HJ

Oh what a surprise that Fergiescum was lying about their defense, was always expecting Brown to show up.

Ash was easy to mark in 07/08, are you kidding? He was fantastic. All our play went through him because we didn't have a right side and he delivered constantly. To say that a decent right winger would have had us challenge for top 4 is just absurd, it would have had a negative effect on Ash like Milner ended up having, we had a shit keeper, Knight playing CB most of the season, fullbacks who couldn't attack at all, we were leaking tons of goals, we were miles off top 4 and a decent RW wouldn't have changed that. I don't care about pretty, I care about creating chances from open play. We had more in first half vs. Hull than we have had all this season while in 4-5-1.

Well they will probably be raising at least money: link

If Fergie isn't bullshitting about Fletcher and Carrick playing in defense then I think it will be something like Rooney-Berbatov Giggs-Gibson-Anderson-Valencia

More importantly though 2 up front for most of the season.

I care more about points as well. Sidwell/NRC/Petrov didn't have the potential to get enough good attacking performances to get us points for top 4 which is why Carew has been up there. It hasn't worked either, and as I said probably worse than the 4-5-1 would have but that's largely because the other striker hasn't produced, second most important reason is general lack of quality in centre although Petrov is still the pick of the bunch for me. If Milner keeps going in his new position we have that quality in the middle. The final aim is not to try to sneak results by shit on a stick football, but by trying to get us to attack as well as we did in 07/08 while having a sturdier defense.

Yeah I got the Arsenal home/away games mixed up, we were good in both as well as Bolton. Thats still a long while ago. Don't remember the WBA home game really. We don't have Barry this season so it would have been NRC instead of him and that would make us quite a bit worse with the ball. We have been quite flat going forward with Sidwell/NRC/Petrov every time which would have been a problem for it if we had used it more. As I said Milner in the center there is an option now and I'd like to see it at some point, whether we will play exciting football remains to be seen. Oh it can be worse, we could play like we did in 4-5-1 home to Boro last season for example. We have had 1-1 draws and 1-2 defeats and that isn't good but we haven't been a million miles off more points, that would be what Hull was last weekend. Since Carew/Heskey have been so poor in many of those games we would have probably been better off with just a DM instead of them but I'm thinking like turning one of those draws to a 0-1 win while still not playing particularly well, like we often did last season.

It can be, but the last time it actually was attacking for us was, uhm, Arsenal away on the back of the only great performance that Sidwell has played for us? We scraped a couple of 1-0 wins from own goals after that etc. We have played 4 games this season with 4-5-1 and barely created anything from open play in any of them. Solid, but struggling to conjure up situations that can lead to goals. Dropping Carew also means we are quite a bit weaker in set pieces. Now it could all change when we can now play Milner in the middle in that formation so we have an actual player who can attack in the middle which is a must for me if we want long term success with the formation, but its all speculation until we actually play it and attack well.

SHA game was not great by any means and we only won it by going 2 up front. Our overall level of play wasn't any better than any of our away games this season. Because Carew in form is far, far superior footballer to NRC or Sidwell and helps the team win more games. I don't actually have a problem with going 4-5-1 because he really hasn't been on form, but lately there have been signs of life from both him and Heskey. Okey, I don't agree, can't be bothered to do the whole Petrov thing with you again We had no control over Liverpool game, we defended brilliantly including all the midfielders but had like 30% possession, it was back to walls action and we didn't create anything at all from open play until Gabby's cross to NRC very late in the game. Barcelona/Liverpool/Arsenal all have midfielders who score tons of goals. If we went 4-5-1 I think we would struggle attacking although we would be very solid.

It continued for two games? It's 2 wins in 13 games. Yep it has continued hasn't it? For the most part of last year it didn't work and for all of this year it hasn't worked. 2 Games doesn't change that. Just like if we changed to 4-5-1, lost two games and then won 6/7 in a row. I'd hardly call that a failure just because we lost first two games. It continued because we were on good form regardless of the formation. You throw those 2 games away like they mean nothing but the 2 away games this season in 4-5-1 is a huge deal, it doesn't work both ways. I'm not happy with 3 points from 5 games and I think we would have got more with 4-5-1. But its because Carew has been missing so much that we've played a 4-4-1 basically and on the back of his good performances at the end of last season his good game / bad game ratio of this season couldn't have been expected. It's not a fundamental problem of formation or Petrov, it's a problem of our second striker doing nothing for the most part.

Why did our good away form last season continue when we switched from 4-5-1 to 4-4-2, if that's the difference?

The bad run didn't start when we changed formation. We still beat Pompey and Blackburn away with 4-4-2 after we changed formation, Blackburn in particular was an excellent performance. At home we drew with Wigan although completely battered them, and lost to Chelsea. Conceded a total of 1 goal in those 4 games. It all went down the shitter at 80th minute of the home game vs. Stoke.

In cups we need to play 4-4-2 away though since its 4-4-2 : 2 of 2 4-5-1 : 0 of 1

barry'sboots, just in case you didn't see it in the General thread, this might interest you:

Yeah, if Carrick-Vidic is their central defense we should attack them with two strikers. If its Gabby alone Vidic is just going to stick to him and Carrick just needs to mop up whats left, if we play two it means Carrick has to play 1 on 1 vs. one of them. I'd also rather play Carew than Heskey here, more potential to wreak havoc in their defense.

The Bolton game was when the opponent actually got back into it and made it 2-1, in real life not in some fantasy what-if situation, as opposed to almost getting back into it and almost making it 2-1. Hull had 0 shots on target, Bolton had 6.

None. Manu home record: 07/08: 17-1-1 08/09: 16-2-1 09/10: 6-1-0 Of 45 games they've lost 2. I'm sure they'll manage to get enough defenders fit to field a good defense next weekend as well. People always come up with reasons why this year is the best chance we've ever had to beat them there when it never actually is.

Spurs haven't won away at any of the big four since 1993, we aren't quite as pathetic as them at least.

He's shaved the beard, maybe the poll should be re-opened.

I'd be tempted to play the same team as well. We did well there last season with Gabby/Carew up top. Would be fine if we swapped a striker for NRC/Sidwell as well.

Carew hit it straight down the middle along the ground, not sure if I'd be comfortable with more of those kind of penalties..

Friedel took a freekick deep inside our half, Carew nodded it on towards Ash superbly, keeper took him out. Clear penalty.

Friedel hasn't had anything to do and we are comfortable, we do try to counter attack but haven't really nailed it, they defend it well or we miss a pass or hit a bad shot.

Great goal by Dunne, Milner spotted him unmarked in the box and the shot was a bullet, unstoppable

4-4-2, Young and Downing switching left and right