Phillip

Possibly, but that would have applied to Carvalho's tackle, and not anything to do with A. Cole. I think "cube" probably was meant to refer to penalty box, but who knows?

It was the proper decision, to lessen the pressures on JT and on the England squad. Otherwise, things would have just continued to fester. Fabio Capello was absolutely correct in acting quickly on this matter.

After seeing Maverick's avatar, let's not forget Carvalho's HUGE mistake in tackling Donovan in the box to give up a penalty kick that Cech thankfully saved. So, two small mistakes and one huge mistake.

Don't know about that, Coco. If I am marking someone who is positioned at, say 8 yards from goal and at the center of the goal, and that player then makes a dash in a direction towards where the corner is being taken, then I will likely have no option but to stick by him, but at the same time trail behind him (since he got the jump on me by his initial move, unless I am clarivoyant). Now, Saha is located at an extreme angle to the goal when he makes head contact with the ball, and executes an excellent flick header for a goal. In that case, to fault JT, who is very close to Saha but correctly positioned between Saha and the goal, is harsh. Lamps was the first defender between Donovan (who took the corner) and Saha, and it is his prime responsibility to get his head to the ball, which he did not do. More fault to Lamps, and at best, very minor fault to JT. Upon reflection, if it was Carvalho, he would have grabbed onto Saha's jersey, and kept him from getting to the ball, so perhaps JT can be faulted for not doing something like that. I am being serious when I say that, since it seems to me that 95% of the time, a defender gets away with such tactics. Also, on what basis do you fault Cech for the second goal? To me, he was properly positioned, and Saha just hit a rocket that flew past him before he could react to get to it. Did you want Cech to run out when Distan made his long pass and try to intercept the pass, and thus likely bollux up JT's defending of Saha?

I am at a loss too, with respect to what Mikstaw is trying to convey. Weird that he could not find the actual English quote, since I am assuming that Ancelloti made his quote in English, and not in Polish, and thus why the need for a Google translation?

Good point, Bridgeboy. That first goal was just a well executed corner, and you really cannot fault JT much at all. Perhaps a little fault to Lamps for not getting up high enough as the "first defender", but JT was goal-side of Saha and properly positioned. JT was indeed hobbling before the 2nd goal, but if that was the case, then he should have played more conservatively, and he is at fault no matter what his condition was at the time. On another point, it is becoming clearer to me that we lack a pacy midfielder, like Ji-Sun Park or Anderson of ManU, and while we have skillful midfielders by the dozen, none of them is particularly swifty, which causes us problems as of late. When we had Bossy and a healthy A. Cole in the lineup, that defect was hidden to some extent due to their forward runs, but now it is coming to light (even though Ivan makes some nice forward runs lately).

Maybe, Loz, but it clearly is affecting the other players on the team. Perhaps when he barks out orders to someone on the pitch, they come back with "F*CK OFF, YOU TWO-TIMER", or something to that effect.

Essien is possibly due back at the end of this month.

Why was Joe Cole not on our substitutes list? He might have made a difference in the 2nd half. That one is a big mistake on Carlo's part. Also, JT's issues are clearly affecting him and the entire team, unfortunately. It was bound to happen, and now we face a very dire time for this team.

Cech for me as well, though every one else was dreadful, except Mikel, who I thought did well for the second game in a row.

Cute name, though. Welcome, and I hope your joining the forum bring us good luck today against Everton.

Where were you sitting, Carlos? Was that your first game at the Bridge?

Totally agree with you. If they had Van Persie, then they would have been a threat, but it is clearly just between us and Manure. Come on, Villa, beat the Mankees on Wednesday!

I am having a "Moi" moment, but there must be over 100 posts that use "loosing" when they meant "losing". I see it a lot on this forum, and on other forums that I frequent (which will remain nameless).

Wow, that was spot on, except for the bossing them in midfield, since Arsenal did win the battle in that part of the pitch.

I'm sorry, I did not mean to criticise Ivanovic, but rather to point out that he was not in the top 5 for contention for MoM. He played OK, in my opinion, but with others playing excellent, I cannot fathom how someone voted for Ivanovic, that's all.

That was a poor choice. A. Cole and JT were much better, and Cech was magnificent, and Drogs scored twice. What were you thinking when you voted for Ivan? Did you see him get beaten a lot in the first half?

Loz wrote: A Cole - 10. My man of the match. For me that was a perfect performance. Everything he did he did impeccably. He certainly revels in getting one over on the Gooners. I know a lot of us thought Arsenal had got the better side of the deal when Gallas and Cole swapped clubs (myself included) and it is safe to say that a lot of us have been proved wrong. I respectfully disagree, since he was played through with a perfect pass one on one with Almunia, and A. Cole had a heavy first touch which killed his chance. He was great on offense, but for that "mistake" (and he also mis-headed a clearance in the first half into touch), I would give him an 8.5.

I am usually harsh on Mikel as well, but I thought he did well today -- not great, but OK. He did not give up any dangerous free kicks, like Carvalho did. He made a few bad passes late in the first half, but he hustled a lot. Best one on the pitch today was Mike Dean, who I thought was very good in allowing play to go on when other referees would have blown the whistle many more times and would have stopped the flow of the game.

Petr Cech for me, since without him, and with Arsenal's domination of the midfield, this might have been a much different game without his 3 great saves.

I think we will be OK, even if we draw tomorrow. If we lose, then you may be right.

When we play with Joe Cole, A. Cole, Franky, Mikel and Bossy, or some combination of them, we have serious problems with their aerial man-marking, since none of them is really good in the air, and a half-decent player can get to a corner and head it on goal. We are kind of like Arsenal in our lack of aerial strength, absent Drogba and perhaps Ballack, and we need to get better in that regard (don't know how, with our current squad).

I disagree, since by taking the shot first time, from an acute angle, he took the keeper by surprise, and Myhill was lucky to get his fingertips to the ball to keep it from going into the net. If Sturridge did what you wanted him to do, it would have required a few more deft touches, and would have allowed the defender to do his thing to muck things up, and to allow Myhill to close up on Sturridge to make himself "bigger". I think it was the right choice by Sturridge, and was a very skillful maneuver that almost gave us all three points.

I am too lazy to read the earlier posts, so I will assume that this thread is about songs with abysmal lyrics. In that case, the award goes to Karma Chameleon, by Boy George. I think it just repeats one stupid line ad nauseum.