Our immediate future

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billycopper said:
I think we'll somehow fumble our way through it. There are major issues that need to be addressed though. By hook or by crook we need to find a way to score. Stoke's long throw routine was very difficult to stop and Arsenal of old scored a large proportion of their goals from set pieces. Was it Joe Royle who latched on to using Andy Hinchcliffe to feed Dunc? We've got enough big players (Fellaini, Straq, Vellios, Rodwell, Distin etc). We should be profitting from Baines' deliveries with much greater regularity.

Unless, by some miracle, funds become available, we've got one loan signing left to patch the squad up. Jags is only out for 6 weeks and I think we can cover that with a combination of Hibbert and Duffy if necessary. I'd probably look for a goal poacher. I'm not sure what his fitness is like, but it's hard to imagine that Robbie Keane could fail to find the net with Donovan and Drenthe flanking him. We could have a solid midfield three behind them including any combination of Fellaini, Rodwell, Osman, Cahill and Neville.

More longer term we need to strip away dead wood and bring more players into the squad. Why do we need Hahnneman? Neville seems to be clinging on? Bily seems to have already moved in his mind. And Saha seems like he just doesn't have it in him any more. That should free up wages. I'd drop Cahill into a deeper and less regular role too, like Ferguson did with Scholes. Can we sign Drenthe on a free? What about players like Kalou and Gordon? Who else is available? We need to establish Duffy, Barkley, Gueye, McAleney and Vellios in the squad as a minimum and get them playing regularly.

If Moyes walked into the job now I'm sure he'd relish that sort of challenge. I think it's worn him down though and he's having trouble getting out of a rut. We need decisive action at this time and this sort of decisions he's made this season, such as Ba and Yakubu make me think he's losing his edge.
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I agree with you billycopper - I think we'll end up stumbling our way through it. We need some confidence and Damon's right in a way - today was still a win, and that will be good for the boys. If we had lost I don't know what would have happened.

You know - right now rather than being a jokester, Phil Neville should be earning his keep as Captain.

Agree on the goal poacher front. Keane was playing better than Saha in all honesty, and I would take him here though others wouldn't. He and Landon were building a very solid rapport in LA playing upfront together - I wouldn't mind seeing that either. But looks like he's going to Villa anyway - where we could see him against us as early as 1/14.

Moyes at this point NEEDS to operate out of his comfort zone. He's gotta do it. Let's see who he puts out on Wednesday. The starting line-up continues to be very ?????.

But I'm going to stay an optimist. There's still a ton of footy left, and one thing I do admire about this club - the players have pride in it. Something's gonna give.
 

Kay20 said:
I agree with you billycopper - I think we'll end up stumbling our way through it. We need some confidence and Damon's right in a way - today was still a win, and that will be good for the boys. If we had lost I don't know what would have happened.

You know - right now rather than being a jokester, Phil Neville should be earning his keep as Captain.

Agree on the goal poacher front. Keane was playing better than Saha in all honesty, and I would take him here though others wouldn't. He and Landon were building a very solid rapport in LA playing upfront together - I wouldn't mind seeing that either. But looks like he's going to Villa anyway - where we could see him against us as early as 1/14.

Moyes at this point NEEDS to operate out of his comfort zone. He's gotta do it. Let's see who he puts out on Wednesday. The starting line-up continues to be very ?????.

But I'm going to stay an optimist. There's still a ton of footy left, and one thing I do admire about this club - the players have pride in it. Something's gonna give.
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Funny thing is before Keano went across the park we had threads galore on the poor lad at GOT. It became as bad as the annual Riquelme threads. But I would probably take him at the moment the way Saha has fallen off the cliff and runs only when he wants to.
 
billycopper said:
The most worrying thing is that we've been very lucky so far (Blackburn, Fulham, Sunderland etc). What happens when our luck runs out?
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I kinda don't buy the luck thing.

You make you're own luck in football.

Blackburn - not our fault they can't take pens is it?!
Fulham - Zamora missed a sitter...he's missed them before and will again
Sunderland - Osman had to be there to fall over. Not his fault the ref gave a pen.

I know we are playing badly but I strongly beleive you make your own luck.
 
kenada_blue said:
Well...balls to this season. Next season is looking grim also...

