Oh dear, apart from Torres, Liverpool's players all return from injury and ours start to go down with them.

This does not augur well and I sense an onslaught from the foamers come saturday evening.

If he isn't fully fit then drop him. He is currently out of form anyway and being on international duty too he could should be rested if not fully fit. Besides, I would like to see how Irlend and De Jong look in midfield. I think it would suit Irlend perfectly as De Jong is more defense minded to Barry and Irlend has been lost this season because he has less of a free role with us play the extra man up front.

Hope Barry's fit on Saturday - with a return of the form he showed earlier in the season, not so evident lately. Seems to me we need to win this game to get back on track and for the players to believe in themselves. We were robbed of a point at OT and we weren't allowed to enjoy the victory over Arsenal so come on City - don't give the gloaters any satisfaction in the Liverpool and Chelsea games.

Becuse of the consecutive draw record and the respective form of both clubs there are people (myself included) expecting us to go to Anfield and win.

As the man with the tache and the curly perm says "calm down, calm down".

Getting any result at Anfield - heavens preserve me even a draw - would be good going.

I ask myself why Kompany isn't an automatic pick for midfield again. Kompany, Barry, Ireland, Sweep with De Jong and Weiss on the bench seems like a great midfield for away games.

I've never known Hughes play a midfield diamond, it is the most obvious formation to go for with this four starting.

I HOPE BRIDGE GETS DROPPED SO SO POOR ,, MOVE HIM ON

oh dear...hes been awful since we played villa, cant understand why he hasnt been dropped yet when weve got a fully fit ireland on the bench who was our stand out player last year, isnt that the benefit of having a big squad being ableto bring people in when weve got injuries, suspensions or players not performing???

CTID

This is one of the big criticisms of Hughes. I am not one of the many who want him out but I do wonder at times as to where exactly he is coming from. I presume Barry went to the internationals with a soreness or not long recovered. He had a nightmare at Birmingham, was dreadful at home to Burnley and then we found out he wasn't fit. I am quite sure he played injured because he had been very good up to those two games. If he isn't 100% fit then don't play him. It is quite a simple concept. Hughes is on record as saying that he wanted top quality players to cover every position in the team. If Barry is not 100% and his game is suffering as a result, rest him. We have got two perfectly capable replacements in Kompany and de Jong. This was Hughes's problem last season. He insisted on playing players out of position then because he said he didn't have the players to fill the gaps. Now he is playing players when not wholly fit even though he has perfectly adequate replacements waiting in the wings. If Barry plays and either does not finish or has another shocker because he cannot go flat out for 90 minutes and we lose, the finger will be well and truly pointed at the manager. Liverpool, on the other hand, almost have to play Gerrard because they don't have adequate replacements so they will gamble. We don't have to gamble and we shouldn't.

I HOPE BRIDGE GETS DROPPED SO SO POOR ,, MOVE HIM ON
PATRICK DOWLING
19/11/2009 at 15:29

_________________________________________________________________________________________

Ah, brainwashed by a few Alan Hansen comments like the rest of the sheep. Look forward to Bridgey having a good game saturday.

Andrew Shaw

Spot on with your post,it appears to be Hughes achilles heel though and he appears obsessed with starting each game with certain individuals namely his costliest signing's.He mentions in an article yesterday that Bridge was only 50-50 in terms of fitness for the Burnley game,so why play him,why did he get Silvyniho,he claimed he bought Lescott and Barry and stated they could fill in at left back when signing them???

Would love to see both Kompany an Johnson if he's 100% in this one,my team would be ;-

Given

Onouha,Toure,kompany,Lescot

Ireand,De Jong,Johnson,Bellamy

Dickov (sorry I ment Tevez)

Adeybayour

Really funny about the people slating Bridge the guy has been our best player in the last 5 games and he makes one mistake and gets this!!

ethan, Gloucester

You must watch a different City to 90% of the fans on here,he's one of the 3 players I never wanted Hughes to sign(RSC & Lescott) being the others).He's the most one footed player I've ever seen and looks like a dog chasing his own tail when he receives the ball on his right side almost turns full circle to get it on his left foot,allows attackers to get goal side of him far too easily, and pretty weak in the tackle and the only reason I can see he's made it to Premier level is that he has a left foot nothing else.

The Riddler??, Manchester
19/11/2009 at 18:59

You should hear him play piano.

ethan, Gloucester

Sorry but Bridge has improved from last season, but he is far from being our best plaer in the last 5 games. I wouldn't give that prize to any of the back 4 as we have let in too many goals. Most of our goal in recent games have come from our left hand side (all 3 at burnley).

I agree about the fact that Hughes seems to play certain players even if they are injured.

This season we have played with several times with injured player

Toure has had a foot problem for most of the last month
Tevez has played with knee injury
Bridge was 50-50 for the Burnley game
Barry has had injuery we weren't told about
Bellamy is perminantly injured.
Ade's back problem

As a one off this wouldn't be a problem but in some games it has been as many as player carrying injuries and you just can't carry that many players.

I thought the reason we had a strong squad was to cover for injuries, I can't think of a position in the team we haven't got decent cover for except maybe centre half (as Ned has been injured).

Ethan, I have to disagree that Bridge was our best player the last 5 games. But he surely wasn't the weak spot in the team and got very harsh critics from Hansen at MotD that formed a lot of peoples mind about the player.

Riddler, I remember Maradonna using a leg and one leg only to play a decent game of football. Now ofcourse Bridge is not in the same league as Maradonna, and I doubt seeing Bridge in several clinics to get of the drugs, alcohol or being heavily overweighted. So nothing to compare other than the odd leftfoot. I think you are being a bit harsh on him. Even Capello seems no other competition for the number 2 spot to Andy Cole in the England team.