Teddeer

Tino against Zaha is a worry. Think he'll take him to the cleaners and Palace may well target him because defensively he's not been great for a while now. Ralph should have rested him for this one.

I hear it's nice living in cloud cuckoo land.

I see Vieira is using the old reverse psychology trick on his Palace players by telling them how good we were against Arsenal. Yeah Patrick, we were sensational.

Lucky for him we gifted them 3 points in typical benevolent fashion.

Something not right about this injury. Funny how it miraculously cleared up for the Scotland games but then flared up again immediately afterwards.

Good return or poor return? Pretty obvious how it's going to go if you have been watching Saints and Ralph's tactics/strategy lately. Don't think we're suddenly going to put in two decent performances with good results. Still, he'll have the injuries to use as a ready made excuse and, in some ways, that's a relevant argument I guess.

Maybe Palace should start him tomorrow if they are looking to reignite his goal scoring.

Yeah, God forbid we go into a slump!

Do you think players make decisions on where to move to based on where their mates play?

Unfortunately I think he is still taking the majority of corners albeit his delivery is abysmal. He used to whip them in with pace and bend but now he hits pathetic floaters that are food and drink to any goalkeeper and often lead to us being hit on the counter attack. He has lost his mojo and needs a spell on the subs bench because we looked a better side without him when he served his 3 match suspension. He seems sluggish and cost us the second goal at Arsenal when Redmond won the ball and JWP decided it would be a good idea to present it back to them. And don't get me started on his ridiculous decision for the free kick against Brighton. At present he is contributing very little to a struggling side so time he was dropped but we know Ralph won't do that.

Arsenal could and should have scored more. Even aside from their 3 goals they created far better chances than we did. We were lucky this was not a 6-0 thrashing.

This should be a walk in the park for Palace. Ralph will continue with his formation and tactics that clearly are not working. Best we can hope for is a one nil defeat but fear it will be worse than that.

On target! We'll need to beat Palace to scrape the 5 points and that aint happening so the pessimistic forecast of 5 points was actually very optimistic.

We can't possibly stray from Ralph's brilliant play book which every other manager in the Premier League is desperately trying to get a copy of.

His system, the way he sets us up and the way we play is the major problem but he is too stubborn to admit he is wrong so we continue to rinse, recycle and repeat and commit the same errors. If he will not change then he must go. He has for a long time proved the definition of insanity and it cannot continue.

Well, they'd convert hardly any chances so not a lot different to when the main strikers are playing.

Nail hit firmly on the head.

Much of what you say is correct. However, you imply that the current playing system is the only one we can adopt despite admitting that it does not work. We can all appreciate that Ralph is working on a very limited budget so he either has to alter his tactics and the way he sets the side up for games to make us harder to beat or we sack him. There is no point leaving him at the helm of a ship that he is steering onto the rocks because he is too stubborn or not bright enough to change course.

Some excellent points here that are hard to refute.

It has nothing to do with this one result. These poor performances have been happening over a long period and Ralph keeps making the same mistakes and using the same flawed tactics as though he expects it all to magically come right. It won't. He is a busted flush and it's time for a change for a myriad of reasons that have been highlighted on here by many different posters. And before the 'who will we get in his place' brigade start there must be some good managers, both young or experienced, around who would jump at the opportunity to come here and have a chance of showing what can be achieved with a bit of passion and tactical nous. Not sure we could do worse than what we are being served up at present. Yes, it's a risk but better to take a chance than sleep walk towards relegation. Clean out the inept coaching staff as well and bring in fresh eyes with fresh ideas.

I doubt we'd have gone to the trouble and expense of hiring Caballero if Fraser was only going to miss one match.

Spot on. You can forgive it now and then but this is another continuing trait that Ralph fails to address. I don't see other sides continually hit on the break after their own corners. One of the big reasons is the poor deliveries from JWP. He has gone from whipping dangerous balls into the mix which are hard to defend against to floating in easy catches for the keeper who can then launch the ball into the wide open spaces vacated because we have defenders up for the corner. It has to stop!

Whether it's Arma, Chez or Lord Lucan up top we are clearly not equipped to play this pressing style other than for a very limited period of every game. During this short window we look very good but we cannot sustain it for long. If the manager is too stubborn to admit to this glaring tactical ineptitude we will continue in the same vein and relegation will become a real possibility. He has to change our approach because his tactics are not working. I couldn't care less what principles he abides by and what his beliefs are as to how the game should be played. His way is not working for us.

We'd blown ourselves out by then and Arsenal had us sussed and just proceeded to pick us off at will. It's a depressingly familiar pattern but our stubborn manager refuses to learn. It's rinse and repeat week in week out. Bored of it now.

Don't think it's in the play book.