This post probably isn't worth the flaming it will get but fuck it, maybe some of you can have a reasonable discussion about it rather than getting on the ultra defensive and calling me a rag :p
Don't care about that crap about winning the league ugly, I wanted to see something that would give me some confidence going into the Spurs game off the back of what has been our worst part of the season. I didn't see it. I saw another useless Nasri, a still tired Silva (though it was a superb set piece and still managed a through ball for Aguero that he arguably should have done more with), some good chances created and not finished. One set piece goal separated the top of the league with the bottom. When we played them earlier in the season we created some lovely chances that Aguero finished with clinical precision. Tonight we needed a wonder header from Dzeko (superb to see him back on the score sheet again) to clinch it. Needed Hart to keep us in it AGAIN! How many good chances are we going to give teams?
Let no-one ever question how important Yaya is to us. Milner, god love him, was dead on his feet. We really needed that composure Yaya brings to the middle. And god damn even if Lescott did start the season better than Kompany, I'm now completely convinced it was only due to some weird effect of Kompany having to do more work than one man should. You could crash Bluemoon waxing lyrical about how important that man is to our team. Thankfully as people have said it's one more game without him and a vital 3 points.
Pluses: Savic looked a lot better. Far less rash. Still a bit iffy with some of his positioning but far more confident. Could probably make more of those bursting runs out to release the ball because unless Yaya is there it seems difficult to move it forward. Dzeko looked well up for it, made a much better outlet and some good turns showing lots of strength to hold people off. Great partner for Aguero, and crucial to get him in the goals again at this stage of the season. Hart once again (almost doesn't need mentioning now, the guy is just, well, insane). And despite the scoreline we did actually make a few good chances. We're still umming and arring about finishing them but it's better to see no chances created at all. Oh and that Aguero dribble, was wishing that one to go in just so you could watch it on the highlight reel over and over and over again, but sometimes that boy just needs to use his ion cannon foot and fucking hoof it. It basically won us the Liverpool game.
We really need to tighten it up. Still hoofing forward too much, still too many headed clearances to opposing players, still getting caught up field and giving away chances.
People will think I'm just moaning, but if you can't spot the deficiencies when you're winning you'll have no idea what to do when the results suddenly don't go your way. I wish I could be more upbeat about it, but we're still lacking all the possession and crispness of passing that was decimating teams at the beginning of the season. We had some awesome awesome interchanges at the beginning of the match that didn't come to anything but you could look past it being the start of the match. We needed 3 points tonight, but we also needed confidence going into playing Tottenham on Saturday. If anyone can honestly say they feel better about it after that I'l be amazed. How do we still have so many tired legs? I know even the best teams don't play at 100% for the entire season and we have some crucial people missing, but it was Wigan FFS. Sometimes you just need to go out and give someone a good whipping to get everyone back on track.
