R18 vs Newcastle | Sun 22nd Feb | 5:00pm | Bellevue Gardens Hotel

Edit: not the injury. Poor guy, but the football change.

I see where I went wrong :-)

Inverted wingers?

This is the 21st century

Will Siggie be in a Hannibal Lecter mask?

Is Krishna left footed?

Ready-made -

I get that, but its not his preferred position.

Nice to see some sensible management of Louis' head injury (am assuming thats what it was) after the incident and for this weekend too.   He's in the wars that boy...

Why is that? Boxall is good coming on for 20 mins every now and then, but he isn't a full-back. He doesn't get behind defences, and he is easily outpaced. Fenton is a big loss, which most people likely wont recognise until after the game.

From last season:

Merrick said Boxall was the fastest in the squad over 20m

http://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/football/9575274/Michael-Boxall-to-replace-injured-Fenton-at-back

Must....resist....

I think Fenton struggles more with quicker players than Boxall has ever done. Boxall is deceptive because he never looks like he's at full pace.

Previously when Fenton has been out Manny has attacked on the left, so I assume that's what we'll see this week. Whether it's a loss depends more on our front players finishing their chances.

Referee: Kris Griffiths-Jones

Fastest in the team, likely strongest in the team, yet can't get a centre half spot over Sigmund and Durante. Boxall in my mind given time would make a better centre half than either of them. You all have a go at him when he has a poor game there (which he's had what 3 over 3 seasons?) yet for Durante and Sigmund to conced a league high 100 goals over the last two seasons gets next to no hate. Don't get it. He's younger too, so will last longer. They both get caught out for being poor in the air and too slow so...

Also heard Merrick has been quoted as saying he might add some bite to the midfield by replacing Rodriguez with lia, because of the way opposition teams are being a bit physical. Lia doesn't do anything except make the one bad challenge and give the ball away half a dozen times. If I was the opposition manager and knew that, I'd be telling my boys to get in there, I'd say it's a win if we get lia on. He's a weak point in the side and other teams know it.

Djinksta wrote:

Lia doesn't do anything except make the one bad challenge and give the ball away half a dozen times. If I was the opposition manager and knew that, I'd be telling my boys to get in there, I'd say it's a win if we get lia on. He's a weak point in the side and other teams know it.

Have you got any stats to back this up? I suspect you'll find that most players give the ball away at least a half dozen times in a match, you just remember the times that Lia has done it more because you're looking out for them.

Also, he's got the same number of yellow cards (2) as Riera and Dura, and fewer  Yellow cards than Siggy, Fenton, Muscat, Rodriguez and Bonevacia. Yet is is Lia who is prone to making bad tackles?

think Lia has been a lot better this last season or so. Justifiably earning starts ahead of some of other other quality midfielders at times. 

Designated Scapegoat

Stop trolling with yr "Scapegoat" shark....

"Scapeshark" maybe??

Sharkgoat?

http://www.radiolivesport.co.nz/Ernie-Merrick/tabid/454/articleID/22501/Default.aspx

Because you would find that Lia does it on a regular basis. Yes he can pull out some great passes but when he screws up, he tends to really fudge up.

Enough of the Lia love. Not convinced Alex has played that badly he deserves to dropped to give Lia spot. The last game Lia played was a shocker that you would have to admit and Alex hasn't played that badly since coming in.

Lia has been directly responsible for at least 2 goals this season.

Riera might give the ball away but without him we'd be stuffed. He covers for both centre backs and the amount of ground he covers is massive. How about we try vinnie instead of Albert then? What happened last season?

Thumped three to four times. Lia is a liability and none of you seem to understand that.

Also, why didn't Merricks make any subs in the melb City game? I totally didn't get that :/

All Rodriguez needs to do is get some confidence, he looked good against Melbourne I reckon. Much more composed on the ball, not afraid to dribble into space.

I thought A-Rod played quite well last game, especially considering he hasn't had consistent game time. I thought he made a few stray passes, though, that could've cost goals (remember one bad backpass which resulted in a Siggy Spray)

I do think he has far more potential to become better than Lia does if he gets consistent game time, and at the moment I'd put A-Rod above Lia most of the time.

I don't think Lia is the cause of all ills, but I do think he's not good enough to be starting for us most games.

so he has pictures of Ernie with a sheep to go with the pictures he had of Ricki with the Goat then? Only explanation I can think of

Boxall to score from a set piece header.

Boxall scoring paying $12 on CentreBet - decent odds, TAB don't offer goal scorer option.

Set piece?  Score?  Bahahaha

Saying every decision Ernie makes is correct is silly; even he wouldn't say that. He took Vinnie off at half time quite recently..

Anything's possible - even Vince Lia scores one every hundred games

Mossy to score the winner!

Well, correct me but I meant no enforced subs. Fenton would never have stayed on. The problem was we were not making proper chances at all. You could tell the game was beginning to drift. City defended deep and got physical when they needed to. I think he should have made some subs to try something different, but when one of your best young talents can't make the squad...

Also, we should not sign Griffiths. He's passed it.

Not clear cut chances. I'd think that substitutes may have given us a chance or two, as we were beginning to tire.

I said one of our best young talents. But then again he's up there anyway. Yes, I mean Boyd. What does he have to bluddy do?

erm we created plenty of clear cut chances