A bit of perspective please

[alunevans]

Sean mate, why are you couching this in terms of it being either sack rafa or back him completely.

There is a middle ground where you can say no I don't want Rafa to go, but what the **** was he doing there.

Or I wish he'd do this instead of that.

And that middle ground is where 99% of people making critical comments about his selections/tactics/substitutions/rotations occupy.

Frankly, chatting about this stuff is one of the main attractions of going the match. Having a view is part of why we love the footy so much.

[alunevans]

Ah ignore that. Kurt said it already. And you've answered him. No need for duplication

[sean_lfc]

Good to see you around alun, Ill write more tomorroe= just got the little cat sleeping on me left arm typing with one hand is quite a challenge kik lol dont have me glasses on eithrt lol sorry mate

[Nicey]

'Is there anything positive to take from the match? The only comforting thing is that it has finished.'
'This could be the worst game we have had since I came here, especially at home. It was a bad game,


Rafa as always calls it straight ..

To think some numptie was saying cant wait to see what Rafa says tomorrow like he has ever used any excuses for piss poor performances ... There has not been many since he has come along in my books ... unfortunately most of them has been in the last 4 games or so

[sid]

Pretty grim but very true. No drive, no passion and absolutely no idea in any of those matches. I'm not expecting things to magically turn around in time for Sunday.

Rafa continues to rotate for rotations sake and if you continually make disjointed team selections you'll get disjointed performances.

Rafa talks about having players fresh for the run in....well there's no point having fresh players for the run in if we've got nothing to play for.

[kurtangle01]

a last minute equaliser today would have glossed over how poorly we are really playing. take nothing away from marseille they came looking for points and were fully rewarded for their ambition. the title of this thread says "one bad game" but lets be honest, its a stretch of bad games and its real ugly too. im gonna go out on a limb here and in my OPINION i think rafa has lost some of the dressing room. we just dont seem to have that togetherness or seem to be as cohesive as we did against chelsea. In my OPINION i sense a whole lot of frustration from some of the senior players with regards to rotation. like every other job, people want to know where they stand and want to be performing on a regular basis. dont want to be critical of the lad but leto is nowhere near ready for champions league football and i bet you any money the players know that and it would only be human nature to have some dissent about that selection.
id love to know the mood of the training ground these days, who is the liason between the manager now that paco has gone. someone mentioned the body language of peter crouch last week, but in fairness you can see it in most of the players. no one seems to want to stand the **** up and be counted. in fact, we look like the team that sacked mourhinio and are ****ing moping about on the pitch feeling sorry for ourselves.
i hope spurs feel the backlash of such an embarrasing performance not only tonight but in recent games. the manager and the players owe it to themselves, they also owe it to the fans who walk through ****ing walls to follow this team and they need to show us the pride that comes along with wearing this ****ing great shirt of ours.

Can't argue with any of that, mate.

[Jack D Rips]

I am sick of us getting this "kick in the arse" thing. It doesnt work. We've been getting it for 17 years and it doesnt ****ing work.

We have been poor since the start of the season. Who have we beaten?
We were lucky to beat Villa and Wigan and even in the destruction od Derby we were piss poor for half an hour until Xabi scored a lucky goal.

We are not good enough to break down inferior sides and Im sorry to finally have to say it but I feel Rafas rotation policy has the team going on the pitch looking like a team of strangers.

Can someone please tell me what is our supposed style of play?

[Revo]

Aw man, you come out with some real ****ing gems revo

hows your recovery coming along today sean

[sean_lfc]

lol quite well, back at it to be honest ehehe

[El Jefecito]

a last minute equaliser today would have glossed over how poorly we are really playing. take nothing away from marseille they came looking for points and were fully rewarded for their ambition. the title of this thread says "one bad game" but lets be honest, its a stretch of bad games and its real ugly too. im gonna go out on a limb here and in my orOPINION i think rafa has lost some of the dressing room. we just dont seem to have that togetherness seem to be as cohesive as we did against chelsea. In my OPINION i sense a whole lot of frustration from some of the senior players with regards to rotation. like every other job, people want to know where they stand and want to be performing on a regular basis. dont want to be critical of the lad but leto is nowhere near ready for champions league football and i bet you any money the players know that and it would only be human nature to have some dissent about that selection.
id love to know the mood of the training ground these days, who is the liason between the manager now that paco has gone. someone mentioned the body language of peter crouch last week, but in fairness you can see it in most of the players. no one seems to want to stand the **** up and be counted. in fact, we look like the team that sacked mourhinio and are ****ing moping about on the pitch feeling sorry for ourselves.
i hope spurs feel the backlash of such an embarrasing performance not only tonight but in recent games. the manager and the players owe it to themselves, they also owe it to the fans who walk through ****ing walls to follow this team and they need to show us the pride that comes along with wearing this ****ing great shirt of ours.

