hi all...stoke fan here!
just wanted to firstly say well done for tuesday, best team won no doubt about that..made us look like a bunch of part timers with a hangover!
firstly to clear a couple of things up........
1)"Harvester-gate!" - please don't take that as a representation of Stoke fans in general! those involved (on both sides, ours and yours) i'm sure you'll agree are bloody idiots who embarass the club they're apparently there to support.every club has them and thankfully they're a minority!
2)our lack of support - we'd only just had the Arsenal game 48 hours earlier and stoke isn't exactly a flush area economically so the prospect for some of going to the Brit on a Tuesday night for a second round cup tie against a lower league side (no offence meant, genuinely) was obviously never going to be a big draw for many of the fans (particularly given the football they've had to witness there since January - pretty dire most of it!!!)
3) the waving our arms around ("Doing the Wenger") - we always do it when Arsenal come to take the piss out of Arsehole Wenger and his constant pleas for free kicks,penalties etc. anytime anyone breathes near one of his precious little players. when PDC starting doing it we started "Doing the Wenger" for a laugh (again, no offence..pretty much everyone in football including us has a LOT of time for your manager.genius player and great manager!)
anyway, onto the game.......
we were
AWFUL, possibly the worst display i've seen us put in for at least 5-10 years! players of
ANY Premiership side should not be embarassing themselves in that fashion. Whitehead couldn't pass with anymore strength than you'd expect from a 5 year old, Upson looked confused everytime the ball came near him, Jerome wandered around whinging and blaming everyone else for his lack of ability and don't even get me started on Shotton (although apparently he's off to Leicester, i'm driving him there myself!!!). most Stokies are livid with the players for their performance (especially given that much of the same team managed to get a 0-0 with Arsenal 2 days earlier) and are just thankful we even managed to take you to extra time!
but despite our failings (and i won't bore you with them all, we'd be here for weeks just talking about Shotton's that night) i was VERY impressed with you guys..both players and fans alike!
your left side did a proper job on Pennant all night! Pennant looked to be positive and get at you (as did Kightly, probably our only 2 starters who actually gave it a go) but you forced him to come inside virtually everytime where he was almost always crowded out and gave away possession/went down praying for a free kick. Collins was very sharp, very alert and obviously knows where the goal is.
at the back you seemed very solid (until Crouch came on) and held up to our aerial bombardment far far better than most of the "Ooh ref he's hurt me by brushing against my shoulder" Prem players we come up against.
all in all you were better all over the pitch, gave it far more dedication to the cause and actually looked like it meant something to you.we were just embarassing!
probably a great game for the neutrals due to the amount of goals and the whole back and forth of it all but for a Stokie it was completely soul destroying to see our team put in such a keystone cops kind of performance, credit to you guys for exploiting that (people always say in the Prem if you make mistakes like that you get punished; you guys proved that decent lower league sides will also punish you just as much!!!) and good luck for the rest of the season and the cup run that follows for you
What
hi all...stoke fan here!
just wanted to firstly say well done for tuesday, best team won no doubt about that..made us look like a bunch of part timers with a hangover!
firstly to clear a couple of things up........
1)"Harvester-gate!" - please don't take that as a representation of Stoke fans in general! those involved (on both sides, ours and yours) i'm sure you'll agree are bloody idiots who embarass the club they're apparently there to support.every club has them and thankfully they're a minority!
2)our lack of support - we'd only just had the Arsenal game 48 hours earlier and stoke isn't exactly a flush area economically so the prospect for some of going to the Brit on a Tuesday night for a second round cup tie against a lower league side (no offence meant, genuinely) was obviously never going to be a big draw for many of the fans (particularly given the football they've had to witness there since January - pretty dire most of it!!!)
3) the waving our arms around ("Doing the Wenger") - we always do it when Arsenal come to take the piss out of Arsehole Wenger and his constant pleas for free kicks,penalties etc. anytime anyone breathes near one of his precious little players. when PDC starting doing it we started "Doing the Wenger" for a laugh (again, no offence..pretty much everyone in football including us has a LOT of time for your manager.genius player and great manager!)
anyway, onto the game.......
we were
AWFUL, possibly the worst display i've seen us put in for at least 5-10 years! players of
ANY Premiership side should not be embarassing themselves in that fashion. Whitehead couldn't pass with anymore strength than you'd expect from a 5 year old, Upson looked confused everytime the ball came near him, Jerome wandered around whinging and blaming everyone else for his lack of ability and don't even get me started on Shotton (although apparently he's off to Leicester, i'm driving him there myself!!!). most Stokies are livid with the players for their performance (especially given that much of the same team managed to get a 0-0 with Arsenal 2 days earlier) and are just thankful we even managed to take you to extra time!
but despite our failings (and i won't bore you with them all, we'd be here for weeks just talking about Shotton's that night) i was VERY impressed with you guys..both players and fans alike!
your left side did a proper job on Pennant all night! Pennant looked to be positive and get at you (as did Kightly, probably our only 2 starters who actually gave it a go) but you forced him to come inside virtually everytime where he was almost always crowded out and gave away possession/went down praying for a free kick. Collins was very sharp, very alert and obviously knows where the goal is.
at the back you seemed very solid (until Crouch came on) and held up to our aerial bombardment far far better than most of the "Ooh ref he's hurt me by brushing against my shoulder" Prem players we come up against.
all in all you were better all over the pitch, gave it far more dedication to the cause and actually looked like it meant something to you.we were just embarassing!
probably a great game for the neutrals due to the amount of goals and the whole back and forth of it all but for a Stokie it was completely soul destroying to see our team put in such a keystone cops kind of performance, credit to you guys for exploiting that (people always say in the Prem if you make mistakes like that you get punished; you guys proved that decent lower league sides will also punish you just as much!!!) and good luck for the rest of the season and the cup run that follows for you
What a nice chap......thanks.
Supports the magic of the Cup.
Generally speaking your fans were decent and after the game were praising the Swindon performance.
For the record can't see Stoke going down this season.
