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Post by Deleted on May 7, 2013 9:33:58 GMT
www.readytogo.net/smb/showthread.php?t=780087"I couldn't believe how passive they were in the second half. They could have won the game comfortably had they wanted to, but they just invited us forward with their awful negativity. I'd be fuming if I was one of their fans." "Worst side I've seen his season at our place, their players can not do the basics like first touch and passing a ball. Truly horrendous side." "The long ball game last night from them was really really bad. It was almost every time. When they tried to pass it, they weren't actually that bad." "A decent side would have kept the ball and ran us ragged. Stoke were utter shit." "Came for a point and got it, playing the same god awful football they have for years. I was shitting bricks that they were gonna nick it when they got those corners towards the end. Thankfully not. Horrible side." "I have never been that good at reading a game but even I saw that SCFC wasn't as good as I thought they would be which took me totally by surprise. They weren't as piercing in their attacks as I thought. They had as much of a problem stringing passes together as we did at times. We easily for me was able to regain possession. And in the first half they had as much of a problem getting chances in as we did. Shocking performance by SCFC I felt." So fucking frustrating. I'm still relatively pissed off about it this morning.
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Post by Dharma Bum on May 7, 2013 10:54:04 GMT
I can understand why some of you are disappointed, but the fact is... we're not actually very good and haven't been all season. Let's not kid ourselves, the two wins (against the league's worst team and the only other team on as bad a run as us) could have easily gone the same way as last night's. I thought we created a few more chances than usual yesterday, but it's daft to expect us to suddenly have become a team who scores at will, when we've been dire all season.
Positives for me:
Adam played well again Shotton looked solid NZonzi had a real decent effort (with his weaker foot?!)
I'm as disappointed as anyone, and I don't feel a win would have been unjustified, but realistically a draw is not a bad result. We need to sort ourselves out over the summer. That means (and it seems daft that I have to say it) good players for positions we have problems with, signed early. No pissing about with old big names, relegated players or fucking centre midfielders. Really don't care if it's Pulis or not, because we have enough good players at the club already, and enough cash to bring others in, but we really cannot afford to fuck around like we have done for the last two seasons.
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Post by PickSCFC on May 7, 2013 11:31:58 GMT
I'm past caring now as that point has sealed safety.
Had it been any other time in the season I'd be pissed off that we surrenderd a 1-0 lead against a shit team with 10 men.
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Post by RickyFullerBeer on May 7, 2013 11:46:44 GMT
And there lies the problem. Shawcross came from the Utd academy, Huth came from Chelsea (not directly), Wilson was a young talent many teams were watching, Adam was wanted by Utd at one point and ended up at Liverpool, NZonzi is very good on the ball, Crouch has played champions league football. All are internationals so why are we so poor in possession. It really can only be the tactics. They players are good enough to play in possession but the manager seems to not trust anyone! I quite enjoy long ball at times, but you can't play it every time. As soon as we get it we look straight for the long ball. It should be the last option. Pulis plays 94th minute tactics for the whole 94 minutes! Really grating on me now
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Post by Deleted on May 7, 2013 12:15:08 GMT
Exactly what gets on my tits. We have the ability to play good, pressing football. Like you, I enjoy long ball at times when it's implemented correctly, but we spend a good proportion of matches just smashing it without any real thought about who's upfront / what support they have / who's around them.
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Post by RickyFullerBeer on May 7, 2013 12:20:13 GMT
Not his biggest fan but Crouch won nigh on every arial ball last night but the understanding between him and Jerome was piss poor. Crouch didn't know where to put it, Jerome didn't know where Crouch was trying to flick it on too.
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Post by Chairman Meow on May 7, 2013 16:01:19 GMT
We either need to be retaining possession and building attacks, or playing direct and fast football.
We do both, but the negatives of both. Slow, direct football.
We show glimpses of doing both well but we need to focus on one or the other, both can be exciting as the other but what we play now is not.
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Post by Rootsreggaepotters on May 7, 2013 16:52:21 GMT
Mixed feelings really. Yeah the point was ace, thanks very much, another step in the right direction up the table. I just thought that it was all set up for us to really dig the sword into the bones. The crowd were at them, everything they touched seemed to turn to shit, man down. All set up for a decent team to go for the jugular and send home the couple of hundred hardy fans with 3 points. Frustrating but nevertheless this is stoke and we just don't do going for the throat in away games. Shame because we could have fucking hammered them and been out of sight.
I'm now accepting the fact that pulis will be here next season, i was wrong a few weeks ago, i wanted him the fuck gone and thought there was no chance we would survive, call it fickle, whatever you want, i call it passion and not being afraid to say what you are thinking. We've had a fine little run and fair play to the gaffer and the players for delivering when it matters. Let's not paper over the cracks, there is shit needs sorting and plenty of it. I just hope pulis will learn some big lessons from this campaign and put them straight for next season otherwise i will have the fear.
