Man City v Massive West Ham United Sunday 28th November Kick off 1400

BubblesNeverDies

I take a little consolation in stopping another Citeh clean sheet.

thornburyiron

That was a fairly comfortable ride for City and they showed their class. We are still a long way behind the top clubs but slowly getting there.

PrestonHammer

That's what 500 million pounds plus buys you.

thornburyiron

That was the second time in a week we’ve conceded with a shot from near the edge of the area with nobody marking the scorer.

jay_in_cpt

We've come a long way from the thrashings we encountered not too long ago, while we didn't look like scoring for most of the game, we always hang in there....COYI

OldCastleSwift

No complaints about the result. Limited the GD damage which is about the only consolation.

Frustrating to see us spurn most of our decent openings with poor touches or dreadful set-pieces. Against teams like City you have to be clinical and make the most of the chances offered. Managed it against Liverpool but struggled today.

ScotHammer

MIAHammer said:

Clear gap now between 3rd and 4th. We’re only 1/3 of the season gone but looks like it’s going to be a battle for 4th place.

We are normally in a battle for 17th at this point of a season, so I’ll take this year’s fight quite happily!!

alderz

Big respect to @PrestonHammer for throwing themselves on the sword for this one, by the way

Lukerz

thornburyiron said:

That was the second time in a week we’ve conceded with a shot from near the edge of the area with nobody marking the scorer.

This happens fairly regularly when you watch our games; Soucek and Rice vacate that area too often when we defend & end up marking nobody expected other patches of grass. It’s not such an issue today as we were chasing the game.

Lukerz

When Dec got to the byline and ran it out summed up our performance. Just couldn’t find it within ourselves to put a clinical piece of football together.

thornburyiron

International breaks are not good to us.

alderz

Good reporting from the BBC. #PrayForRyan

OldCastleSwift

alderz said:

Good reporting from the BBC. #PrayForRyan

Aaron Fredericks to start v Brighton 👍

Slacker

Well that was fun.We got about 10 miles onto the M62 and the light snow turned into full blown storm. Traffic came to a standstill and the sat nav told us after a while that we would miss the kick off.
We made the decision eventually to turn round and come home in probably the worst driving conditions I’ve ever driven in.
So glad to be home.
Sometimes even West Ham come second.

jay_in_cpt

Slacker, so true , well being wins, so more than football.....
Keep safe all.....

welovethehammers

Despite the result, Rice was immense today

yoyo

We're still punching above our weight and it's great to feel a tad disappointed

chicagohammer

A couple of times Rice broke up play and moved the ball forward whilst urging his teammates to step up, looked like a true captains performance

OldCastleSwift

welovethehammers said:

Despite the result, Rice was immense today

City bound? Pep had some great words to say about him this evening. Fernandinho's long-term replacement?

MrsGrey

I was posting earlier ( didn't finish it though) that the only one of our players who would improve the City team is Rice

yoyo

Some players improve every season or every six months. Rice seems to get better and stronger every couple of weeks. The sky's the limit. I hope he stays as long as possible but for him personally, I hope his career is injury free and he achieves great things

MrsGrey

He'll always be one of our own.

( Unless he does something terrible to get a transfer.)

chicagohammer

Oh Mrs Grey, you have so done it now……..

claretandbluesky

This season the top three are a level above all below them as the goal difference shows clearly. Our target regard the league is realistically to place between 4-6 and should we do so that would be a great achievement as we can expect United and Spurs to get their act together now they have got rid of their managers.

Brighton is a big game on Wednesday as we play Chelsea at the weekend, so we need three points from Brighton to ensure that should we lose to Chelsea we won't have lost too much ground.

It's a real achievement to have navigated the Europa games, qualified for the knockout stages AND be fourth in the league. If we get to the New Year in a similar position and use the transfer window well we could yet have a 2022 to get very excited about.

alderz

BREAKING: Declan Rice is holding Bubbles the Bear at gunpoint and is demanding an immediate transfer to Death Row Records on a 1 album deal

PrestonHammer

alderz said:

Big respect to @PrestonHammer for throwing themselves on the sword for this one, by the way

I'm blaming OCS, he wasn't negative enough hahaha

BubblesNeverDies

I thought Zouma looked a bit shaky for the 2nd game in a row, not very comfortable in possession and seems to be missing Oggy beside him.
Let's hope it's just a bedding-in period because at the moment he doesn't look any better than Dawson, who cost considerably less.

Also Thorn's comment "That was the second time in a week we’ve conceded with a shot from near the edge of the area with nobody marking the scorer." and both from the left side of the box. This should sound some alarm bells with the defence coaching.

alderz

As with last week, Zouma looked less comfortable playing on the left. I agree he didn’t look any better than Dawson today, but he IS a better player. I think if you want Zouma to be at his best he needs to be on the right, and Diop or Dawson on the left, but Dawson isn’t capable of playing there, seemingly

BubblesNeverDies

So are you saying Dawson can't play on the left and neither can Zouma, but nevertheless Zouma is a better player?

OutcastLondoner

BubblesNeverDies said:

So are you saying Dawson can't play on the left and neither can Zouma, but nevertheless Zouma is a better player?

No he’s saying Zouma on the left looks to be the level of Dawson in his correct position. The fact that Dawson is never the one to go to the left suggests he might be significantly worse there.