Stoke’s dismal April form has slouched it’s way into May as the Potters lost 2-1 to Crystal Palace in London this afternoon. Stoke looked to be back to winning ways after Charlie Adam’s goal midway through the first half, but a sub-standard second half saw Dwight Gayle score two goals to secure his club’s mathematical safety and extend Stoke’s winless run to nine games.
Since impressing Hughes sufficiently last week against Sunderland, the Stoke team was unchanged, with Marko Arnautovic passing his fitness test and Bojan remaining on the bench. Peter Crouch and Adam did enough last week to encourage Hughes to reward them with another stint away from the bench.
Palace started the more offensive team in the first half: it only took two minutes for Whelan to bring down Yannick Bolasie just outside the penalty area and collect a yellow card for his troubles. The resulting free kick was hit straight at Xherdan Shaqiri, the deflection off him nearly diverting past Jakob Haugaard into the net, luckily for Stoke it spun wide. Minutes later, Phil Bardsley brought down Gayle, who then appealed for a penalty; however not only did the referee let play continue, the contact was outside the area regardless. Palace kept charging at Stoke who had no choice but to sit deep and absorb the pressure, it was enough to restrict the Eagles enough to not trouble Haugaard too much.
A real season of two halves and thankfully we had such a great first half it has stood us in very good stead for when we have struggled. And boy have we struggled in 2016. Our win at the Britannia in December was the last win we managed in the league until we beat Norwich in April which was ludicrous. It was quite odd that that we managed to beat Premier League teams in the FA Cup, including yourselves, but just not in the league. It has been hard to put a finger on it really other than an injury crisis which you guys know all about coinciding with a real loss of form. Regardless, I am convinced we have done just enough even though we are not mathematically safe. There is a view that it has papered over some cracks but to reach the FA Cup final is incredible and many will forgive our league campaign if we stay up and put up a fight for the old trophy in a couple of weeks.
It’s been common knowledge for a while that Hughes always looks to buy a striker. Not entirely satisfied with his past and present choices of Cameron Jerome, Kenwyne Jones, Peter Odemwingie, John Guidetti, Jon Walters, Peter Crouch, Mame Diouf, Joselu and Bojan: Hughes was actively looking last Winter for a new forward man. Here’s some that could be at the bet365 Stadium this Summer.
One (For the Money): Saido Berahino
Safe to safe we’re definitely in for this guy… Berahino is a 22 year old frontman for West Bromwich Albion. He’s bagged nine goals and an assist in the 35 games he’s played for the Baggies this season, although due to a bit of transfer window drama (partly caused by us) he’s only started 17 out of the 29 Premier League games he’s played in this season. Hughes has made it publicly aware that he wants Saido at the club and to be fair, we know he can score goals in the Premier League when his head is clear; not to mention that he’s a young prospect who will only mature and also helps to fill the English/homegrown sector of the squad. However, we also know that Berahino is vulnerable to public scrutiny and other external factors which can affect his game, something that may become more prominent the higher his profile is raised. Another obstacle is that Berahino’s signature won’t come without competition from other Premier League heavy hitters. Spurs have also been interested in signing Berahino as well as a host of mid-to-lower-table teams. But the biggest threat may come from West Brom’s owner, Jeremy Peace. Peace has blocked big money moves for Sadio previously and may elect to do so again, although Berahino’s contract does expire soon, so this might just ease Peace’s grip slightly, but who know’s what price he will demand?
Munas Dabbur you may say in a very confused manner? Yes, We’ve never heard of him before either.
Today The Sentinel have reported that we have been linked with the current Grasshopper no. 9 so we thought we would dig a little deeper and take a closer look at the apparent Stoke target.
Born in Nazareth, Israel in 1992 he started his youth career with his boyhood side Macabi Nazareth spending 7 years there from the age of 11-18 before moving to Macabi Tel Aviv where he spent a year on a youth contract. However, Dabbur was to move back to Nazareth to start his professional career. He spent a year back in his hometown but could only muster up 5 appearance in which he failed to score in any of them.
An apology to players who are often at the wrong end of my criticism. As the old guard at Stoke reminded the new what is missing from their game, work rate.
Like many of us come 2 o’clock I was less than amused at Sparky’s team selection, I was glad to see the return of Pieters and Shaqiri; and believed Cameron was a good option to deal with Defoe’s pace. But, I was not happy with the selection of Mr. Crouch and Adam. In fact prior to the match I tweeted this:
What's the point of playing the potato and the bean sprout
referring to the physical make up of both of my not so favourite players. Yet I was left eating my words as one was awarded the man of the match award and the other certainly deserved it.
