let's review the season so far. we started it with new players coming in. fresh, hungry, inexperienced. everybody said that we needed a new striker. nothing like that happened. we were set for the season and that's when we lost Meireles, Essien and De Bruyne. 3 different players who brought change and depth when needed. our first game was against City in the Community Shield which we lost thanks to Ivanovic when we were better throughout the whole match. not a biggie. it was a glorified friendly anyway. we started our Premier League run and by the end of the August were sitting at the top of the table after beating Reading and difficult teams of Newcastle and Wigan. scored 8 goals while losing 2. it was the time for the Uefa Super Cup. we were bad, underestimated the opponent and got destroyed by something we haven't seen in the last months - striker on form. hard defeat to swallow. had to go back to the premier league where we drew to the infamous QPR. hard again considering we should've gotten a penalty. it was time for the CL, where we had to face the unbeaten champions of both Ukraine and Italy. we drew the first game at home against Juventus, but we stood up against the likes of Stoke City and Arsenal. we then went to Norway where we beat Nordsjaelland quite easily by 4. we seemed to like that number as we beat Norwich City and Tottenham with the same amount of goals. we looked unbeaten, unreachable and ready to defend the title of European Champions. what was coming, nobody could've predicted. we lost at home against Manchester City thanks to the referee who not only sent Torres off when he should've dropped Evans, but also allowed an offside goal from Hernandez. not to mention the second yellow card Rooney should've seen. we then drew to Swansea in the last minutes and saw Suarez equalize in the 73rd minute after fouling Ramires inside our box. We blamed Robbie for Swansea but we should have got 3 points from both Liverpool and Manchester game. the last game of Robbie in the league was against his former club WBA. we were denied two penalty claims yet again and conceded two. the last straw was when we lost 3-0 to the undefetead champion of Italy. we had a streak of bad 5 games in which I firmly believe we should have won three (against Utd, Liverpool and WBA). we lost to Juventus and that game saw the end of Robbie Di Matteo. we were introduced to our old foe who is now supposed to lead us to glory. We managed a draw against City, which seemed like a fair, boring result. Next games, against Fulham and West Ham, saw us draw and lose. we got over these results by beating Norwegian champions 6-1 which in the end didn't really matter. We beat Sunderland 3-1 just before flying out for the CWC. We won by 3-1 against Mexican Monterrey and saw Corinthians life the trophy after disappointing defeat in the final. We then beat 16th Aston Villa 8-0 which looked like resurrection. We then won two scary games against Norwich and Everton by 1-0 and 2-1 respectively. We have than lost to the last team who hasn't won a game in 22 fixtures - QPR. @edit - we also beat Wolverhampton, United in league cup with Robbie and also defeated Leeds under Rafa games Robbie won: Wigan, Reading, Newcastle (who were 4th at the time after beating Tottenham), Stoke City (12th), Arsenal (7th), Norwich (19th), Tottenham (5th), Nordsjaelland, Shakthar (undefeated when we met them), Wolverhampton, United games Robbie drew: QPR (robbed by the ref), Swansea (11th), Liverpool (13th), Juventus (undefeted) games Robbie lost: Man City (after playing with 10 men for the majority of the game), Atletico Madrid (Falcao), Man United (ref, 2nd team), WBA (2 penalty claims yet again, 4th team), Shakhtar (undefeated), Juventus games Rafa won: Sunderland (18th team), Aston Villa (16th team), Norwich (11th team), Everton (6th team), Monterrey, Leeds, Nordsjaelland games Rafa drew: City (2nd team), Fulham (11th team) games Rafa lost: Corinthians, West Ham (8th team), QPR (20th team) summary: Robbie - W11 D4 L6 - goals scored - 45, goals conceded - 26 Rafa - W7 D2 L3 - goals scored - 29, goals conceded - 10 Robbie - 21 games - 2,1 goal scored per game, 1,2 goal conceded per game Rafa - 12 games - 2,4 goals scored per game (1,9 if it wasn't for that massacre of Villa), 0,83 goals conceded per game. Basically what we got with Rafa is a manager who was able to beat teams from the bottom of the table (Sunderland, Villa, Norwich) or lower leagues (Leeds, Monterrey, Nordsjaelland). He drew with City and Fulham but was capable of losing to the last QPR, Corinthians and West Ham. Robbie lost to the Champions of England in the Community Shield, Champions of Europe (kind of) Atletico, vice-champions Utd, 4th team WBA and the undefeated champions of Italy and Ukraine. He drew with the mid-table Liverpool and Swansea, champions of Italy and QPR. He proved capable of winning against the likes of Utd, Tottenham, Arsenal, Shakhtar. so, wtf was that sacking and bringing somebody who is on the same level or even below?
