Nothing of interest; just mindless links to bikes Birmingham City Football Club and useless junk

Blogs I read
Titch
Fat Buddha
Nick's Rants
El Mayor
Archives

 


Player Ratings

Taylor - mixed performance - 6
Clapham - should have been rested - 6
Upson - first goal for Blues made up for earlier error - 7
Cunningham - rare glimpses of his previous self - 6
Melchiot - gaining in confidence - 7
Gronks - showed aggression and tenacity but final ball is sometimes lacking - 7
Dunn - boy have we missed this bloke - 9
Savage - played some nice football - 7
Izzet - looked sharp and linked well with Dunn - 7
DJ - got into good space but failed to use it - 6
Heskey - injured after 5 minutes

Yorke - Well taken goal and good play with Dunn - 8
Clemence - added little - 6
Gray - on for all of 5 seconds

Emile Heskey was taken off due to an ankle injury. An injury he had before the game started. So what did Bruce do? He not only stuck him on the pitch he used him as the only striker. Baffling.

The silver lining from Heskey's early bath was the player Bluenoses feel uneasy about supporting - Dwight Yorke. Ex-villa and another Sourness reject, Yorke and Dunn ran the show up front. Newcastle looked rattled each time Dunn had the ball - and rightly so. Dunn, if fit, will be Blues' best player of the season. No question. Despite his bulky appearance, the lad is light on his feet, quick footed and quick thinking and a danger going forward. His foresight is second to none at St Andrews and with a seasoned pro like Yorke ahead of him the goals we've lacked might finally arrive.

Both Dunn and Yorke were slagged off by Sourness for living the high life. So what? What would most single blokes earning more in a week than most in a year do? So long as they train as hard as the rest of the team and put in 100% when Saturday comes (or whichever time off time Sky kindly allows us to play footie) then let them get on with it.

Bruce has to start thinking ahead. Our 4-5-1 formation showed our intent and Newcastle soon pulled it apart. We've got an established partnership in Gronkjaer and Melchiot being ripped up just so Damien Johnson can start. Bollocks to that. When Izzet was injured Bruce could have switched Gronks over to the right, stuck DJ in the middle and placed Gray on the left. The Newcastle defence has more holes in it than Internet Explorer and with Gronks, Gray and Dunn all pushing up, there would have been plenty of food at the table for Yorke to feast on.

And don't play just one up front. Certainly not at home.


posted by kwacky at 9:03 am