Mike Phelan

I realise this post can be easy to say in defeat, but this is something that I've been thinking for a while... it's time to ship out Mike Phelan and his short shorts.

Phelan is completely out of his depth - he lacks the tactical nous, an appreciation for continental football and a touchline charisma. It's no coincidence that our period when we played our most attractive football was when Queiroz led the training sessions or was ordering players from the touchline. Ever since Queiroz has left, our style has slowly degenerated from a free-flowing 4-3-3 formation with rotating forwards (Ronaldo, Rooney, Tevez) to an old-school rigid 4-4-2. I realise we have reached CL finals and won the league since Phelan took over, but most of that has been down to a system and legacy laid down before, which over time is slowly crumbling.

How many times have we been hopelessly outplayed this season? City both games, Benfica, Basle, Atletic Bilbao, Wigan... the list goes on. And this is not symptomatic of this season, this has been happening for the past 2 years.

Changes are required in the staff this summer, and this needs to start with the removal of Phelan and the appointment of an experienced and cultured man with new ideas.

The derby to end all derbies

I realise many moons have passed since I last posted, but tonights fixture has convinced me to don my keyboard once more.

Firstly, credit to City for keeping the faith (despite Mancini telling the press another story) and making this title race one of the most exciting in recent years.

Fergie has said we should go for the win. I'm not sure whether this is gamesmanship as I think secretly the main objective for him tonight is keeping a clean sheet after October's debacle. City need to win - we do not. I hope we play 4-5-1 and look to smack them on the counter-attack. De Gea, Evra, Ferdinand, Evans, Valencia, Carrick, Rooney will definitely start. Assuming, we play 4-5-1 that gives us a few conundrums:

Right back: Rafael, Jones or Smalling? If Dzeko plays, Smalling could be quite useful in the air. I personally would like to see Rafael play, simply because he gets forward and has a good understanding with Valencia. Plus having him bombing down the wing will hopefully give Gael Clichy something to think about.

Left midfield: Young or Nani? I'd go with Young here as he is quite useful at drawing fouls and taking set pieces.

Central midfield: Scholes, Giggs, Cleverley, Jones? Assuming Carrick starts, I'd go with Scholes and Giggs. Jones doesn't quite seem to have the awareness of where his central mdifield partner is, which has left gaping holes in other games. Cleverley has been extremely poor since coming back from injury.

Overall, I can see tonights game being tight, tense and very nervy. Tevez will have a point to prove so I think we'll have to be careful with him, and I wouldn't be surprised to see Balotelli on the bench either. Lose tonight and the momentum is firmly with City and they will win the title (and we will only have ourselves to blame after Wigan and Everton).

I'm going for a 1-1 draw. COYR