Thierry Henry - A step into management

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View attachment 277652We are up for a very tough game today and we have to be at our best if we want to progress through to the semi finals! Liverpool are a strong attacking side and can really really hurt us if we do not concentrate, I have focused on a lot of defensive work over the past few days and I feel confident that the players know how to cope with Liverpool for this game, whilst looking at the line up I changed a few things, I want us to target their centre back Jones as he has not played a lot of football and we can really use that as an advantage.


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Oh, erm, oh. I am really lost for words! I really really am, how great of a performance is this! absolutely super and one of the best performances I will ever ever get from my team and I have only just started, I really don't know where to start and can't pick out many individual performances cos all of them was at their best! I am especially pleased for Adam Armstrong as he scores his first ever senior goals and he definitely put on a show, he scored four in one match. Every other player was superb and too happy for my players to even give any tactical insight!

[video=youtube;6Yfv4t7E4cs]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Yfv4t7E4cs[/video]

The second goal was my personal favourite as Armstrong showed brilliant placement to put it into the left side of the goal from outside the box.
 
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We will face Bradford City in the 3rd round of the FA Cup and it could be a tough game, Bradford have recently played well as the underdog in cup ties so we can not be complacent when we come up against them next month.

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In the semi final of the Capital One Cup we have a tricky two legged tie against Southampton, this again is a very difficult tie to come up against but we have already beaten them once this season so we can do it again.

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Finally we have some transfer news as Papiss Cissé will be leaving the club in January as he joins Premier League strugglers Crystal Palace, he was never my first choice in fact he was my fourth choice striker and he is not needed in my eyes, although he does have an eye for goal it is a waste of wages if he is not played.
 
View attachment 277195View attachment 277194On the back of a 10-1 victory we are high on confidence, I've had to bring them down a bit in the hotel as I was worried the over confidence would turn into complacency, we set up the same today but with some changes in the side, we will be testing Sissoko on the right today he has immense power and pace and hopefully he can use that to his advantage to dominate his flank. There's not much different to last game I am confident we can give Spurs a good game although it will be a tough one. Adam Armstrong drops back to the bench although he scored an amazing four goals in his previous match.




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We were brilliant today, absolutely fantastic. We looked as threatening as we did vs Liverpool although today we were more wasteful which is a shame as we could've sent a real statement today on what we want to achieve. It was a fairly comfortable game and Tottenham rarely threatened Tim Krul's goal.

The standout performer for me today was Vurnon Anita, he stepped in to replace a very much in form Cheick Tiote and he put in a very good shift which could threaten Tiote's position, whenever Tottenham looked to threaten he was there to break up play. Another congratulations goes to Aarons as he showed great composure to score his goal, he definitely benefited from the Liverpool thrashing.

Onto the next one where we face Q.P.R at home.
 
Also would like to apologise as I have messed up with screenshots for the Tottenham game and the next one, as you can tell the top image is different to how I have been doing it differently
 
View attachment 277189View attachment 277188Today we play bottom of the league and they are seriously out of form, they are winless in seven games and have only won twice all season, I see this as a real advantage to go on a secure a big home win. We have set up to attack and used the same formation that have beaten teams like Arsenal, we have set up differently. We want to control the game and have the majority of the possession but I want to attack every time we have the ball, so we set up in a possessive attacking style today.



View attachment 277186View attachment 277184Today we did exactly what we set out to do and I couldn't be more proud of the boys, I bore people every week with how wasteful we can be but I am not doing that today. I asked them to dominate the game and attack and we did exactly that and it resulted in three wonderfully created goals. Pérez is back on the scoresheet with a trademark finish into the bottom corner and Cabella and Sissoko also got goals as well, it was definitely the story of the attacking midfielders today.

A special mention to all the team as they were all superb and played nice slick passing football, Q.P.R could not keep up with our football today and definitely do look like a team that are destined for Championship football. Adam Armstrong came back into the team and although he did not score he linked up wonderfully with our attacking midfielders specifically Ayoze Pérez who seems to have a great understanding with him.
 
SamPeters said:
A great couple of wins there mate! 10-1!
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Thanks mate! I can't believe the Liverpool game, I wouldn't expect us to score ten goals against a team in a lower league never mind Liverpool who still had quite a few key players starting. Liverpool away is the next game coming up not sure what to expect!
 
