Ireland

[UsualSuspect]

I know you don't want to be at Villa and would much rather be having your eyebrows threaded or getting more shit tattoos - but at least could you try and look fucking interested

[PaulWinch again]

Bit harsh, I don't think he's not trying.

[SoccerHQ]

Couple of things with this.

IMO you'll only see the best of Ireland when Gabby is back.

Ireland needs a pacy forward for his throughballs, I'm not just making this up as we saw it with him and Robinho at City.

Remember someone like Modric who I think is a similar player to Ireland wasn't pulling up any trees in his first few months at Spurs so we have to factor in a settling in process.

[TheSandman]

Needs time to bed in. That is why I wasn't keen on the idea of him coming into the team as a starter or the particularly laughable suggestion of him replacing Petrov.

[Dante Lavelli]

Harsh indeed.  The lad has hardly played in 12-months and will need to time to both get his sharpness back and also integrate with the team.

His/our problem is that the role he plays is such a crucial one (the attacking lynchpin) that it will be hard for us to carry him for a long period, however I think our patience will be rewarded.

[D.boy]

Ireland will come good, give him a chance. Getting on his back will not help the bloke.
Following the last 3 seasons we now have high expectations and become disgruntled when we aren't beating teams we expect us to.
We need to accept this season will be a transitional one with a finish around 7th-10th and hopefully we can have a good run in the cups.

[supertom]

Needs time. Needs the team to really click into Gerards way of playing too, to get the best out of him.

Also, lets not forget, he's only played a couple of times in his best position. His first couple of months here, he was played far too deep.

He'll be alright, and he's a quality player.

[Can Gana Be Bettered!?!?]

Nothing about not being interested, more a case of not being good enough and not fit to lace the boots of Milner.

[fredm]

See "Downing - Season 2009/10." and compare with Season 2010 - 11.

Needs time to get match fit and used to playing with the others.  Tried a couple of through balls today that were just cut out otherwise (forget who) would have been through on goal.  Lacked a bit of pace when he was through and tried to turn back inside and lost the ball.

[eamonn]

Nothing about not being interested, more a case of not being good enough and not fit to lace the boots of Milner.

Different type of player, when he's up and running he'll give us more going forward than Milner ever did. We'll need NRC to keep playing well (and ideally Petrov upgraded) for the midfield to click.

[jibba81]

I think X footballer is only putting Y amount of effort and blah blah blah

[Pete3206]

Ladies and gentlemen, presenting the latest fan's scapegoat.

[pauliewalnuts]

Against Chelsea, he was continually getting frustrated at not getting the ball, constantly looking for it, and frequently making use of space to pop up in useful positions.

The problem was that we weren't getting the ball to him anything like enough. When we did, he invariably did something useful with it.

It seems more than a little harsh to write a player off after a handful of games having moved from a club he'd spent his entire career at. If a player consistently doesn't do it for us, then it's fair enough to have a moan at him, but it seems a little bit much to do so when the player has only been here five minutes.

We were doing the same at Downing last season, and - in my opinion - he has been our best player this season so far.

[phantom limb]

Absolute cobblers - he's a very good player trying to adapt to a new team. You'll be sucking him off once the goals start going in.

[taylorsworkrate]

I really think this is all very harsh.  He barely played last season, has come into a club which was in chaos at the time and he's been played out of position for most of his games.

He is a quality player without question who was treated incredibly badly at Citeh.  He is the sort of character who won't respond well to people getting on his back after a couple of sub par performances.

Get behind him and we'll soon see the creative type of player we've not had since probably Merse.