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Post by One-Two on May 7, 2013 17:55:09 GMT
Every time N'Zonzi has a long range shot he absolutely nails it, (like West Ham away where it hit the underside of the bar,) but he barely shoots, it's crazy. Probably the best long range "smasher" of the ball we've got and he always seems reluctant to do it.
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Post by Nyron Nonceworthy on May 7, 2013 21:02:39 GMT
He nearly blew someone's shins off when he hit one near the end of yesterday's game too.
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Post by Sonko's Head on May 7, 2013 21:43:58 GMT
He always chipped in with 3 or 4 a season at Blackburn, but the way he's played here pretty much kills his chances.
Whelan was well known at Sheffield Weds as a goalscoring centre midfielder & he's scored fuck all for us.
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Post by The Funkasaurus on May 7, 2013 21:56:35 GMT
Craig Gardner has issued an apology to Charlie Adam after his horrendous tackle on the Stoke City midfielder. Gardner, 26, used social media website Twitter to issue his apology to the Scotland international. The tackle saw Birmingham born Gardner receive a straight red card halfway through the first half of Stoke and Sunderland`s 1-1 draw at the Stadium of Light on Monday night (6th May 2013). The Sunderland midfielder, who uses the twitter alias CraigGard8 on Twitter, tweeted: "Just want to apologise to all the fans and Charlie Adam for my tackle and of course the players they were outstanding #gutted #sorry safc" Charlie Adam replied through the site directly to Gardner and tweeted: "Don't worry about it these things happen in a game. All the best for rest of the season." Gardner will now miss the rest of the season through suspension. Read more: www.stoke.vitalfootball.co.uk/article.asp?a=318816&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+StokeCityFootballClubNews+%28Stoke+City+News%29#ixzz2Se8hvVnf
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Post by Uncle Heinrich on May 8, 2013 9:06:24 GMT
He always chipped in with 3 or 4 a season at Blackburn, but the way he's played here pretty much kills his chances. Whelan was well known at Sheffield Weds as a goalscoring centre midfielder & he's scored fuck all for us. Nah Nige, Nzonzi chipped in with 1 or 2 a season at Blackburn (his best tally was 2) and I don't think that he's a million miles away from that here. He's had 6 shots on target here this season, he had 8 for Blackburn last season, 5 the year before that and 7 before that - so he's not doing things too differently here. Also, it'd be fairer to say that Whelan was known as a goalscoring midfielder in the Championship, whilst finding it a tad harder in the Prem. He scored 13 in the Champ for them and 5 in the Prem for us in a very similar number of games - I think that's natural for the step up; Cresswell scored 12 in the Championship for us in 46 games from midfield, I've never played in the Championship and I've scored 3.
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Post by Sonko's Head on May 8, 2013 10:31:22 GMT
He always chipped in with 3 or 4 a season at Blackburn, but the way he's played here pretty much kills his chances. Whelan was well known at Sheffield Weds as a goalscoring centre midfielder & he's scored fuck all for us. Nah Nige, Nzonzi chipped in with 1 or 2 a season at Blackburn (his best tally was 2) and I don't think that he's a million miles away from that here. He's had 6 shots on target here this season, he had 8 for Blackburn last season, 5 the year before that and 7 before that - so he's not doing things too differently here. Also, it'd be fairer to say that Whelan was known as a goalscoring midfielder in the Championship, whilst finding it a tad harder in the Prem. He scored 13 in the Champ for them and 5 in the Prem for us in a very similar number of games - I think that's natural for the step up; Cresswell scored 12 in the Championship for us in 46 games from midfield, I've never played in the Championship and I've scored 3. Genuinelly thought N'Zonzi scored a couple more than that & even when were at The Championship albeit he was only here for a few months before promotion, Whelan never really looked like scoring (I know he did score 1) because he was used in a different way. Only centre midfielder we have who could get double figures for goals is Charlie thats the head & tails of it.
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Post by Ribanjo Fuller on May 8, 2013 12:13:29 GMT
Charlie will only get double figures is he starts taking pens and all free kicks, mental we let Super Jon smash them to the left everytime when we have Adam ;D
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Post by One-Two on May 8, 2013 12:15:10 GMT
The last time we scored a direct free kick must have been that deflected Huth one away at Wigan.
Before that I think it was Marc Wilson against York.
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Post by Uncle Heinrich on May 8, 2013 12:54:39 GMT
The last time we scored a direct free kick must have been that deflected Huth one away at Wigan. Before that I think it was Marc Wilson against York. We've probably only scored about 4 since I started watching Stoke (25 years ago).
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Post by Nyron Nonceworthy on May 8, 2013 12:59:12 GMT
Whelan v Cheltenham Commons v WBA (2004 - deflection)
Literally the only two I can think of.
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Post by Ribanjo Fuller on May 8, 2013 13:16:29 GMT
Higgy vs West Ham and Newcastle ♥
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Post by Nyron Nonceworthy on May 8, 2013 13:19:45 GMT
Not strictly direct free kicks. Weren't they laid off to him?
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