Chelsea didn't go all out attack with or without 11 men, they defended with 11 men, and defended even deeper with 10, which made ard for us to work the opening.

We were the best team before the red and after the red, the game plan didn't change from chelsea, infact they didn't have a plan B or C to revert to. Which chelsea fans admit to, and that is their main criticism of Scolari.

Bosingwa!!!! That is the funniest challenge ive ever seen, he shouldnt of been sent off just for avin the snooker balls to do it

Legend

Not looking good attacking wise now?

Noo not at all, we would even take micky oowen back at this point... well if he ever gets out of the ice bath!

And midfield aint much better

no gerrard, alonso or leiva

Gl predicting that midfeild

kuyt masch _____ Benayoun Riera.... but who is the ______ :S

And up front.... welll torres looks like hes injured again :S or at least totally nackered, which coul mean kuyt go up top, which makes right wing open as well.... unless babbel went up front.... or on the right... well

Am confused, gl rafa, pompey must be bricking it...

Everton 3-0 Bolton

great overall performance from everton especially in the first half!
Jo played brilliant and took both of his goals well, gosling got a massive cheer when his name was read out and never really diappointed in the game making chances and having a couple of shots. Jagielka was brilliant again and lescott had one of his better games, Arteta ran the midfield and Bolton never really looked like scoring.

Come on you blue boys!!!

Leicester city 0-0 Oldham

May not be a big deal a league 1 match but oldham getting their keeper sent off after 50 min and conceded penalty, and dean windass of all people going in as keeper.

They hit the penalty wide, a quality save by windass and oldham nearly won it in the end.

Good game it was

Wow, Liverpool and Rafa got out of jail, thanks to an uncharecteristic fantastic performances from dirkus and Aurelio, and Torres as always - showing he is the best striker in Europe, (and therefore the world) forget Rooney, if you asked anybody outside of England (and even most from england) who was better, they would say Torres, absolutely lethal, not to mention his underated assist qualities.

We will see when spain play England, but hopefully not for long 45mins of him will do me

Robbie Keane:

"I'm now at a fantastic club with a fantastic manager who respects his players and if you're doing well will tell you you're doing well,"

1) Fantastic club??? lmao I think by that logic Liverpool is an absolutely incredible club!!

2) How old is he? Did he really need rafa to say well done and give him some Harribo to help him perform? Jesus what a muppet, we are best off without.

What a joke lmao

lmao mike, i just hope that an england player doesn't injure Torres in that match! otherwise it will be to our title chances.

It doesn't matter what level of ability you have, you always need that extrinsic support to give you confidence. Every person needs praise at some point, it's part of being human. I'd rather play under Redknapp then Benitez.

Its a complete myth that managers need their arms around the players.

I know I wouldn't, total rubbish.

I will ignore the Harry Redknapp/Rafael Benitez comparisons, because there is no point comparing, totally different. Rafa has won league titles, UEFA cups and champions leagues. Harry Redknapp is the biggest of con men in football today. The amount of times his house has been raided, I bet he feels like a Liverpool player

It is a sign of a weak and an insecure person who needs telling how good he is 24/7. I tell my little brother well done for tidying his room. I'd have thought by 20-30 players wouldn't need that sort of patronising praise.

Mike you're post slagging Keane off was harsh, i agree with "lol" i was about to post the same thing he said. Everyone needs support from their manager, if he doesn't believe in him then how do you expect him to believe in himself? It's a confidence boost!

Everton 3-0 Bolton,

Everton played Bolton off the park! Played some beautiful stuff. Watch the game "lol" and a few others who thought Everton just sat back? Get back to me on that one

Maybe that's how David Moyes makes so much out of 'lesser skilled' players, giving them the confidence they so much need.

Whereas Benitez just gets the top players expecting them to be able to play no matter what.

David Moyes has a fine squad at goodison, did you see the smile on Jo's face? My god what does moyes do to them haha! Seriously he's a man who gets the best out of his players, if bramble come to goodison maybe he would get in the England squad?



Jagielka got a call up, Rightly so! He deserves to start now

Yesterday was pretty much the story of our (Pompey's) season, we can not hold a lead, when we go ahead legs turn to jelly, we defend too deep and start making mistakes. It's annoying because our back 4 was so solid last year. Well done on the win though the_kop, I personally would like to see the title end up at Anfield over Man United any day.

Redknapp is seen as a good people motivator because he's a good politician who'll tell you exactly what you want to hear even if the words are empty - it works short term, but the slating of Bent the other week, plus the continued put down of the Spurs squad shows he's not a decent man manager. His attitude towards improving any team is just a huge player turnover.

Keane with his comments sounds pretty much the same as Defoe who found it hard going without Redknapp at Pompey - poor doll. Enjoy your break eh, Jermain?

It's obvious Harry has the effect on players, Pompey we're mid table or something when he left now look at you. I like Harry he speaks his mind, the Bent issue was out of order tho, if i missed a chance like that and my manager came out to the media and started slagging me off i wouldn't be a happy man and my confidence would shoot rock bottom! So it pretty much surprised me that one.

Pompey are too good to go down tho

Benitez doesn't praise or criticise players. - Or at least in the media. To Benitez the team is more important than the player. He always goes on about the squaaad.

If players want individual praise then there is always spurs they can go to i suuppose. Fact is if he was a success he wouldn't be moaning.

Nick I felt sorry for pompey, they are not to good to go down at all. They have experienced players making mistake after mistake, and with James in net, mistakes are never to far down the line. Campell and Distin are slow, but even are making mistakes that Titis Bramble would make with long balls etc... crouchy is not a lone striker and Nugent isn't good enough.

Pompey are in free fall to me, I expect the bottom 3 to consist of bromidge, stoke abd pompey. But I feel sorry for them because yesterday they deserved something, Torres was the difference.

"I'm now at a fantastic club with a fantastic manager who respects his players and if you're doing well will tell you you're doing well,"

Anyway read the quote on Keane, what do you think he was suggesting? That we are a poor club with a disrespectful manager, thats what I thought he was saying....

Edited at 13:56 Sun 8/02/09 (GMT)

We only won 3 games under Redknapp this season and our form since he left does not indicate he's a good manager - we've had serious financial problems and bedding in a new manager who's making some amateur decisions. However Redknapp's comments disrupting our players plus leaving us an expensive yet unbalanced squad certainly didn't help.

Last season we had one of the biggest wage bills outside the top 4 but our form in 2008 even under Redknapp was very poor, and we finished lower than we should have considering the cost of our team. I'm not trying to say he's an awful manager - but he's constantly in the paper with his hack mates detailing how he single handedly took Portsmouth from Division 1 to Europe and a lot of people who aren't close to him believe the myth.

When you say he speaks his mind I agree he says the first thing that comes into his head and hence good for a soundbite. He contradicts himself frequently, does not back up his words, and constantly inflates himself.

A number of Spurs fans are annoyed by him already and came up with this (big picture hence linked):
http://img261.imageshack.us/img261/4852/arry2tc2.jpg



The poison chalice...