Bolton Wanderers vs Tottingham Hotspur

[Lord Kangana]

Was there today, thought we played quite well second half, were unlucky not to get a draw, Cahills cock-up cost us at the end but it was spurs away and we're still 8th. No reason we cant be Everton next Sunday.

P.S Sturridge looks to be a great signing.

we never beat everton...

I think it was more a philosophical question.

[keveh]

So nothing in MOTD about the red card?

[General Mannerheim]

eh?

im in the 'drop him' camp, but the folk blaming Jussi for their winner need to give their heads a shake.

[KeeeeeeeBaaaaaaab]

So nothing in MOTD about the red card?

Or the third penalty/lino doing his job after ref was determined to gift them another one? After evidence that Mark Davies didn't touch Jenas, no highlighting it to viewers?

And "we'll be pulling back every penalty if we're pulling back this one"? No we won't, Harry. Gary. Alan. It was the only thing that Elton John haired ringpiece got right all fecking game. It's encroachment.

[TANGODANCER]

Football's comedien apparent couldn't get off the Cahill penalty topic and onto Spurs goal quickly enough. Nowt new there then.

[aussie_wanderer]

mark davies was good, set up the goal, and does great runs with the ball around the penalty box.im not sure about knight last few games, we shoulda won 2 : 1 clear penalty. clear redcard aswell on chungy. without refs fukin us over we coulda been atleast 6 points better on table

[Prufrock]

Yes Clattenberg is a tw*t and yes with better decisions given the way its gone who knows?

But lets face it, overall the scoreline still flatters us.

Spurs could have won by a far wider margin had they taken their chances.

We're still in danger of getting sucked into a distant relegation battle and I think the brave few going to away games will decline still more if we carry on playing such an open system with the unbalanced midfield we're playing currently.

M Davies and Holden is a no no for me. Trouble is we don't have many alternatives.

I still see a rather grim and relatively unpleasant second half to the season. I'm struggling to remember the last time we've actually played well!

You're a miserable fecker!

Last time we played well was today. Well worthy of a point. Their two pens, not much Davo could do about the first one, and despite all the so called directives about deliberate handball and hand to ball, they're always pens, the second one originally I thought was stonewall, but seen again looks like Ricketts gets a bit of the ball. Even that I can forgive the cnut giving, but he was ready AGAIN to give them everything. We should have had a stonewall penalty at 1-1 to go 2-1 up, and Jenas should have gone for the most dangerous (the word used in the laws) tackle you will see all year. The shithouse fecked us. Again. Then to go to sleep with a poor decision from Cahill, and a poor effort from the otherwise outstanding Jussi (got hands to it) and its gutting. However, first time in months I've been a proud wanderer. Fully deserved a point. We are not going down.

As an aside, anybody got a gif or footage of the Jenas tackle MOTD declined to show. Want to show my spurs supporting mate how bad it was. He'd heard on SSN it's shouldve been a (three) red(s).

[Prufrock]

So nothing in MOTD about the red card?

Or the third penalty/lino doing his job after ref was determined to gift them another one? After evidence that Mark Davies didn't touch Jenas, no highlighting it to viewers?

And "we'll be pulling back every penalty if we're pulling back this one"? No we won't, Harry. Gary. Alan. It was the only thing that Elton John haired ringpiece got right all fecking game. It's encroachment.

Eh be fair there were only twatting four of them encroaching. Twitchy is a grade a c*nt. Clattenburg is in his own league.

[Choppers]

I really think Clattenburg shouldn't be allowed to ref Bolton games.

I don't know *what* we've done, but he is the only ref I would honestly say that I see a bias against us.

Not saying we should have won today, not saying anything about the final score tbh, just that we didn't get a fair crack of the whip.

[scotty]

Yes Clattenberg is a tw*t and yes with better decisions given the way its gone who knows?

But lets face it, overall the scoreline still flatters us.

Spurs could have won by a far wider margin had they taken their chances.

