These wins aren't to be underestimated. Stoke are a handful and we rarely thrive against them,
but today, despite withstanding a lot of second half pressure, Fulham stood firm and deserved their
points.
New players are traditionally given a time to adjust when signing for a new club, but today
Pavel Pogrebnyak was thrown straight into the deep end.
By 1970's Gooner Fabiansky Needs to improve his kicking. Other than that had a good game. Came out
to collect the high balls when he could and relieved the pressure that we all feel when crosses
come in. 6 Coquelin Improves with every game and plays with confidence. With Jenkinson still out I
think he will be a very able understudy to Sagna.
David de Gea has claimed that he reckons he can be as big a legend for this club as Edwin Van
der Sar, despite his early mistakes for the club.
"Hopefully, I will equal or even surpass the performance and contribution he made to the
club," said de Gea. "Let's face it, all goalkeepers make mistakes once in a while and none
of us like it when we do.
Arsene Wenger has acknowledged that his Arsenal side faces a tricky test at Ewood Park in
today's early afternoon kick-off despite the lowly placement of their opponents, Blackburn
Rovers.
Wenger has publicly backed under-pressure Rovers boss Steve Kean and despite expressing a high
level of confidence in his team's recent momentum, the Frenchman believes that Blackburn is a
dangerous opposition for multiple reasons.
The captain meeting his future team mate?
First Champions League match out of the way then. Draw was the final result and it was a fair
reflection on the game. Both sides went about with their usual tactics but the home side had the
upper hand of things in most parts. Like I said yesterday, I would take a draw if it was given to
me.
Arsenal came to Toon to play and play they did.
The first half was predictably all Arsenal, controlled possession and lots of through balls for
Gervinho and Arshavin to chase. Gervinho did extremely well on his Premier League debut and there
is much more to come from the talented Ivorian. Ramsey busied himself about in the middle of the
park and did very well, the midfield trio of Ramsey, Song and Rosicky functioned well and snuffed
out any attacking threat from Barton, Tiote and Cabaye whilst piling more pressure on
Newcastle.
Predictions? Give them in the comments. This has been a low-scoring World Cup so far - 2-0 USA is
my guess, and I think I'm being generous with the scoreline. To the USA, that is.
Lineups: USA - Solo; Le Peilbet, Buehler, Rampone, Krieger; Cheney, Boxx, Lloyd, O'Reilly;
Rodriguez, Wambach
North Korea - Hong; Jong, Ri Un Hyang, Ho, Song; Ri Ye Gyong, Jo, Jon, Kim; Yun, Ra
I like Rapinoe's skill on the ball, but Cheney offers more of a finishing threat, so I'd guess
Sundhage's move is to try to put more scoring punch into the lineup.
Here at CCN we don't tend to get involved with transfer speculation. While I really believe
that most of what you read in the papers has *some* grain of truth to it, most deals don't end up
happening.
There's one deal I do hope happens: Kevin Nolan.
At Bolton Nolan was a functional player.
After the scintillating brilliance of our performance v Man Utd on Sunday, it was back to the
mid-table, Roy Hodgson style mediocrity of a soul-less and dispiriting performance against Sparta
Braga.
A 1-0 defeat was a bit harsh on this Liverpool team, yet it was scarcely more than the team
deserved.
Referees seem to have gone card crazy in the SLeague this season. A whopping 12 yellows and one red
were issued at Gombak United a couple of nights ago while last night there were nine yellow and one
red. One guy even got a yellow for trying to take a corner outside the white lines; something that
I've been seeing more and more frequently over the last couple of years.
Really looking forward to this mouth-watering clash as are the Koreans if you go by the numbers of
Koreans posting on Aussie blogs!
Young fast and mobile with players, that's Korea, playing in big leagues in Europe against an
Aussie team ageing and in decline.
Korea thumped Australia 3-1 earlier this year in Seoul and it could be a similar night tomorrow.
