Be more positive Rafa

cfloo

I love Rafa but I said it on Saturday and I'll say it again.

The man does the hard things right, he's assembled a really good team, we have two good players for virtually every position (which was his goal when he first came here) and when we're on top of our game there's hardly a team on the planet that can cope with us.

BUT conversely he does the easy things wrong such as his negative tactics. Let's admit how many times do we see the likes of Man Utd, Chelsea and Arsenal take a one goal lead with 20 minutes to go and not go and take the game to the opposition in the latter stages and get that vital second goal? Very rarely isn't it?

Rafa's problem is that his negativity is time and time again his downfall. It's OK playing that way (negatively) in cup competitions like the Champions League as draws will never knock you out of the competition but in a league situation where 3 points is a must in most games then draws certainly will knock you out of contention.

We battled hard in the second half tonight and deserved our one goal advantage, despite Everton slightly edging the first 45 minutes. We also tried for a further five minutes to double our lead but to no avail.

After that we were too eager to sit back and defend what we had. We're a far better team than Everton and they we're there for the taking tonight had we continued our momentum but we didn't

It was the same negative tactics against Stoke last week. We played one lone feeble striker in Kuyt up front (surely we learnt our lessons after Athens no?) and barely threatened all game. While we had other attacking options, as in Keane, sitting on the bench.

OK maybe Robbie's not going through the best of spells at the moment so he needs some confidence to improve but he certainly aint gonna pick up that confidence warming the substitutes bench is he?

It just frustrates me so much in the way that he's built what I think is a great team yet his sheer stubbornness and negativity is holding them back. I was only just saying to the lads after game how great we would be with a "Positive Rafa". Maybe about six or seven points clear I think.