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Opinion

Manchester City fans slaughter Newcastle supporters and Rafa Benitez tactics

6 years ago
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Their team may have taken all six points but amusing that both Newcastle United’s supporters and manager have still managed to annoy Manchester City fans.

With his Championship team, Rafa Benitez once again went for tactics of trying to keep it tight, staying in the game, in the hope of then having a go late on at getting something out of the match.

Just like after the game at St James Park, the vast majority of Manchester City fans see this as some kind of unsportsmanlike tactic, demanding why Newcastle didn’t play an attacking formation so the home side could score at will.

Likewise, the home supporters didn’t take kindly to Newcastle fans winding them up about the number of empty seats at the Etihad.

Though to be fair, there weren’t quite as many as Man City’s last home match, when only thirty five thousand of their fans bothered to turn up for the League Cup semi-final against Bristol City (who brought eight thousand).

They also weren’t happy, as usual, with Newcastle fans pointing out that many of those who had turned up, wouldn’t have been seen before Sheikh Mansour turned up and bought them top players in every position.

Certainly walking around the Etihad before kick-off, you saw some very strange sights, plenty of adults wearing half and half scarves and suchlike, Manchester City are definitely doing their best to rival Manchester United on and off the pitch…only the move to expand the stadium appears to have backfired, with not nearly enough of these new fans being able to be found to fill the empty seats.

Manchester City fans comment via their top Blue Moon message board:

‘Brilliant at times, shocking at times.

3 points is all that matters.’

‘Rubbish.’

‘F…… battered the negative c….

Toon got what any team that comes to not play and that’s f… all.

We played superbly well I thought to a man.’

‘S… performance but we got the job done in the end.’

‘Not at our best, Newcastle got what they deserved: F… all.’

‘Newcastle are dour. Terrible side.

A good win and fully deserved.’

‘Zincenko 107 passes, Newcastle 111 passes.

After Otamendi out passed their entire team at St James’ this is a disappointing stat. The young lad needs to up his game.’

‘I don’t think it was a case of complacency…..Newcaslte had 9-10 men behind the ball at all times…..so many blocks from crosses, through balls and shots……its so so difficult to break that down with so many opposition players in and around the penalty area.’

‘Total domination, Newcastle goal was a fluke.’

Newcastle set up defensively and to be fair you cannot be too critical of Rafa’s tactics.

They have a team that is more or less a Championship side squaring up to a team that has formidable attacking options and to expect them to try and go toe to toe with us is both ridiculous and unreasonable.

I thought they did okay, but we were always going to have far too much quality for them.

Their goal and the confusion in the box is largely down to the fact that we don’t have to do much defending and when we do its usually because of the high line or teams trying to hit us on the break.’

‘Most undeserved goal possibly of all time from the negative Geordies.’

‘It was one way traffic for 98% of that game. They scored from.our mistake and then almost scored soon after from Eddie’s hilarious comedy keeping but apart from that they did exactly what the world thought they would do. Sit 10 behind the ball and defend and time waste from the 10th minute.’

‘Toon showed an embarrassing lack of ambition today.

Benitez really is a dull manager.’

‘Amazing third goal – Sane’s dribble was out of this world. Should have scored double what we did though. Some good saves from the Newcastle keeper but overall, I thought we were very sloppy.’

‘I hope those disrespectful geordie f…… end up in the bottom three and almost disappear into the championship whoorl like Villa have.’

‘I thought Zinchenko performed very well today. His defensive duties may have went slightly amiss, I hardly noticed that with Newcaslte’s lacklustre attack but he looks a very tidy player and under Pep’s tutelage he looks like he be an excellent player for us.’

‘A reaction today was vitally important & thst’s what we got. Benitez set his young, energetic side up to defend, & defend with 11 men they did.

When Newcastle threw caution to the wind & came at us, we became a bit ragged, which is something I’ve noticed has begun to creep into our game.’

‘Very interesting day for me. Stood/sat in Newcastle end (I live near Newcastle and a group of mates who go to every away match had a spare).

My mates are decent and know their football but the rest are knobs. The chat before the game was full of racism aimed at Arabs, Sterling etc. Wengers dive comments have stuck. All the Sun and Talk Sport s… has also stuck. I have never wanted a player to score so much. Really pleased he ‘dived’ for the penalty.

Our singing section was rubbish yesterday.

What was really strange however is how glad the geordies were about their two results and performances against against us. Hardly the stuff of the Kevin Keegan era. They love Rafa and it was all about the goal difference to them.’

‘Newcastle fans really are some of the most obnoxious, deluded, arrogant, gobbiest set of fans around, the WWYWYWS got its regular airing every 5 minutes, the deranged half wits with their tops off, the strutting around like Billy big balls.

Big club, fine support, fantastic City but give me Sunderland every time over this lot, their fans are the complete antithesis of the Geordies. Let’s hope Amanda Staveley takes her money to the Stadium of light instead.

Ashley in.’

‘The WWYWYWS really bugged me. NUFC got an average of 16,834 as recently as 1991, but hearing them chant it over and over brought home that some people actually believe this myth.’

‘Some very good points, I love the contradiction that outsiders like to label our ground the emptyhad with thousands upon thousands of empty seats. Then rock up to the Etihad and sing ‘where were you when you were s…’ when there are 50000 plus people in there.’

‘Noticed that about the chant as well! Obviously the Geordies don’t remember when they abandoned their team in the 80’s and 90’s. I do.’

‘All things considered I think Newcastle deserve to be acknowledged for not reverting to kicking lumps out of us, as many others have done.

In fact, I was expecting them (especially Shelvey) to ‘do’ one of ours at any moment.’

‘Just like the Rags with the Emptyhad jibe, that is all the Geordies have left. They sing is every season. Just like their empty seats chant. They’ve got nothing else to sing about to opposing fans. They are after all, after Liverpool fans, are the best football fans the World has ever seen!?

But if ask any of them, St Jame’s Park, old and new, was always full.

They’ve never had any empty sections of terracing, or an empty seats. They’ve always got 50,000+ at the redeveloped St James’s Park.

They can’t remember getting 12,000 and less at the old St Jame’s Park. Getting crowds of 35,000-40,000+ at the New St Jame’s Park. The club selling discounted season ticket to fill the place, etc.

I went up there this season. Their were plenty of empty seats. Thankfully for their fans, the empty seats are grey, so they don’t stand out, and blend in with occupied seats.

But everybody loves a Geordie, so we’ll forgive their deluded and in-denial (away) support.’

‘Good win against a well organised Newcastle side. De Bruyne was poor in terms of set play delivery but we still had so much to cause problems and create chances. The Sane run was outstanding.’

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