This is City

Worst game ever, say the Toffees

THERE is one thing that fans of both City and Everton are likely to agree upon, yesterday’s games kicked off too early and the first half was bad.

One Everton fan described the game as one of the worst he has ever seen, and he is worried that their side is struggling to score at the moment.

Everyone is still shaking their heads at the Danny Mills 25-yarder that kicked the game into life and there was plenty of laughter in the stands as it flew in.

Pompey fans blame keeper

THE Portsmouth fans pinned the blame for their 2 - 1 defeat at Man City on a goalkeeping blunder from Sander Westerveld.

Pompey's keeper failed to hold on to a cross from Joey Barton and only succeeded in popping it up for Claudio Reyna to hit home, equalising Viafara's goal scored from a well worked Portsmouth free kick.

Brum fans call for strikers

BIRMINGHAM City fans say their team’s lack of firepower is going to cost them this season and reinforcements are badly needed.

The PlanetBlues website said that the defeat to City showed that the season had started too early for the St Andrew’s outfit.

Fan’s view from West Brom

THE view of yesterday’s stalemate from the West Brom side shows they were thankful for the services of on-loan keep Chris Kirkland.

The official Albion website said that an away point in the opening game was down to Kirkland pulling off ‘a string of fine saves to deny City debutant Andy Cole, Joey Barton and Claudio Reyna’.

WBA Mad said that Baggies boss Bryan Robson would be more that happy with a point away from home but also recognised the makeshift element of City’s back four.

City's Stuart Pearce was forced to field a makeshift backline in the absence of Richard Dunne and Sylvain Distin, with David Sommeil and left-back Stephen Jordan playing as stand-in central defenders.

Over on the WBA Zone their headline summed up the feeling ‘Solid start for Albion’ whilst some of the fans wondered why speed merchant Robert Earnshaw didn’t get a run out.

Considering our back four wasn’t exactly blessed with pace I was glad to see him warm the bench for 90 minutes.

Blending young Blues with the new

POSITIVE words for the forthcoming season from the Square Football website who believe a strong pre-season has provided a launch pad.

I must agree we have been able to give some of the younger players a try out in these games, and with a few new faces playing alongside them the squad is looking tight.

Square Football write:

With the acquisition of Darius Vassell from Villa and Andrew Cole on a free from Fulham, Pearce could have done far worse.

And the piece finishes off with a wry observation, saying that Pearce hasn’t made a key signing yet, his next one has to be the key one.

Call for consistency

THE Independent newspaper takes a look at the forthcoming season, and the last, through the eyes of Ben Collins from the footy-mad stable of websites.

In the article Ben hopes for something that all City fans have been calling for since the year dot. Consistency.

No Shaun Wright-Phillips to rely on so can't afford to have more than two or three players having an off-day during the same game. Consistency is needed throughout.