We're still in danger of getting sucked into a distant relegation battle and I think the brave few going to away games will decline still more if we carry on playing such an open system with the unbalanced midfield we're playing currently.

M Davies and Holden is a no no for me. Trouble is we don't have many alternatives.

I still see a rather grim and relatively unpleasant second half to the season. I'm struggling to remember the last time we've actually played well!

Im glad its not just me who thinks we play far too open away from home. There were times today when you could drive a bus though the centre of our midfield & it happens most games. Teams like spurs will undoubtedly punish you but even sides like wigan & west brom will & its no wonder we dont keep clean sheets & hence our away form is so poor.

I dont think anyone wants a return to the megson days with 11 men behind the ball & 3 defensive midfielders on the pitch but there has to be a happy medium somewhere. If we could tighten up a bit and not concede as many then im sure our away form would improve. Whether thats possible with the midfielders we have at the club im becoming less and less sure about. As much as i love mark davies & stuart holden, i dont see that they can play as a midfield 2 without leaving our flimsy defence exposed.

I cant see us being dragged into a relegation battle at this stage as we have 33 points already.

On the whole, I thought we were much improved against spurs and a lot more fluent, and with sturridge we have an additional goal threat. Will be an interesting last few months of the season.

[truewhite15]

Yes Clattenberg is a tw*t and yes with better decisions given the way its gone who knows?

But lets face it, overall the scoreline still flatters us.

Spurs could have won by a far wider margin had they taken their chances.

We're still in danger of getting sucked into a distant relegation battle and I think the brave few going to away games will decline still more if we carry on playing such an open system with the unbalanced midfield we're playing currently.

M Davies and Holden is a no no for me. Trouble is we don't have many alternatives.

I still see a rather grim and relatively unpleasant second half to the season. I'm struggling to remember the last time we've actually played well!

What a load of pessimistic, miserable bull. That "open" midfield was doing enough to give us, without a cheating ref, a very real chance of winning. And keep bleating on about "if Spurs had taken their chances" all you like, the fact is they didn't, and that's football. We had chances other than Sturridge's goal to score as well, but I notice you choose to ignore that.

[truewhite15]

Was there today, thought we played quite well second half, were unlucky not to get a draw, Cahills cock-up cost us at the end but it was spurs away and we're still 8th. No reason we cant be Everton next Sunday.

P.S Sturridge looks to be a great signing.

we never beat everton...

Except at the Bok last season?

[Tombwfc]

I think we played quite well, and endlessly chopping and changing will get us nowhere.

Same team against Everton please.

[Wandering Willy]

Yes Clattenberg is a tw*t and yes with better decisions given the way its gone who knows?

But lets face it, overall the scoreline still flatters us.

Spurs could have won by a far wider margin had they taken their chances.

We're still in danger of getting sucked into a distant relegation battle and I think the brave few going to away games will decline still more if we carry on playing such an open system with the unbalanced midfield we're playing currently.

M Davies and Holden is a no no for me. Trouble is we don't have many alternatives.

I still see a rather grim and relatively unpleasant second half to the season. I'm struggling to remember the last time we've actually played well!

Good grief! Did you bruise both knees under the computer desk when you wrote this?

We played very well in large periods yesterday. Some tough calls by the ref but in general much, much better than we have been recently. See- West Brom and Wigan. Lost to a last minute goal at White Hart Lane.

On Clattenburg - at first viewing (on the small screen), I thought the Ricketts and Cahill calls were right but with the benefit of replay both were wrong. The worst decision of the day was the tackle on CYL. Absolutely no doubt that was a red. I think I am right in saying that because Jeans was given a yellow card this cannot be reviewed. Shame - because it should be.

[TANGODANCER]

At the risk of going over much-debated ground, more than the Jenas foul needs reviewing. If one of our defenders had done that, he'd have been off for sure. Fifty-fifty decisions are just that, and refs are as prone to mistakes as anyone. On controversial decisions that lose teams points, and can even get them relegated ( a certain disallowed legitimate goal against Everton?), the fault lies squarely with the officials. It's only thanks to a linesman and not the ref that we didn't have another penalty against us yesterday, and the Rickets one he got a toe on the ball. Cahill gets accused of diving and gets a yellow when all the pundits agreed it was a blatant penalty to us. Farcial, to say the least.

