djourou is only on loan till xmas afaik, i think we might bring him back.
but its just a blooding the young game. i thought again though denilson looked a tiny bit out of depth, but he's had barely any games. just because cesc came in and took no time to find his feet, doesn't meet everyone can do that, very few can do that at all.
senderos didn't do that badly to be honest, like for their first BS penalty, he was strong, moved arm out the way and put in a great block on the cross.
the main issue was **** poor refereeing. its one of those games where one side is too physical and should start getting yellow cards early on, the ref ignored it, and he completely lost control of the game. their 2nd goal came from a completely blantant dive. alves and the guy who dived for that freekick for 2nd goal both did 4-5 dives each, couple in the area. in the second half their midfield simply hacked us down with almost every attack yet nothing. one guy did two fairly harsh tackles in a row, then for no reason about 20 yards in our own half shoved eduardo in the back and to the floor, he was going nowhere. it was pure petulance but showed exactly how crap the ref was. in games like that the ref should, quite rightly due to repeated fouling and especially diving, give out 2-3 yellow cards, that would simply stop 90% of the fouling that happened in the rest of the game.
their 2nd goal was from a complete BS freekick, we had a stonewall without question 100% certain penalty denied. their first, eventually not given penalty. the linesman with perfect view gave nothing, the ref, who didn't have a clear view at all, gave a penalty, the letter of refereeing law is, if you didn't see it, you can't assume and give a freekick/penalty, anything. he couldn't have seen it but gave it anyway, he was clearly against us. the 2nd penalty was fairly bogus too. up till even their 2nd goal we had some dodgey decisions and lack of help from the ref. after that the game was in chaos and we still played very well considering.
poor ref's ruin the game
as for cygan, can't help but love him, big weird russian mafia looking bugger
i can't help but remember a game or two he played at left back and, shockingly, bombed up the wing, did overlaps with whoever was infront of him(can't remember who at all), crossed, ran into the box, he was actually, almost brilliant.
he was another player though who first game back after more than 4 games out was crap, then turned into a completely different player 2 weeks later with 4 games under his belt. he and senderos are both like that.
gilberto was one of the bigger issues tonight, but then, we also aren't really great with a 4-5-1 but we did ok. i honestly think if the ref had been fair and clamped down, as he bloody well should, on diving and fouls early then we would have won the game fairly easily. its easy to get momentum when you get away with fouling the other team constantly and get goals from freekicks you don't deserve.
more than anything, we need our backups, theo, diaby, gilberto to get a few more games, and play with each other a bit so they are better when bought in for games like these. frankly, denilson i think looks like he needs another season of experience in a few games here and there, before he's really ready to be able to replace fabregas effectively. when you play, train and learn 4-4-2, switching to 4-5-1 constantly isn't helping, and putting rosicky on, then playing him left wing, middle and right all of a sudden.
