Skashion said:Balotelli is better on the left and Johnson is better on the right. You need to get over it.Johnsonontheleft said:Total nonsense. Your attempt to defend the indefensible is nothing short of laughable.
gio's side step said:samharris said:Not poor at all, some refs would have given yellow for that, but we all know what a shit coward of a ref we had last night,theres no denying he was poor..
The Rooney elbow was a red..not given,
The carragher challenge on nani was a red...not given,
The Rafael challenge(in the same game) was a red...not given.
( please give me your views as to why these above challenges were not given)
So why is my assumption that Balo's red shouldnt have been red a poor point..?? Like i said a different ref would have given yellow..
The Rooney, Carragher, and Rafael have no bearing on whether Balotelli should have been sent off last night, so it's completely illogical to bring them into this discussion. That is for elsewhere. The way I judge it is this. Some tackles are malicious, some are reckless, some are violent, some are mistimed. Equally, some are done with brute force, and some are cowardly. Balotelli is a coward. And last night was malicious, but in a cowardly way. It wasn't the same type of maliciousness as in a player clearly elbowing someone, nor was it reckless in the sense of a player leaving the ground with two feet. But it was, in it's particular context, malicious, because he did leave his foot in, and actually, when you watch the clip, you will see goes beyond just running his studs down the player, he actually at the end, moves his foot forward to put further pressure on Popov's thigh. He knew what he was doing. It was extremely cowardly. Unfortunately, he has fooled some of you lot too.
However, I agree, the referee was very poor overall.
Blue Mooner said:OrigamiNinja said:When? Where?
I keep reading and hearing from other City fans about how talented he is yet I have yet to see it. He scored a good double away at WBA (then got sent off) and he scored a hat trick at home against an awful Villa side, a hat trick that contained 2 pens and a 1 yard tap in. Other than this what has he actually done in a City shirt that has made you go "wow".
I have seen nothing to suggest anything other than him being a myth! He is young and maybe I am being unfair, maybe he will go on to achieve great things in the game but I am sorry at this moment in time I just dont see it.
One thing is for sure any greatness he does achieve none of it will be at City! Why everyone is blindly defending someone who I would hazard a pretty strong guess doesnt want to be at the club is beyond me. If he is here at the start of next season I will be amazed!
Did you see the way he took those penalties? Sheer class.
The finish against Villa, class, created a goal out of nothing when we were struggling against Fulham with a rocket shot, class.
If you'd watched anything on Football Italia you would be as enthused as I am. Balo was getting into the European Champions team at 19 and you don't think he any good !!! Laughable. I think some City fans expect every player to be like Messi beating 3 & 4 players before they think a players any good. I think Balotelli is quality already but he has the potential to get better, but as a finisher, he's not going to dribble past 3 players and score like a Messi or Ronaldo.
The guy is only 20 and he is already showing frightening potential. If you can't see that then literally words fail me.
Berkovic_blue said:Why bother backing the team and players when you can childishly slag everything off
Chicken Kiev said:I have never been a fan of Mancini and never will be. Hopefully last night will prove to be the first nail in his coffin. Next we will be out of the top 4 and then we will loose at Wembley and finish with nothing. I just hope the rumors about him being booted at the end of the season are true. I know some fans love him and would argue we are having the best season for many a year, how ever, when you conciser there is 300 million to choose from it ain't that good!!!
Mancini OUT and take that Idiot Balotelli with you!
No17 said:gio's side step said:The Rooney, Carragher, and Rafael have no bearing on whether Balotelli should have been sent off last night, so it's completely illogical to bring them into this discussion. That is for elsewhere. The way I judge it is this. Some tackles are malicious, some are reckless, some are violent, some are mistimed. Equally, some are done with brute force, and some are cowardly. Balotelli is a coward. And last night was malicious, but in a cowardly way. It wasn't the same type of maliciousness as in a player clearly elbowing someone, nor was it reckless in the sense of a player leaving the ground with two feet. But it was, in it's particular context, malicious, because he did leave his foot in, and actually, when you watch the clip, you will see goes beyond just running his studs down the player, he actually at the end, moves his foot forward to put further pressure on Popov's thigh. He knew what he was doing. It was extremely cowardly. Unfortunately, he has fooled some of you lot too.
However, I agree, the referee was very poor overall.
exactly, because you have to get used to the fact that in the premier league some tackles are allowed, in europe that's a straight red...the ref has done a great job last night by european standards not english premier league standards...you have to understand that...and that was a red...
No17 said:exactly, because you have to get used to the fact that in the premier league some tackles are allowed, in europe that's a straight red...the ref has done a great job last night by european standards not english premier league standards...you have to understand that...and that was a red...