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View attachment 277177Not too long ago we played this team and won amazingly 10-1. We can't be complacent as Liverpool are still a good side. We have set up to protect the defence as Liverpool can have a frightening attack if they are on top of the their game, we hopefully can hit them on the break and attack their fragile defence, it also makes it better for us considering they only have three at the back, we will be planning to stretch their defence.



View attachment 277176View attachment 277175I've been getting used to saying recently "we dominated again" and "was wasteful with our chances" this time though we were dominated by a much better Liverpool side. At the time I was actually quite disappointed we drew as we came back from behind twice to go 3-2 up after super sub Emmanuel Riviére came on at half time to get a hat trick and has definitely gave me a selection headache for the next game.

Anyway the game we were by far the worse team in the contest, Liverpool outplayed us in every aspect for large parts of the game. We went behind twice and looked like a team that couldn't create a chance never mind score a goal but we did show some resilience as we kept on fighting and when we did get that one key chance we took it and if we didn't drop in concentration towards the end of the game we could of won the game.

I am satisfied with a point though as we could of been a lot worse off and it looks like these Liverpool encounters will serve some exciting games.



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Looking back at it, we had a very impressive month. We won 5 of our 7 games and should of not of lost one of them, we can look back at this with great confidence as we destroyed a good Liverpool side 10-1 and dominated Tottenham in their own backyard. It wouldn't take a genius to figure out what my favourite game is from December!

We open the month with a Wear-Tyne derby against big rivals Sunderland, it will be a fiery game and I don't expect much football to be played, it could possibly escalate into a war. We're fully expecting James Tomkins and Kaka to make debuts in that game whilst Jonny Williams may sit on the sidelines recovering from a small injury. It is a big month for us, we could possibly be in the Capital One Cup final and face Manchester United at Old Trafford at the end of the month.

View attachment 277172We have steadily improved since I took over towards the end of October and find ourselves just three points outside the Europa League places. If we keep up our run of form we fully expect to be in there and perhaps closing in on the top four. Pleased to see Ayoze Pérez has moved into the top four scorers in the league and just four goals off top scorer Aguero.


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It's been very tough picking a player of the month for December we have had truly an outstanding month, I would pick the whole team but I need to pick one. Some special mentions go to Ayoze Pérez as he continued his fine goalscoring form and the fact he has so much more to his game than just scoring goals. Steven Taylor was fantastic in defence, he won most things and looked a brick. Final mentions go to Rolando Aarons and Adam Armstrong as when they have featured they have played well and looked to have an effect on the game and Adam Armstrong scored a mighty impressive four goals in a game vs Liverpool.

Sissoko won it this month for the reason why I have mentioned him so much before, the ability to run 50 yards with the ball is unbelievable, he has added some goals to his game this month and his all round game has been magnificent.
 
Lippo255 said:
Wow, what a difference 12 days makes!
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I know kind of proves the cup game was a freak result but nothing to be too unhappy about that month, we could of easily caved in against City and Liverpool and instead we just lost against City and fought back for a draw against Liverpool
 
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View attachment 277165It's the big game vs our biggest rivals Sunderland! I have experience Arsenal vs Spurs and the El Clasico so I am well prepared for this one but as a manager, for this game we have set up to push Sunderland high up into their own half, they look to keep possession and pass from the back with Gus Poyet in charge so we will be looking to counter that by putting them under as much pressure as possible, we welcome Kaká and James Tomkins to the side as they make their debut for the club in the derby!






View attachment 277164View attachment 277163It was fairly even for the majority of the game and Sunderland were definitely trying to stop us from playing our game as much as possible, it didn't quite have the derby feel like it usually does as there was minimal yellow cards and was no red cards. We slightly edged it towards the end and I feel we were the deserved victors of the game. What great debuts for Tomkins and Kaká both score on their debut, Tomkins finished close range from a corner and Kaká made it look so easy and placed a finish into the top corner to finish off the game.

We tried our best to stick to our gameplan despite Sunderland's best efforts to stop us and felt we controlled the game well and looked dangerous with some good passing moves, at times we're a bit hopeless once we get into the final third and can get confused with what to do however Sissoko showed good composure to set up Kaká for his final goal
Hopefully we can keep being the better side throughout the month and continue to get the results we need.

[video=youtube;5IkmzamSu2U]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5IkmzamSu2U[/video]

I definitely got caught up with the excitement during the game and thought it was one of the best finishes of our season but just got caught in the moment, however it was a nice first time finish into the top corner and a good finish for a debut goal.
 
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