So the inevitable has happened.

Despite being in our best position for years, we have arrived at a crucial stage of the season in a position few of us could have imagined.

Having negotiated a potentially awfull Xmas/New Year and January we now look at THREE games that could make or break our season

After Spurs we have two must win/should win home games against relegation opposition and a home 5th round cup tie in a Competion without some of the major big guns - with the right luck -potentially winable.

Rather than excitement and confidence its back to that bloody fear and dread due to the fact we have allowed ourselves to be forced to play a midfield which I firmly believe would get us relegated if we were forced to play with over a whole season.

Maybe I sound defeatest but young McClen and Acuna were overun on Sunday and are not up to being in the crucial centre of midfiled in any Premiership side never mind one who claims to have title/CL/UEFA pretentions.

Sorry but this situation could and should have been avoide.

We lack any quality cover in this area and have and are over half way through a long season now relying on two players who are simply not good enough - McClen and Acuna.

Add this to the already known situation regarding Dyers' long term absence and the subsequent dangers of relying too heavily on him: Lee being 36 and taking an age to recover from all his last injuries and Bassedas sent out on loan - suggesting a decison was reached a long while ago that he is not up to it.All of these were known in bloody September - no June!

So Speed our only experienced/ quality midfielder and now he's gone.

A crisis waiting to happen and one which IMHO should and could have been avoided.

No money - seemingly not - but with IC Newcastle proudly telling us how uch TV money will role into the Toons coffers over the next two months -some 3.5million thats a small comfort.

Graveson at Everton? Young.Combatative and would be ideal as folly for Dyer and lighten Speeds load. Not a fortune and not necessarily a short term solution.

No Chance it would seem. More intersted in some ailing Spanish second division outfit and chasing contracts in China.

This needs urgent action as if the problem is not addressed we will lose out on the lot.

Guaranteed IMHO.

-- Anonymous, January 29, 2002

Answers

Pete my sentiments exactly. I have been concerned about this possibility for a long while and as usual when things are going well, the inevitable happens.

I am so bloody p*ssed off about this it's untrue!

(My post below is on the same line as yours)

-- Anonymous, January 29, 2002

Spot on Pete. Our only chance of remaining at the top was to stay injury free. Lee, Speed and Dyer all knackered is bloody unlucky but the writing was on the wall weeks ago.

-- Anonymous, January 29, 2002

Another Point

Bolton/Southampton arrive in a 10 days

It would appear that we will go into these games with the same midfielders available as Sunday

Having watched both sides recently, I would not be confident about beating either of these sides with an engine room like we would send out. A crucial area of any side and one which can dictate the performance of the whole side.

Acuna and McClen

Perlease

-- Anonymous, January 29, 2002

My point is to what extent is it luck or incompetent planning

We knew about Dyer

We knew about Lee's age and problems with injury - he was never going to stay fit

We new about Bassedas - the fact he was sent on loan says as much - AND with no replacement seemingly being saught

So it was inevitable that the problem would arise and the performance of the midfielsd on Sunday reflected as much

It was horrible - but as expected from me

-- Anonymous, January 29, 2002

Pete I'm just laughing at your number of posts! You are obviously as furious as me! I'm ranting about it as well! In fact I think we need to set up a self help group.

AAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!

-- Anonymous, January 29, 2002

Its the numberof times this issue has been raised on here which make it laughable.

We could see it - and that was before Bassedas was sent on his Spanish adventure. We suspected he was not up to it. That confirmed it - yet he has not been replaced.

-- Anonymous, January 29, 2002

I know Acuna and McClen aren't the best partnership in the world, but it's against a team who are playing the biggest match of their careers. McClen has played in bigger games under Gullit and Acuna has certainly played in bigger games before, so it is perhaps a little unfair to judge on one performance together.

I know players shoudl always be motivated for every match, but it's always the same against lower league clubs. Patrick Vieira (I think) looked awful against lowly Watford, probably because he wasn't really up for the game.

An idea - what about Bernard as a central midfielder? Robert on the left and Bernard in the middle with Acuna probably. Bernard can tackle, he is pretty quick and his distribution is pretty good as well. Why not play him in the middle?

-- Anonymous, January 29, 2002

The same though crossed my mind Paul. Given the choices I'd like to see Bernard in CM. If not him then what about O'Brien with Distin / Dabs behind? BTW is Dyer definitely out?

-- Anonymous, January 29, 2002

Or as Clarky pointed out on another thread, Dabs in M/F? Basically anyone but McClen, just because it's a bit too early for him. You never know - Bobby might pick him and he plays a match winning game. :o))

-- Anonymous, January 29, 2002

I'd put O'Brien ahead of Dabizas as a midfielder. He is more comfortable on the ball and less likely to make an @rse of himself. However, Bernard would be ahead of both of them IMHO.

-- Anonymous, January 29, 2002

But has Bernard played in central MF before? The thought of him playing there has crossed my mind, but I really worry about whether he's too inexperienced. Would he really be any better than Acuna or McClen in that role?

-- Anonymous, January 29, 2002

I agree with you Pete in every word you say. There is still one thing we can do, we can fight like never before out on the pitch and you in the audince can cheer and scream more then ever. No way we will go down without a hell of a fight!

-- Anonymous, January 29, 2002

No, no, no. We can not put Dabs or O'Brien in midfield. They would continually lose the ball and we'd be under severe pressure. YBR will work a solution.

-- Anonymous, January 29, 2002

Couldn't agree more. Everytime someone asks me how I think the league will finish I tell them that of the top 5 we're the most likely to miss out on a CL place because our squad is by far the thinnest and sooner or later we're bound to pick up some injuries. It's so short-sighted, just a few million spent would give us a real shot at the 10 million pound champions league spot. Not spending it is tantamount to conceding defeat to the other 4 - which means that next year we'll have even less money than them next year.

-- Anonymous, January 29, 2002

Simple solution is just to ATTACK....it might not work but it's got to be better than patching things up in the hope they'll work....i'd settle on a all out attack team and take the game to them from the kick off, see if we can unsettle and break them.....

If it doesn't work then at least we tried...

-- Anonymous, January 30, 2002

I hope he's not tempted to play a narrow three in midfield, eg Solano, Acuna, Robert to shore things up. On the other hand, how often do we get genuinely wide anyway? Who knows, as one or two have suggested, Acuna and McClen might have great games - and the reality is, as long as they don't have shit games they'll be doing as well as Speed/Lee have for most of the season.

-- Anonymous, January 30, 2002