Castiel

I wasn't aware we had anything to do with Rangers aside from the strip colours and the lion.

Thats a fair point but it has lead to the criticism of Luiz when he is caught out of position and miscommunication with Ivan resulted in an open flank. Surely it'd be more productive to have Luiz in a position where he is expected to make advanced runs and where Ivan is expected to stay back and cover. Thats basically what I was trying to say as thats what their preferred movement seems to suggest so far.

Thats exactly why I've been thinking about it. People say Luiz ends up out of position and Ivan ends up covering for him, it just looks like they'd rather swap places.

Well my main basis of comparison was Luiz and Ivan vs Hernandez. In the league Luiz thwarted Hernandezes runs pretty easily and generally showed him up, in the CL Hernandez managed to get passed Ivan for quite a few runs. I believe Hernandez was clocked as the fastest player in the world cup which is quite an achievement, so I think judging Luiz' pace against his is relevant - especially considering he's one of the likely scorers tomorrow. That said Ivan contained Bale very well last weekend who is also fast, if not as fast as Hernandez.

No clearly not a good idea to suddenly try it tomorrow and I didn't mean to come off as if I was diminishing Ivan's ability as a right back, because I wasn't. He's good in that position, I just feel that Luiz would offer more offensively there than Ivan does and suggesting that Luiz is faster isn't ridiculous to me.

This has occurred to me before and I think its worth a discussion. We've seen how adventurous he is and its returned some goals so far which is brilliant. He's got some pace on him, watching him beat Hernandez to the ball on several occasions at the Bridge to clear it was an eye opener and he seems to spend a lot of time on that right hand side defensively - probably because he's so much faster than Ivan that he can catch pacey wingers more effectively. His passing has been brilliant, picking out our strikers from long distances and setting up good runs, he can cross the ball and he has a strong right foot. I think it'd be worth an experiment. In that position he'd be allowed to come forward as he so often likes to, pick out crosses and hit on the counter as well as cover that right flank like we see him doing frequently anyway. Anyway I thought it'd be a good idea to try him there, what's the general consensus?

Spoke too soon about Everton it seems, credit to them they completely turned it around in the 2nd half. But City could and should have killed that game off, missed a lot of chances to take it to 2 or 3-0 before they could mount a comeback.

City comfortably beating Everton at Goodison. I'm confident we'll hammer them on the last day if the title depended on it.

Well he'll just look like a bigger idiot when he doesn't then.

I believe his outburst is reflecting what a lot of people are starting to think about Barcelona. He's put his own career on the line to shine the light on their sinister antics behind the perfect facade and I hope it pays off. Jose did say he'd quit club football if this happened though, lets see if it was just a heat of the moment comment or if this was the final straw.

That video is why I think he'll make the difference (compared to the CL) on Sunday. He had Hernandez in his pocket. Shame we can't play Luiz at right back because he looks so much more dangerous than Ivan coming forward.

Yes of course its not a surprise just nice to have some media backing for once. Another note, Carlo's press conference: http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/13317052.stm His comments about the formation are a worry. Its clear that we just perform a lot better in a 433 and that the Drogba/Torres partnership (the only reason to go 442) is still in the experimental stages. It could end up working nicely but now is not the time to force it, we got away with it against Tottenham but we wont against United.

Seems the Liverpool press are on our side over Howard Webb. I've seen a lot of articles placing him under scrutiny over his favourable decisions to United, even suggesting that if they beat us it will be because of a decision in their favour. Because this is being published in such bulk I believe it'll weigh on him when he's faced with one of those 50/50's and think twice. Scouce bitterness finally comes in handy.

His job isn't to score goals. Would you rather him running up the pitch trying to score when we've got 3 forwards and 2 other mid fielders able to play offensively, leaving us wide open for the counter attack and more importantly, Rooney unmarked - or to nullify Rooney and prevent counter attacks? At the moment he's the best holding midfielder we have, and he's improving every time I see him. Leaving him out of this match would cost us dearly.

If we're 2-0 up at half time I think I'll die.

Mikel and Ramiers for me. Mikel has just been outstanding lately and should keep the place, and I feel Ramiers will pose the greater attacking threat - keeping in mind we cannot settle for anything less than a win here.

They're convinced of a comfortable win on Red Cafe because Webb got the game. Should email that thread to the FA.

Really says a lot about this competition that their reserves can literally batter Schalke in the CL semi-finals on autopilot.

Seriously how did this team get to the semi finals?

Man United fielding a heavily weakened side for Shalke. Lets hope it backfires horribly.

I noticed this, the ref went out of his way to avoid sending anyone off and some the RM players seemed to be asking for it. Whether this was a victory for Jose or an attempt by UEFA to discredit his accusations remains to be seen.

Whatever Webb does couldn't possibly be worse than 2009, we've suffered the worst the refereeing scandal in history and we're still here. I'm not afraid of them or OT at all because I know that our team is better. If we're cheated out of it, then thats that - nothing our team can do about it. What we can do is play them off the park, score more goals, and hope the ref doesn't humiliate the FA any more than they already have.

You've got to remember that plays in our favour even if it does annoy us as fans. United also have no idea if they'll be facing Torres, Drogba or both and at what point in time they'll be on the field. Defensively dealing with Torres and Drogba are very different prospects - and the United defence have nightmares about both. Having either of them on the bench would be a worrying prospect for them knowing that after holding out against a world class striker for say 60 minutes, another with fresh legs and a completely different approach is about to ruin your day.

I don't think it'll matter much whether we start Torres or Drogba in the middle of a 433. They're both performing very well as far as I'm concerned, but of course the safest bet would be Drogba. The only thing we absolutely cannot do is start them both together.

Disgraceful club.