If proven at fault for something, fair enough, but when the ref gets it all wrong the consequences don't hurt him, just the clubs. It needs something to happen to level things up and make the game fair. Right now, it isn't.

[TKIZ!]

Jenas 'tackle' was more akin to assault, had that been say Taylor/Holden or Moobs on one of theirs it would have been a straight red. You only have to look at the Mark Davies red against Blackburn to know that he would have happily have sent one of ours off for that particular style of 'tackle'

[TANGODANCER]

Zulu attends a southern debacle:

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[BWFC_Insane]

Look I get folk are calling me miserable and I see why. I'm not suggesting we're going down.

It would just be a shame if after a great start we started looking over our shoulders. Sadly thats whats happening. Of course we aren't really a top 8 side in quality terms so finishing 12th will be fine and a good season. But our form currently is shite.

After we beat Wolves I didn't gloss over what I thought was a pretty inept performance. Had Doyle's shot in the last 5 been 2 inches to the right/left depending how you look at it, then I can guarantee this and other sites would have gone into meltdown. Which again would have been an overreaction.

Yes we battled well second half yesterday but only after the game should have by rights been beyond us. We capitalised on Spurs being a bit wasteful and got ourselves back into the game. Its no great shame losing at Spurs but I don't see many easy games, Everton, Villa, Sunderland at home, all sound tricky to me for a team that has 1 win in how many premiership games? Blackburn, Man Utd, Newcastle away likewise.

What worries me is that if this half to the season fizzles out, is it that the squad aren't capable of keeping up their standards. Or is the 4-4-2 pressing game tiring legs too much? Or have we to an extent been found out. It certainly seems that teams now know "what to expect from us". They've worked on packing the midfield and stopping the front two having such a great impact.

Sturridge gives us a different option at least and can stretch teams in behind with his pace.

My point and I'm sure many won't agree is that we had a slump as we expected on the main, and Wolves was our chance to spring back out but we just don't look the same team as before christmas. We couldn't expect to keep that up consistently but it would be nice to see it again in flashes!

COYM!

[norm the jedi]

Form - It was always going to fall off from November.. The way we play and the middling quality of squad we have + the lack of depth up front and at centre back was always likely to catch up with us.. pressing and running down the opposition when not in possession is feckin hard and when it's the same 11 doing it every game, legs will get heavy by this time.. Mu came on and looked rested and back to near his best yesterday, may be it's time to give Mavis a rest ... Elmander isn't a right winger either, so Coyle has to make a decision as to which front man gets a warm suit..
But why do we chose to highlight opponents missed chances and take that as evidence of our demise.. All the time, we hit the bar had a couple of close ish efforts and didn't get a stonewall pen.. against a top 6 team who spent a conservative 150 mill more than us in the last 4 seasons.. Tottenham, that's 'still in the champions league Tottenham' with a second 11 capable of giving us a game on paper will always create chances against us at their home.. They didn't take most of them and at least some of the credit for the misses must go to our efforts in defence or in goal..
Let's face it, how many of the starting 11 would Happy Harry drop to swap in one of our starters.. Cahill or CYL at a push and probably only if the starters were injured..
As for wolves.. we won a game we deserved to win [just about] but let's get it straight this is the same Wolves who have now beaten 6 of the top 7... They're not Derby, Swindon or Watford of days gone by.. There's not a lot in it
Why can't we accentuate the positives for a change.. Holden was brilliant, Sturridge is 2 in 2, Robbo is the best pub player we've had for some time..
We were never finishing 7th or even 10th on our budget.. Mid table mediocrity is about the extent of our ambitions and the possibility of a cup run..
At least now it's good to look at....

[Worthy4England]

Robbo is the best pub player we've had for some time..

I didn't say he was the best!!!