Posts: 13,163
Threads: 4,453
Joined: Jun 2012
Monday 25th November 20.00 (UK time)
From what I can see on social media, most fans are expecting us to win this game comfortably.....
Me? I've been around United long enough to know that such thinking can often come a right cropper!
Still, what could possibly go wrong??
Posts: 1,445
Threads: 21
Joined: Jul 2012
Playing well, scoring goals, looking confident, home game under the lights against a team who are struggling and a manager about to lose his job, this is what football is all about!
... only we have supported this club long enough to know there is likely a red card in the first 10 minutes and trying to salvage a point in our immediate future!
Jokes aside, we obviously look forward to watching the team every game, but if there is such a game you can feel confident about in advance and enjoy just that bit more in the build up, it is this one. I just can't see us not winning this one.
3-0.
Posts: 13,163
Threads: 4,453
Joined: Jun 2012
Posts: 1,445
Threads: 21
Joined: Jul 2012
Kelly gets his time to shine and then defends the set piece like that. Absolute garbage.
We haven't played badly, but the intensity has been in waves, and our quality in the box has been awful. Plenty of time to turn this around but the longer it stays like this, the more they will waste time and stay on the ground.
Worst thing to happen was going a goal down against this lot, they are happy to defend deep and we struggle to break teams down. There have been plenty of opportunities to cut in off both flanks, which makes this ideal for Barnes at some stage. Need an early goal in the 2nd half as their confidence will crumble.
Posts: 1,318
Threads: 31
Joined: Jun 2012
Looking forward to some substitutions around 60 minutes by which time West Ham will have settled for protecting their lead. Basically, this is going to pan-out exactly like the Brighton game and we're going to lose. Unless Eddie Howe has a Damascene moment and changes our approach before it's too late. Not going to hold my breath though.
Posts: 1,445
Threads: 21
Joined: Jul 2012
I know we have had worse overall, but I would say that 2nd half performance is the worst we have had at home under Howe. Taking quality out of the equation, that was a frightening demonstration of just how mentally fragile this squad is. You go 2-0 down at home, you come out firing, you go all out, fired up, flying into challenges, you put it all on the line. Instead, we got insipid, embarassing, completely unacceptable shrinking performances from a bunch of players who looked like they couldn't have given a fucking shit. The subs came on and did exactly the same, you could be forgiven tonight for thinking the manager the players wanted out wasn't Lopetegui, but actually Howe. On the performance side you could spend paragraphs picking individuals and the collect effort apart, but the standout for me was just how disorganised the defence looked, again, arguably the most disjointed a back 4 we have fielded has looked in a long time, supported by a midfield towing caravans, a far cry from the previous two league games where we looked liked we were getting back to our intense best.
I didn't see a loss coming, but losses can happen, what I didn't see coming even more, was a performance akin to any Mike Ashley area NUFC team, where every player is just shot for confidence and low on quality, combined with looking like they couldn't care whether we won 2-0 or lost 4-0.
Add in injuries (to whatever extent) to Willock and Bruno and tonight is about as bad as it could have gone, typical of the old NUFC, just when you think a corner has been turned, you get hit with something you didn't predict.
The "mentality monsters" of 2 years a go looked like mentality midgets tonight, fucking shameful.
![[Image: IMG-3722.jpg]](https://i.ibb.co/5cR996k/IMG-3722.jpg)
