as much as he usually does. The banter was alright. Watching Norn Iron now. 1-0 against Portugal at the mo. Could they?
James Posted October 16, 2012 Posted October 16, 2012 They probably could. Portugal are very wasteful. Apparently there no ground staff at the stadium in Poland because it had a roof......
Mokong Posted October 16, 2012 Posted October 16, 2012 Haha, awesome, Sweden just came from 4-0 down to Germany to draw the game 4-4, brilliant. And it was IN Germany too. See that is a team that knows not to roll over and die just cause "Germany are too good, they are certain to win 1st place" and are willing to fight on. Trap said after we lost to Germany that it doesn't matter to him, "he knew" we couldn't match Germany and it didn't bother him cause Germany were gonna win the group and we'd be fighting for 2nd place with Sweden and Austria. Trap expected Germany to win all their games and take max points. Well Sweden just proved him wrong, that draw actually puts Sweden 3 points behind Germany witha game in hand. So Sweden know they have a good shot at not just 2nd place but 1st place in the group. So it could be fully possible we could end up fighting for 2nd place with Germany aswell as Sweden. Even if he thought we couldn't stand up to Germany so a loss wouldn't matter he damn well shouldn't be saying it. Great message to the players isn;t it "Hey guys I'm your manager and I think you got no chance". Just shows he didn't even take the German game seriously and didn't care. If he did maybe we could have gotten a draw with them too. He was so adament that losing 3 points to Germany wouldn't matter in the race for 2nd place he wouldn't even consider the possiblity of taking even sharing a point each with them.
bob Posted October 17, 2012 Posted October 17, 2012 The Luis Suarez training session was going well....
Fierce_LiNk Posted October 17, 2012 Posted October 17, 2012 God, the passing in the game earlier was awful. Such a bad game. I don't know how Poland didn't win that.
Mokong Posted October 18, 2012 Posted October 18, 2012 *Sigh* Just seen th enews that the FAI have decided not to sack Trap Said cause we are still in a position where qualification is possible and cause he was backed by some "senior" players they thought it best to keep Trap in charge. Sickened. Firstly with 3 games in the only reason we are in a position where qualification "seems" possible is cause 2 of those 3 games were against the two worst teams in the group, Faroe Islands & Kazhkstan (who we were very lucky to beat in the first game). And the "senior" players that backed Trap are the ones that know if a new manager came in he'll make the proper changes needed which would mean they wouldn't be first choice starters anymore. Can only hope in our next 2 games which are Friendlies with Greece and Poland before our next qualifier with Sweden in March go so badly the FAI see they made a mistake. Cause if Trap is allowed to continue to pick the poorer players available to him as starters and leave the better and younger players on bench after the Sweden game we will then be far from qualifying for Brazil. I bet the real reason they didn't scak him is cause they didn't want to have spend the money it would cost to sack him. It was a stupid move to renew his contract the day after we Qualified for Euro2012, should have waited till after the tournament, bet had he not already had his contract renewed he would have been sacked after Euro2012 after how that went.
Charlie Posted October 18, 2012 Posted October 18, 2012 At least you guys have a chance of qualifying. After 2 games we had next to no chance, yet our manager was allowed to stay. After 3 games there was no chance. After 4 games there is nothing to play for and 2 days later he's still here. He wasn't even qualified to do the job in the first place. A couple of average seasons in Scotland, a terrible one in England and some more average ones in Scotland. Levein out, Strachan in.
Mokong Posted October 18, 2012 Posted October 18, 2012 Ouch, hadn't looked at Scotlands (and Wales') group till now, didn't think ye'd be doing that bad. ALthough if we were in that group instead of ye I bet we wouldn't be doing much better with Trap in charge.
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