'I bet they wish they had a Delap now'

[PSmyth07]

They'll be down in a year or 2....Delap will be retiring soon.

I couldn't believe it in the first half, when City were all over them, they changed their tactics to, "Kick as many City players as possible".

Vile team.

 

[the god Gerry Gow]

Tell u what i hate about joke. Your f*****g hypocrite of a manager. He has winged and winged and winged about other teams players yet in Fuller you have a dirtiest, snidiest,most winging mard arse in world football. He will kick out at some one off the ball then go down writhing in agony cos he has broken a finger nail.

 

[Franny Lee's Barrel Chest]

I think we should stop being bitter and get on with it. Fact is, despite the criticism of Stoke's way of playing, we've had 3 recent goes at them, and failed to beat them once. Of course they're one dimensional, but they play to their strengths and it works. There's absolutely no problem with that whatsoever. We have some fantastic players on paper, but sadly, no heart, but for one or two. Now if we can't beat Stoke City, then we should be looking at why, and not whinging about their style of play. It's up to City to suss it out and deal with it. And if we're not going to deal with their set plays, then we need to expose any weaknesses in their defence, and just score more than them. Unfortunately, if we set up just to try and deal with their way of playing, instead of taking the game to them and not worrying about them, then there's only going to be one result.

It's no good crying about their players falling about or whatever, because we do that too. And it's called gamesmanship, something which every team does, not just Stoke.

Bottom line is that it's our own frailties that meant we couldn't beat them in 3 attempts. It's up to Mancini et al to deal with it. And if he can't then he'll be out of a job in the summer.

 

[GOULDYBOBS]

So what is it that you really hate about Stoke? All the money you've spent gives you automatic wins against 'a horrible dirty shite football team'. Think you'll find 'arrogance ' has more to do with your 'kin attitude than Stoke's. We've got a committed manager, team, chairman and supporters all up against twats like you who think your new found wealth brings automatic success. You'll struggle for top 4, arsehole.

Where to start? Your big tactic's a throw-in and your 12th man is a towel. Your secondary tactic's lumping the ball up-front. Effective yes, but not exactly football. Your players go down like they've been shot by a sniper in the crowd as soon as anyone looks at them and your manager dresses like a wino. Oh, and your fans are all six-fingered banjo players. Other than that, nothing else really.

Spot on!

 

[terryphelan]

Fair play to Stoke they thoroughly deserved to win and showed more guts than us.

It's not pretty football but it's effective,

As opposed to our football which is not pretty and ineffective

 

[Matty]

Stoke will go down sooner rather than later, Delap will be 34 in the Summer, he won't be playing for them much longer and without his ridiculous throwing they don't actually have any attacking abilities.

 

[terryphelan]

Stoke will go down sooner rather than later, Delap will be 34 in the Summer, he won't be playing for them much longer and without his ridiculous throwing they don't actually have any attacking abilities.

why are you slagging a team who have just dumped us out of the cup?

 

[Matty]

Stoke will go down sooner rather than later, Delap will be 34 in the Summer, he won't be playing for them much longer and without his ridiculous throwing they don't actually have any attacking abilities.

why are you slagging a team who have just dumped us out of the cup?

Firstly because of the reason mentioned in your question.

Secondly because, despite the fact they (eventually) managed to beat us, at the fourth time of asking this season, with an additional 30 minutes, and a man advantage, they still play the dullest, most one-dimensional football in the division. Effective or not, lobbing the ball 40 yards into the box from throw-ins, is monumentally shite. Take Delap out of their side, like he was for Stoke's ineffective first 60 minutes at COMS in the cup, and they haven't got a clue, put him in the side and it's "load the area and chuck it in there". Delap has a season, maybe two at a push, left. After that Stoke will actually have to work out why the word "foot" is included in the sports name.

 

[MysticalDescent]

Ho-hum.

Man City's tactics were to clog the midfield with as many men as possible at every moment. They had no intention of playing the game and spent the entire time smacking it long to Adebayor or Santa Cruz, as you did the week before. If you weren't doing that, you were tippy-tappying it on the halfway line. Stoke were the only team out there that actually looked like they wanted to attack and win the game.

Let's look at the goals. First goal was a beauty, a purposeful passing move from the back, a well manoeuvred one-two and a superb finish. Your goal was a free-kick that shouldn't have been that led to a hopeful punt into the box. Adebayor won the header on the far post to get it to the poorly marked Bellamy. The second, a long throw. Rather than calling Delap scummy, you should probably try and work out why Shay Given thought it would be better to try and jump through two of his own defenders than to stay on his line. The third goal, a fine combination of our combativeness and skill. Whelan putting in a good firm tackle, powering through your half and then Tuncay waltzing around your defence.

The best player on the pitch? Fuller, by a mile. Tuncay, Whelan and Whitehead were pretty close behind. The only player you had who looked worth the money was Kompany. I presume you still have somebody from Mark Hughes' coaching staff somewhere, because somebody had finally realised how right Mark Hughes was when he put Kompany in midfield to man-mark Sidibe and cut off our get out ball.

Bad luck, but no need for all the sour grapes.

 

[01782]

...Is this the Stoke that had a average attendance of 17,000 before getting in the Premiership.

Claims about attendance levels always make me laugh. It's all about relative support compared to size of City. Approx 2.5 million live in greater manchester. 360,000 live in the city of stoke and borough of newcastle. that makes Manchester nearly 7 times bigger. If we can attract 17000, you should be able to get 118,000 in... mmm.. and with the 27500 that turn up at the Britannia for every home game these days, you would need to be getting 190,000 in every week.

I'm quite willing to concede that Munchester is a bigger city than Stoke, but more committed fans? don't make me laugh!!