Rolling into 2012-2013 season

Contracts up end of this season (apparently)
Duffy
Distin
Saha
Mcfadden
Baxter
Wallace
Forshaw
McAleny

Players out -
Drenthe
Stacqualursi
Donovan

So...the "maybe's" to be sold or looking for transfers -
Bilyaletdinov
Heitinga

So with almost 8 contract renewal players, 3 loans going back, and 2 who could be shipped off that's 13 players off the books.

For us to make any transfers or to add to the squad to replace the ones leaving, the usual applies - a big name will need to be sold.

Rodwell
Fellaini
Baines

I'd rule out Barkley because he's not done anything. I'd rule out Jags because he's knocking on, and seems to be getting bad knees.

I could even exclude Rodwell, who too is getting niggling injuries and I dont think clubs will still pay the fee we want.

Additionally you have, Hibbert, Osman, Neville, Distin, Saha, Cahill all rolling in their 30+'s...

Grim. Very Grim
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It seems like Distin is happy with a 1 year extension. Saha has 6 months to prove that he's worth a new deal. I don't think Moyes can afford to let the academy products go, as we'll need the numbers. I'd expect that they'll all get 1 year contracts.

Drenthe seems happy enough. It will be a result if we can get him on a bosman. I don't know how much Tigres are likely to want for Straq but, unless it's a pittance, I can't imagine us going for him. Who knows whether we'll see Donovan again.

I'd expect Bily to go in the window. Heitinga is playing much more often appears to be more settled.

We probably haven't seen the end of the outgoings. Fellaini perhaps signed a new contract on the understanding that he could go if a Champions League club came in for him. I don't think Baines or Rodwell especially want to move at this stage.

Hibbo and Ossie should be alright for about another 3 years. Neville can't have much longer left and Cahill needs to adapt his game.

We could do with following Newcastle's example. They lost Carroll, Barton, Nolan and Enrique but brought in Marveaux, Ba, Cabaye and Obertan. They've also given Krul, Vukic, Gosling and Guthrie opportunities. There are some decent bosmans available including Arshavin, Kalou, Rodallega, Figueroa, Hoilett, Tchoyi, Diame and Klasnic. It will take brave and strong management to push us on though.
 

I'm confused.

How does us giving away 2 penalties to Blackburn but them being too ****e to score them mean we made our own luck?

Or are you saying we aren't even any good at that!
 
ijjysmith said:
I kinda don't buy the luck thing.

You make you're own luck in football.

Blackburn - not our fault they can't take pens is it?!
Fulham - Zamora missed a sitter...he's missed them before and will again
Sunderland - Osman had to be there to fall over. Not his fault the ref gave a pen.

I know we are playing badly but I strongly beleive you make your own luck.
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It does tend to even itself out of the season. Things that have gone in our favour in the first half of the season could easily go against us between now and May. Has our injury crisis been down to bad luck?
 
billycopper said:
It does tend to even itself out of the season. Things that have gone in our favour in the first half of the season could easily go against us between now and May. Has our injury crisis been down to bad luck?
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There could be loads of reasons for the injuries.

Bringing players back to early certainly doesn't help.
 

deathbyropeandglass said:
Which surely means it was good luck on our part that we still had their striker who could actually score penalties.

Or was that all part of our plan hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.
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It's not luck. That's circumstance. And I also remember Yakubu missing pens for us on more than one occasion.

Its a skill thing too. Blackburn had 2 people who took bad penos, we had 1 person who took a decent one.
 
ijjysmith said:
It's not luck. That's circumstance. And I also remember Yakubu missing pens for us on more than one occasion.

Its a skill thing too. Blackburn had 2 people who took bad penos, we had 1 person who took a decent one.
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Nothing to do with making your own luck though really. The Osman pen is yeah, cause if he hadn't of made that run he wouldn't of been in the position to get a penalty.

There was nothing we done which influenced missed penalties.

I just don't think luck is anything than pure random chance, sometimes it goes in your favour, sometimes it doesn't.
 
deathbyropeandglass said:
Nothing to do with making your own luck though really. The Osman pen is yeah, cause if he hadn't of made that run he wouldn't of been in the position to get a penalty.

There was nothing we done which influenced missed penalties.

I just don't think luck is anything than pure random chance, sometimes it goes in your favour, sometimes it doesn't.
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I hate getting into these conversations on here.

Basically mate, I don't beleive in luck.
 

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