I only get the sense that Crouch and Gerrard have an issue with it. Everyone else was told coming in what to expect and they respect that.

[mick the click]

a last minute equaliser today would have glossed over how poorly we are really playing. take nothing away from marseille they came looking for points and were fully rewarded for their ambition. the title of this thread says "one bad game" but lets be honest, its a stretch of bad games and its real ugly too. im gonna go out on a limb here and in my OPINION i think rafa has lost some of the dressing room. we just dont seem to have that togetherness or seem to be as cohesive as we did against chelsea. In my OPINION i sense a whole lot of frustration from some of the senior players with regards to rotation. like every other job, people want to know where they stand and want to be performing on a regular basis. dont want to be critical of the lad but leto is nowhere near ready for champions league football and i bet you any money the players know that and it would only be human nature to have some dissent about that selection.
id love to know the mood of the training ground these days, who is the liason between the manager now that paco has gone. someone mentioned the body language of peter crouch last week, but in fairness you can see it in most of the players. no one seems to want to stand the **** up and be counted. in fact, we look like the team that sacked mourhinio and are ****ing moping about on the pitch feeling sorry for ourselves.
i hope spurs feel the backlash of such an embarrasing performance not only tonight but in recent games. the manager and the players owe it to themselves, they also owe it to the fans who walk through ****ing walls to follow this team and they need to show us the pride that comes along with wearing this ****ing great shirt of ours.

I haven't read the entire thread - and a certain amount of rotation is necessary - but you're spot on!

[captainfog]

I totally disagree with the lack of hunger/desire/motivation comments.

Of course our players are giving 100% As soon as any team plays badly comentators and fans start questioning the above. You don't have to lack hunger to play poorly, you just have to be off form.

Our lads were trying very ****ing hard yesterday, but were were crap. We couldn't pass the ball for ****. That is what went wrong. When we start passing better we will look a completely different team and everyone will say we are unbeatable again.

I agree a few of our players are not technically gifted enough, Riise and Momo being two of the main offenders (although i still think Momo has his place in the squad), however, we have enough good enough players to win games and indeed win the league. Nobody is playing well at the moment, we were playing great, but then the international break came and we seemed to suddenly turn ****.

Things will turn round and get better. Just think, we are playing **** at the moment yet we are unbeaten in the league. We will be ****ing amazing when start playing well!

The rotation arguement is a complete red herring. All of the players bar Leto played some part in the both the last couple of games and the core have started every game. Rotation is not the problem. Everyone said it was after the pompy game saying Torres should have played (he was the only non first player playing) however, El Torro played yesterday and has started the last three games yet he like everyone else on the team was ****e.

Thing WILL get better. A rough patch but we are winning!!!!!!! This time last year everyone was saying the same thing, however, look how well we did from November onwards. We were great and would have won the league! This year we have actually started pretty well and miles better than the last two seasons, yet people still moan. If we finish as strongly as we have in the last couple of seasons we will win the league.

Everyone needs to chilll out and see the bigger picture.

[bigfooty]

I only get the sense that Crouch and Gerrard have an issue with it. Everyone else was told coming in what to expect and they respect that.

Crouch was one of the key reasons we had a decent league campaign in 05-06 and our top scorer last season despite starting only half our matches. Gerrard is proven quality. If Rafa's "lost" them because of the rotation then we're in serious trouble because we're not going to win the league Kuyt and Voronin supporting Torres or relying on the midfield supply from Momo and Pennant.

[bigfooty]

Things will turn round and get better. Just think, we are playing **** at the moment yet we are unbeaten in the league. We will be ****ing amazing when start playing well!

Thing WILL get better. A rough patch but we are winning!!!!!!! This time last year everyone was saying the same thing, however, look how well we did from November onwards. We were great and would have won the league! This year we have actually started pretty well and miles better than the last two seasons, yet people still moan. If we finish as strongly as we have in the last couple of seasons we will win the league.

Everyone needs to chilll out and see the bigger picture.

First of all, Aston Villa were unbeaten until the 28th of October last season. They finished something like 10th in the end. So it counts for very little really.

Secondly, we're not winning. Against "first choice" sides we've won 1 in 5, not counting the Reading game as we both fielded weakened sides in certain areas.

Finally, we may have started better when you look at who we have played the sides have included teams like Wigan, Sunderland, Birmingham and Derby, three of which played in the Championship last season and one that came within a goal of going down to that level. Hardly the better Premiership sides.

Now contrast that with last season when, in our first seven games, we played Cheslea, Bolton and Everton away. We've not come close to matches of that difficulty yet and it's expecting an awful lot for us to suddenly up our game and collect points from those games at the time when, last season, we were putting together a winning run against the sort of sides we've already played and dropped points against this season.