goose island

it's hardly subtle.

he's all but named Torres and Mascherano there. why bother going into that detail?

why go on record to say that though? hardly dignified having a go at your ex-teammates to stick up for a man who was at the club for 6 months and left us flirting with relegation.

i bet you this is the sort of s*** that blew FSG away as well.

my faith in American owners is very minimal at the moment, especially when division of duty appears to be the modus operandi. we all remember the original American model at Chester City and how that worked out for them.

he is Fernando Torres, Nike or whoever make his boots would have had a hissyfit if he wasn't there.

top 6. or given where we were last season 65-70 points would be a good return. i agree with Kenny's public assertion that we don't need a massive investment in the playing side. i think our squad is stronger than it was in 09/10, when you factor in the injuries we had that season. i also think that we should be looking at another couple of seasons before we can realistically break into the Champions League places again. another striker and a replacement for Carragher are both necessary for us to be able to do this. plus replacements for Kuyt & Maxi if they are off. i don't want to see Jordan Henderson play anywhere other than centre mid next season. i don't want to see Steven Gerrard playing in centre midfield. i want to see more of Andy Carroll starting games. i am giddily excited about the return of Lucas.

it really shouldn't be a debate for us to have until at least another 18months / 2 years.

all very good points, and without even going into the fact that this is Kenny Dalglish we're talking about, I agree that he deserves to be given more time. the over-riding feeling i get reading all of the above though is that it screams out we should have never sacked Rafa Benitez in 2010.

This content is not viewable to guests.,This content is not viewable to guests.

not at Bolton, but possibly at Everton given their recent record against them is atrocious. haven't Everton got a number of players out for the season now though (Cahill, Arteta & Fellaini - I could be wrong about this)? Everton have also be really inconsistent at home this season. we've also got to beat City at home first for this to mean anything.

to stand any chance we need 20+ points from the remaining fixtures (ideally the full 24 available). even then it's a slim possibility. edit - just looked at the fixtures, I can only see City dropping points against us and Spurs. 16 points from them fixtures (2 points a game) takes them to 69, which is the most we can get. we will more than likely drop points somewhere so 4th is too long gone. 5th is very possible with the fixtures Spurs have. let's hope they have an end of season burn-out!

naive was maybe a harsh word to use, but we were over-reliant on trying to hit Carroll with the long ball. agree it's a poorer side but Maxi & Cole are well established at International level, both saw a lot of the ball and both produced very little with it. opportunities from wide were very few owing to the fact that Cole spent his entire time on the pitch drifting inside and Maxi would never dream of attempting to beat a man. we weren't quick enough with the ball at our feet, it took Spearing coming on for that to happen, and movement up front was far better with Ngog on the pitch. wasn't really talking about the first leg, but Kyrgiakos' tackle to concede the penalty was very naive!

can't fault Kenny in terms of the personnel, but it was a pretty poor and sometimes naive performance. not saying that is Kenny's fault either, but it did go some way to showing that we don't have the squad capable of winning the Europa League. if Gerrard was fit we may have got through last night, but I think we would have struggled in the following rounds.

i don't think that we're going to find a better example of us being spoilt under Rafa than this post above.

This content is not viewable to guests.,This content is not viewable to guests.

vermouth is cool! i remember very little else from that day (or the match) other than cutting the days drinking short at about 8pm to catch the train back to Buckley for a dentisht appointment the following day that didn't exist.

haha, remember meeting you (and your hipflask of vermouth) at the station early doors before the march. glorious sunny day. if i remember rightly as well they were on course for a hat-trick of "turn up for a nil-nil and nick all 3 points after the previous two years (O'Shea & Tevez). the O'Shea one was ridiculous, we had absolutely dominated that game it was unreal, and then Scholes got sent off for taking a wild swing at Xabi - ah, the loveable rogue that is Paul Scholes, terrible tackler (chuckle, chuckle). to come away from that game with nothing was absolute robbery, although the Tevez one the following year we were pretty poor in. same with Morientes' debut. any game that Fowler scored in - the freekick that wrong-footed Schmeichel and the one when he had to forget the fact that Gary Neville had just fallen in front of him.

happy to admit that i thought Kenny had been away from the game too long to make a positive impact replacing the Hodge, I'm f***ing ashamed and I'm absolutely delighted to have got it so wrong! have loved the formation experiments, but for me the biggest positive has been how much more movement there is when we've got the ball. it's now quite rare for our players to not have at least 2 options to pass to when they've got possession of the ball.

we are s**** and they are going to win another treble.

i'd agree with the first line, although it highlights just how bad Chelsea were yesterday. then again, he might have been guilty of playing it on the face of who the opposition were in that respect. i'm not saying that it was the right thing to do, just hopeful that it was a one off. let's face it, how many times have we taken a lead with us into half time in the league this season, let alone a 2 goal lead & against top of the league? the mindset of keeping what we've got at all costs was always going to creep in, but it was nice to see that we still created chances despite the deep backline. let's see what the approach is going to be for the next 3 games. they're certainly all winnable, and yesterday should have given us a massive confidence boost.

i'd disagree with the plateaued comment - some of his performances during the latter stages of the Europa League were top drawer (home games against Lille, Benfica & Atletico Madrid off the top of my head), although admittedly i didn't catch many league games after new year last season.

has definitely been on an upward curve for at least 12 months now. yesterday was one of a few stand out performances that we've seen in that period, the question now is whether we can see him dominate 3/4 games in succession, starting with wigan.

this is it for me, for whatever reason it's now clear that we try to put pressure on the opposition when they've got the ball. when we win it higher up the pitch, Torres is no longer isolated like he has been in some of the games we've played earlier in the season. the poor start hasn't put us in a great position, but the league is so open this year that a few more wins can put us right up there for a top 4 spot. if Roy can achieve this, I can't see a reason to replace him. long way to go yet though.

every time I see his name, I'm reminded of a lad called Christian on a youth project that I worked on in Bolton, who despite being 13 years old had the face of a bulldog licking piss from a thistle. on the back of his Wanderers shirt was his nickname - Crid. I will forever be referring to Christian Poulsen as Crid.