Bobbins said:
Fuck me this thread is tedious, Joe got dropped because he was playing shite and needed a wake up call, MP called on Pants as the clubs No2 keeper to fill as long as he deemed it necessary and to take some of the press heat off Joe !! Why do people have a hard time understanding that ?? It doesn't matter if Joe is historically a better keeper in his current form he has been shit and shipping vital points. What was Mp supposed to do? leave Joe in until we were out of the title race and then rest him ??
Very straightforward then but I wonder if Joe finds his situation tedious and, as others have pointed out, if this " wake up call" treatment would also apply to Yaya being replaced by Garcia after an indifferent spell of form or Kompany with Boyata or Silva with Milner. What Manuel should have 'deemed necessary' was to back his best player to come good and refrain from drivel about him needing a rest because he's been first choice for a long time. Did they ask Trautmann or Banks or Jennings or Schmeichel etc if they found being picked as number one long term rather wearing and whether they needed replacing with an inferior player to improve their performance?
This was definitely not an easy decision for the club and I appreciate the argument about the wider responsibilities of the management to give reserves a meaningful chance when the first choice is underperforming. The key test as to whether dropping an established player is correct is whether the team will be improved specifically as a result of his replacement with someone else.
