City v Northampton Sept 7th

Having just read their manager's comments about this match it sounds as if they are hoping to win the toss, make City play to the Kop in the first half and frustrate the crowd.

 

Is Cooke injured ?

 

Do you have your "Bowyer out" placard already made up?

 

I'd swap Cooke for Devine. Agree with the rest of it

 

In my head, a midfield of Palmer and Cooke sounds absolutely weak sauce.

Isn't Cooke 5'7 and similar I'm style to Palmer?

 

You're right but what's the alternative in a 2 man midfield? Akpan is weak as piss and devine is also lightweight and not good enough.

 

I'd stick with Devine and try Cooke since Palmer has been very disappointing.

Probably going to get Akpan and Palmer though.

 

I think that's what he'll go with. However for me devine is nowhere near good enough, we may as well play with cooke and palmer.

 

The fact that it’s almost impossible to definitively name two players out of nearly thirty on the books to play together in midfield speaks volumes. This is where matches are won and lost. I’m afraid Akpan will play because he has to: there’s no one else for that sort of holding role unless you want to do what Jack Charlton always advocated and play a centre half in midfield. Somebody somewhere must have a huge blind spot.

 

It's my first game of the season on Satdi, so things should start improving I think;-)

 

Er, why is that?

 

Erm just because.... Reckon they'll put in a rip roaring performance knowing I'm present.. You just see!

 

You do realise that Danny Devine is Shi&te don't you?

Problem with Devine is he doesn't do much in the centre of the park. He is pointless. He's slow, doesn't shoot, never scores, too relaxed on the ball, doesn't have a great range of passing and just plays safe balls. Devine is a no no from me.

Palmer has been disappointing so far. He needs to up his game.

If we going with 2 centre midfielders then Palmer and Cooke/Akpan maybe.

If going with 3 the Akpan has to play.

 

GB will have had sleepless nights this week worrying about the mighty Northampton coming to town and how we are gonna have to defend against their potent strike force......

 

Sounding like it’s 3-5-2 now as his preferred formation according to Parker in t&a

 

He will change formation because of them.

Never seen a manager so scared.

He acts like its little old Bradford who have little support.

 

Devine isn't worse than Akpan, he's better.

 

After Tuesday I'd maybe give Pritchard a go in the middle. We've got poor options anyway and this lad is a 6 footer with a good workrate and looked like he likes to put his foot in.

Not sure if he's played there before but I don't see many other obvious choices to play alongside Palmer.

 

The bar for both though, doesn't leave terra firma

 

He's not though.

Akpan is a defensive midfielder and really if all eyes are on him it's because the midfielders and attacking are putting far too much pressure on the DM.

We're not controlling games hence why people look at Akpan.

Akpan as a DM hasn't been great but Devine is woeful mate. Him and Anderson are not good enough and Palmer has been a let down.

Akpan is an easy target without thinking about the game.