Bir_CFC

Beautiful article, almost brought a tear to my eye reading those quotes. So happy that he's feeling much better and very very proud of those doctors and physios that helped Fabrice. Just makes me want to appreciate those around me that much more, cause you never know what can happen. Money, job, sports might be fun, but not being there for the ones you care about is something one will regret forever. Gonna take a holiday and visit my parents again.

I am not superstitious at all, except when it comes to sports. Then I get like crazy superstitious. Like just for the Napoli game, I was watching it at work on my desk. I had my phone in front of me till we were up 2-0. Then I put it for charge and Napoli scored, then I unplugged it and moved it front of me again and we scored the penalty. Then I got so shit scared so for extra time I wrote down names of all the players playing and folded it up and put it in my shirt pocket like next to your heart and I left it there till we won. Sometimes I'm watching and we are doing badly, I'd go to the washroom and we score. So then I just stop watching lol. So fucked up sometimes!

I hear that Richards will start at CB and Zabaletta will play RB and no Savic. Which isn't really that bad of a back 4.

Arsenal & Tottenham games will be key.

Sick goal by Vucinic. Scored that like a boss.

Thanks for that. Will do, need to find out more about Benefica.

City's home form: P - 14 W - 14 D - 0 L - 0 GF - 42 GA - 6 Yikes!

City primarily play through the middle and use very little width. If they are stubborn at playing through the middle, I think defensively we can stop them and counter effectively. Just play deep and counter with Mata, Ramires & Torres/Sturridge.

Soak up pressure then counter. 4-4-1-1 (4-4-2 on offence) Cech Ivan - Luiz - JT - Cole Ramires - Essien - Lampard - Mata Drogba Torres/Sturridge

He can play there, but we have players much better suited to that position compared to him. Hence my point being either on the wing or on the bench.

I think 4-2-3-1 is the way to go in the future. So we definitely need a world class winger and a creative midfielder. I would love a winger that can play on both wings cause I think Ramires should be on one wing from now on. Dude has shown great play on both wings and actually puts in good balls and is surprisingly good at taking on his man as well. Plus a guy like Ramires on your wing adds a lot to your defence. Sturridge should be a super sub and 2nd choice striker (Drogba should leave). For next year: Ramires - Mata - (Buy Winger) Torres ST - Torres, Sturridge, Lukaku RW - Ramires, Sturridge, Kakuta, KDB LW - (Buy a Winger - Hazard, Hulk etc.), Kakuta, KDB CAM - Mata, Kakuta The midfield is the biggest problem for me since I don't think we have a single player there that is even close to world class. Lamps is old, Essien isn't the same, Meireles, Mikel and Romeu are just mediocre. I think out of all the above listed we should only be starting one of them and buying a 2nd world class option - Modric, Hamsik type guys. First XI Cech Ivan - Luiz - JT - Cole (Hamsik, Modric, Pjanic) - Romeu Ramires - Mata - (Lavezzi, Hulk, Hazard, Jovetic) Torres Second XI Turnbull Bos - Cahill - Bruma? - Bertrand Meireles - Mikel Sturridge - Kakuta - Malouda Lukaku So essentially just two big buys - 1 winger and 1 mid, lets say 55-60M in total. I think that's a reasonable spending to expect. We can let go of Drogba, Kalou, Hilario, Ferreira and maybe even Malouda depending on how much we can rely on Kakuta, Piazon, McEachran. Cause say what you want about Malouda he is fairly decent and provides good cover in both CM and the LW. And, I think he's been pretty decent lately.

If we're playing a 4-2-3-1 I don't think there is any room for Ramires in the midfield. Either on the wing or the bench.

^ I don't think we need to buy Azpi now that we bought Cahill. RB - Ivan, Bos LB - Cole, Bertrand CB - JT, Luiz, Cahill (Maybe one more, recall Bruma maybe?)

I think he's had some of his best games lately. I was hoping to see some positive comments when I entered this thread but instead people are criticizing him. Goalkeepers usually already get very little love but he made 2 superb saves yesterday and was probably our best player over the two legs against Napoli.

Very tough game. They are a different animal at home and this is their season on the line pretty much. If they drop points here they are definitely out of the title race. Anyone know if Kompany is fit for this one? We should play on the counter (Valencia style), hoping for a draw at least.

I agree. But I also think he's young so he's at that stage where he wants to show off and score goals. In due time, he'll mature.

Sturridge just needs to cross from the wide instead of trying to score everytime. Other than that, dude has world class feet. He was toying with em. Tbf, he is a striker being forced to play out wide, so his natural instinct is always to score. He'll learn soon.

When did Hansen praise him? Got video or something?

Yeah, Dyer being banned wouldn't make a difference. Routeledge(sp?) is probably second choice on the wing instead of Joe Allen or Britton. Doesn't change much for McEachran, except the fact that he might be first off the bench though.

FERUZ IS A BAAAD MOTHER FUCKER!!

horrible goal to give up, although they probably deserved 1 but still bad bad goal to give up

Boys got a bit too overconfident.

Nditi is the weak link yet again. He was almost directly responsible for all 3 goals in the quarter final too.

Should really get another goal here. Cant let them get a lucky goal and make it 1-1.