Gobsmacked by the appointment of Pearson, but the acid test is I would. I'd have Foster, Cathcart, Dawson. Mariappa and Holebas too. And I think Masina is a warrior-in-waiting. Cleverley. Sarr. Deulofeu (with Pearson infusion). Deeney. Nowt to do with formation. Everything to do with player mentality and the siege mentality we need. Bring it on.
So you’d basically have our whole team who have been limp all season in the trenches with you? This doesn’t make much sense.
Theres a massive difference between not trying and not being confident enough to be comfortable trying. That olympic speed skate Elise Christie tryed harder than anyone. But wasnt in control or confident it would happen. Footballers trying too hard to make a tackle will give away fouls. Trying too hard to put the ball in the top corner means you take a split second too long and get tackled or sky it. There are one or two in the squad who you could class as sunshine footballers who are good to have in when youre doing well, but we've missed a bit of grit and effort to force things to go well. All our defenders can tackle, but they fear making errors dont have confidence and dont choose the right time to back off versus commit to winning the ball. Virgil Van Dyk, who everyone raves about seems to get that sort of decision right every time because he's confident in doing so.
So, and I think I’ve understood this right, what you’re saying, is that we should play Elise Christie at the back?
It's a small thing but I've noticed that in the last two games, he actually runs to go and get the ball when it's out of play as he wants to inject some tempo into the game when we're behind. Shows that he cares, unlike some of the others who amble around with their heads down.
