Match Day Thread Vs Genk (A)

What's your preferred midfield trio?

 

Just waiting for Jimmy's rant about "Lovrens"

 

I am sorry I find this a rather superficial view of stereotyping. No sensible individual or group would like to be stereotyped. I know many black men find it distasteful that they are stereotyped that way. When they have other skills, such as for example playing football. In the same way, some female nationalities or racial group might take exception to be stereotyped according to their breast size for example.

The club quite rightly condemned the banner and promised to punish the perpetrators. As I said in another thread our clubs history on racial issues is not exactly glorious.

 

Oh the banner was inappropriate and needed to be removed, no doubt.

I'm just curious how many people really found it "racist" though.

 

I can't speak for other people. I definitely found it perpetuated a racial stereotype therefore racist and rather offensive to both player and black people. I can't honestly understand why our fans would think this was an appropriate banner for one of our own players.

I would definitely in favour of a severe punishment for the perpetrators if only to show that the club cannot accept this kind of stuff from our supporters.

 

As Ox gets better and better after that horrific injury (career-ending, 20 years ago), I'd say Fab, Ox + A.N Other from Keita, Windy, Milner and Hendo. I'd like to see Trent and Jo Go given chances too if we progress in the League Cup. Would love to see Jo Go at the base of a diamond in a midfield four, and Trent's future is in midfield, imo.

 

Oh, and Grujic back in Jan too, and Shaq as a no 10 if he gets over his latest injury

 

Well. That was a lovely performance in the end.

Whilst we weren’t that great defensively, it’s worth mentioning the following:

- the midfield have hardly played together so it was natural for it to look a little imbalanced. But in the second half, it certainly clicked. The more mins they get, the better it will be. At least from an individual perspective, all 3 were excellent and I’m sure the collective will continue to improve.

- the defence had Milner and lovren. This definitely wouldn’t have helped

- genk’s style was to play it long and bypass our midfield. It looked like it worked but most of these were offside but never called because of VAR.

Now with that said, let’s look at the sexy midfield. Keita was the controller. Everything went through him - 100 completed passes and most of them were going forward. That’s the key - he was always looking to give and go but also isn’t afraid to delay the pass in order find the right option. Neither Hendo or Gini would have played that pass into Firmino for Ox’s second goal. And it’s the little things like this is why he will prove to be an integral part. He didn’t do anything spectacular - he took risks and made it look simple but it was effective. It wasn’t just passing the for sake of it or boost stats. And he puts in a shift - won the ball back 12 times which was the highest in the match.

Ox was really good and provides us with that injection of pace, acceleration, the explosiveness from midfield. The ability to dribble and beat a player to create space. But he also brings a goal threat. Which is massive when we can’t rely on the full backs to provide creativity.

I don’t need to say anything about Fabinho because I think we all now appreciate how good he is.

 

Missed that match while working away. I’ll have to watch the recording at the weekend. How did we play? I see we coughed up our usual goal....that really annoys me - VvD, Robbo and TAA are way down on fantasy football team points!!!

 

It made the news...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/50159587

 

As a black man I see no harm in the context of the banner but I understand why it came across as 'racial stereotyping'. We live in a world where anything and everything offends anyone.

I only took offense though with Mane for not finishing that sublime assist by Bobby. Absolutely Filthy!!!!

 

I agree, it was a superb moment from Bobby.

 

Happy to agree, Jimmy. The more time that midfield three gets together, the better they'll get. All four goals were quality, especially the 'team' goal. Salah even scored with his right foot

 

Not as much as it annoyed Alisson

 

Firminho was the orchestrator

 

i see you are very happy to have popped your cherry .

 

nice goals but honestly thought that for most of the match we were pretty average last night . Nice to see AOC & Keita get some minutes (lets just hope Keita can stay fit for more than 3 weeks ) however it left us very vulnerable and that was against the might of Genk. The defence still looks wobbly as it has all season.
However since we're top of league , won away in group stages of CL and won a LC cup tie it seems a bit churlish to be moaning .

 

Also worth noting that we conceded 2 against Napoli and 3 against Salzburg when using our ‘solid’ midfield.

furthermore - we finally won an away match in the CL. Not a coincidence ...

 

They were no ordinary goals, they were M&S goals .....

 

it was only Genk