Dudu strikes again

Dudu strikes again

Postby rodney » Sun Jan 06, 2008 4:58 pm

Eduardo was the difference between the two teams today. Burnley battled very well today and gave us a very tough game. In the middle of the park they battled for everything and tried to unsettle Diaby and Denilson. We couldn't play our usual passing football, largely due to the state of the pitch and Burnley's pressing when we did have the ball. We came through it though thanks to two moments of brilliance from Eduardo who has been superb in the last 4-5 games.

Burnley started off the better team and came very close to opening the scoring. The ball was played down the channel to Gray who turned Senderos so easily and put a brilliant ball into the centre and Lafferty sent the ball crashing against the crossbar. If he had headed the ball down then it would have probably been a certain goal, however he didn't and we got away with it. We seemed to liven up after that and it woke us up. Eduardo created space superbly by draggin Varga out of the defence and Toure played a good ball over the top, Eduardo latched onto it and calmly put it away. Typical of his recent finishing and gave us a great start. Burnley weren't put off by this and actually carried on hassling and getting forward. A ball into the box caused unnecessary trouble as Traore held onto the ball instead of just sending it into row Z and Blake sent it over the bar.

I wasn't impressed with Traore today. His defending was very shacky at times and everytime the ball went down our left hand side he was usually beaten. He was also very wasteful when going forward and gave the ball away a number of times. He is young though and will hopefully learn from his mistakes ahead of the game against Spurs on Wednesday.

We had another good chance before the end with Bendtner creating something out of nothing with a superb bicycle kick, which was comfortably saved by Kiraly who looked very shaky all afternoon. At the end of the half Burnley were definitely still in the match and the next goal would be crucial.

We came out second half and still were not at our best. Burnley continuing to press us and were actually dominating the game, without creating any real chances. On the break though we created a superb chance. Eduardo played the ball into Bendtner and he controlled it before giving it back to Eduardo, the defence seemed to open up for Eduardo and given his recent clinical finishing I was suprised that he put it just wide of the post. That was our chance to seal the game and kill off Burnley. Burnley carried on going at us, but Senderos was suprisingly very strong at the back in the second half, after a shaky first half. Toure was back to his best today and gave the ball away a lot less than he has been. Kolo and Sagna gave us the experience we needed to avoid any difficult moments.

Then the talking point of the match. Lafferty lost the ball and lunged into win the ball and went over the ball and caught Gily with studs up. Imo it was worthy of a yellow card and that would be sufficient. However Wiley who was very fussy all game brandished the red card. A very harsh decision imo and very similar to that of the Ipswich lad who was sent off yesterday. We should have then taken control of the game, but our midfielders couldn't take control of the game. Eboue was particularly poor today. His end product is simply not good enough to play on the right wing. His passing was horrific and as was his shooting. I'll be glad to see the back of him for a few weeks to be honest.

Burnley were tiring and we killed them off with the second goal from Nicholas Bendtner. Eduardo played a superb through ball to Bendtner he took one touch round the keeper and slotted it away nicely. That was game over and done with and I thought we may go on and grab a couple more if Burnley heads fell. We instead just kept the ball well and saw the game out. Eduardo had another good chance, after he was sent through on goal from a delightful through ball from Diaby, one on one with Kiraly and he stood up well and guessed what way Eduardo was going and took the ball.

A good win today and getting through was all that mattered and into the draw for the fourth round. Some good EPL teams have fallen this weekend to lower opposition and I am glad we aren't one of them. I thought Kolo was superb as captain today and we will miss him badly, as he now goes for the ACON, but we knew this and we must now battle on without him.

2-0 as I predicted and Dudu does it again :D
rodney
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Re: Dudu strikes again

Postby Cheese » Sun Jan 06, 2008 5:12 pm

I thought it was a good cup game where the underdogs gave the favorites a good game.

Nice report Rodders :1:
“What a great day for football, all we need is some green grass and a ball.”
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Re: Dudu strikes again

Postby AFC RED ARMY » Sun Jan 06, 2008 7:26 pm

NICE 1 M8 :1:
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Re: Dudu strikes again

Postby Younggooner08 » Tue Jan 08, 2008 7:15 am

I enjoyd the game. Good to see Gilberto and Super Phil put in some good performanes. Very disappointed with Denilson though
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