Congratulations on your 5-0 win. Those 3 points will come in very handy in your pursuit of 4th place.

Fully agree

Probably so.

... me too.

Well I disagree.

Mancini is a step above Hughes. 4 Italian Cups and 3 Serie A titles in his short career against fresh air from Hughes.

Man City aren't in a position right now to capture a Hiddink or Mourinho, unless they got very, very lucky.

The major worry from Citeh's POV is if Mancini struggles with the transition to the PL. That could mean Citeh don't qualify for Europe. I think Hughes should have possibly been given time to either succeed or fail, but if the Citeh players were indicating their lack of belief in Hughes that could have been what made their decision.

If Mancini was at the stadium today though both Citeh and Mancini deserve to fail. Disgusting if they came out with that stunt. If that was the case they should have sacked Hughes before the game so he didn't have to suffer with having to go through the whole of today knowing he was out.

Seems very badly handled (as always) by City, especially if Mancini was in the ground. I thought MH would at least be given until the end of the season. City's last result before he took over was an 8-1 defeat at Boro. Transforming a team from that level of performance to Top 4 is no easy task no matter how much money is spent.

The strange thing about MH's tenure was how un-Hughes like it all seemed. When he was appointed I expected him to produce a solid, hardworking if dour team. Even with the sudden riches I thought he'd stick to his basic principles. Instead he persisted with selections that always seemed over adventurous and was surprisingly reluctant to make substitutions aimed at protecting leads. And TBH watching today's match it made you wonder whether the players ever do any defensive work in training.

Havent a clue how good Mancini is but he's got a lot on his plate, having to bring in a completely new coaching team, the Xmas programme, the loss of players to the ANC & injuries, the January transfer window. Does he speak English?

That's a false argument IMO, and one I've heard many times. The 8-1 wsan't an 8-1 that got a manager sacked, it was an 8-1 that happened precisely because the manager was going and everyone had known it for a while.

From memory you'd given up well before Sven left.

Hughes had the full pre-season, so I really don't think he had to pick anything up from the 8-1.



He ended his career at Leicester.

I read today that he's been over here pretty much since he was sacked by Inter, so I'd expect he speaks English quite well.

Time for Bolton to f*ck Megson off now and get Hughes in. Proved he could do it at Blackburn, hopefully he could do the same at the Reebok.

Ban yourself!

Maybe a very good call that

time is running out on rafa now has to be

Ooo, you filthy mind.

I meant flick

He has to be on the thinnest of thin ice just as long as nobody mentions Mark Hughes for the job





The problem will be his big fat contract he signed not so long ago !!

wash your mouth out

You know what the papers are like

I must admit that made me laugh

The ad campaign is Rafa saying, "The bitter is perfect, the taste is perfect, they never do a bottle wrong."

I must admit, the appointment of Mancini does not fill me with any great excitement. I never thought we'd get Mourinho but Guus Hiddink would definitely have been my first choice.

Can't exactly say I am delighted about how we have gone about it. Mancini has obviously been lined up for a while and, in that respect, I feel a bit sorry for Leslie who has been an honest toiler.

That said, he was clearly out of his depth and wasn't helped by a distinctly underwhelming backroom staff. Which ever way you look at things, Hughes, Bowen, Niedzweiki and Hitchcock were never going to lead us to the promised land.

Today's game summed up perfectly the shortcomings. Once again, we concede three preventable goals and, once again, it's left to individual performances to pull us through. I have to be honest and say that if we had Taylor and Robinho playing all season rather than Given and Bellamy, then we'd be way down the table. Then again, if we'd had Arsenal bloody Ladies centre half instead of Toure then we'd be a lot higher.

Unfortunately, Hughes has been let down badly by some of his signings but he chose those players who are clearly not good enough/strong enough/mentally 'up for it' enough and he has badly neglected other areas when people could see those areas needed addressing before he started buying icing for the cake he did not have.

As for Mancini, well, I'm not exactly over the moon but if an Italian can't sort out our comical defence than no-one can

Bentez: "I have seen the replay and for me it is not a sending-off, but anyway the referee was perfect. He didn't make any mistakes. Now Javier is injured, and I will say again the referee didn't make any mistake."

Press: "We don't understand? You say the referee didn't make a mistake?"

Bentez: "No he was perfect. Perfect. He was perfect."

Press: "So why was it not a sending-off?"

Bentez: "I have seen the replay, for me it's not a sending-off, but anyway. Perfect."

Press: "Was there any particular reason why players like Gerrard or Torres couldn't get it together and perform?"

Bentez: "No, the referee was perfect so Torres, he didn't have any problems."

Press: "You were a goal down before the sending-off, the average observer wouldn't say you were controlling the game at half-time. Why do you say it turned the game when you were a goal down already?"

Bentez: "If you see we created a couple of chances and we have plenty of possession in the first half I was convinced we could change the game."

Press: "Can you just explain what you said about the referee?"

Bentez: "Perfect. No mistakes."

Press: "But you say he made a mistake with the sending-off."

Bentez: "Perfect."

Press: "Don't you think Torres was fortunate to escape being penalised for that elbow?"

Bentez: "The referee was perfect."

Rafa is a fecking clown!



Awful defeat for Utd yesterday, completely outplayed from start to finish.

Feel for Hughes, win the game in hand and he is right up there challenging for 4th spot. Not sure why they have gone for Mancini, very odd appointment.

Benitez is the most un-media friendly manager in football. His interviews baffle me.

Hughes is a victim of the transfer window system. I think he would have been given until summer if it hadnt been likely that he would spend another £70m or so.

wont the new manager be doing the same

or at least get rid of the dead wood within the team