I’m struggling, I really am. It’s difficult to take a draw such as this, when it really does feel like a loss. As I always do in this article I’ll be looking at five issues from the match that has just taken place, however I want to start off by saying that for roughly 60 minutes (More on that later) today’s performance was much better than we have seen over the past 4 weeks. It would be unfair of me to only point out the issues and not recognise that fact.
So with that in mind, let’s get started shall we?
Issue 1: The omission of Bojan
Now hold your knives and pitchforks, when the team sheet went up I (Along with nearly everyone else) slated Hughes for the inclusion of Peter Crouch over Joselu or Diouf, and Charlie Adam over what appeared to be Bojan (Given how the team was pictured by the Stoke City twitter page). However I’m not going to be ignorant enough to say that Crouch and Adam didn’t have a good game, in fact they were probably our best players on the pitch (Only beating out Arnie due to the fact they were on for longer). So no, I don’t think Bojan should have been have been ahead of either of these players (Not with hindsight anyway). It is instead Imbula who I feel should have been dropped.
It just wasn’t to be for Stoke City today as they were left heartbroken right at the death, drawing 1-1 to Sunderland at the Britannia. A much improved Potters performance was rewarded with a Marko Arnautovic goal in the 50th minute and, despite a valiant effort to keep Sunderland at bay, a Jermaine Defoe injury time penalty was enough to reignite Sunderland’s survival hopes. Stoke created much more chances, looked more defensively sound and were generally revamped compared to the previous three games; but a host of missed golden opportunities and a couple of defensive scares all but foreshadowed a blow such as this.
Mark Hughes decided to juggle with his starting XI options once again: Jakob Haugaard kept his place after being substituted on last week, Geoff Cameron moved from midfield and filled the gap in central defence after Phil Wollsheid dropped to the bench, Erik Pieters returned rested ahead of Marc Muniesa, Charlie Adam filled the vacant midfield position, Xherdan Shaqiri returned to the side in place of Mame Diouf and Joselu made way for a rare outing for Peter Crouch.
The wing is a position that Stoke have had very few recruits for in recent years. Marko Arnautovic and Xherdan Shaqiri are currently the only senior wingers at the club, with the likes of Jon Walters and Ibi Afellay occasionally covering in for them during times of need. As good as both of them have been this season, Arnie is yet to sign a new deal with the Potters and Shaqiri hasn’t come without his niggling injury troubles (although a full pre-season may solve this issue). It would be wise for Hughes to bring in some more players in such a threadbare position; and it might be a nice excuse to see some more young, big-future players at the club.
One (For the Money): Andriy Yarmolenko
It’s this man yet again. Yarmolenko is a 26 year old Ukrainian winger who plays for Dynamo Kiev. He’s played 33 games for Kiev this season, scoring 19 goals and providing 13 assists. Yarmolenko has been a long standing target for Stoke ever since Hughes took over the club, with the previous Summer being the highest profile pursuit of the forward; leading to a prolonged affair between wingers Yarmolenko, fellow Ukrainian Yevhen Konoplyanka and current Stokie Xherdan Shaqiri. Yarmolenko has a very prolific goalscoring and assist-providing record and has done for any seasons with Kiev and with his national side (23 goals in 57 caps), this obviously makes him very desirable if he can keep this record going. On top of this, Yarmolenko also is known for his blistering pace, his surprising strength and his devilish flair, often humiliating his opposing fullback before cracking a goal away. Previous pursuits have broken down before because of Kiev club President, Ihor Surkis; claiming that he would prefer Andriy to move onto a higher-profile club than Stoke. However Surkis has just revealed that Andriy is now free to leave the club (at the right price of course) and this could trigger a third Summer saga between Stoke, Yarmolenko and some crazy Ukrainian owners.
Well, if the season had started at the culmination of the January transfer window we might well have been flying high in the top half of the table, but the fact of the matter is that it didn’t, and our struggle towards the safety line has been a direct results of years of mismanagement, and particularly the decision to give Dick Advocaat the manager’s job in the summer. Sunderland, especially in recent weeks, have proven themselves to have fight – and with players like Jermain Defoe and Jan Kirchhoff, we have the ability to beat just about anyone. Leaving the Britannia Stadium with anything less than three points this weekend is just unacceptable, because it’s probably our best chance of moving clear of Norwich and Newcastle – for a week at least.
And that’s no slight on Stoke, by the way. You have a very capable squad and I’m expecting we’ll have a tough battle on our hands, but let’s be honest, Stoke have suffered from injury troubles recently and have been below par in recent weeks, so if we are to give ourselves a good chance of staying up we have to be targeting three points this weekend.
It hasn’t been uncommon throughout the season to see the occasional article linking Hughes with a move away from the Potteries in the summer to so-called “bigger clubs”, most notably a few linking him with Manchester United during the peak of our season. Now with the cluster of news outlets reporting a link between the Potters boss and a move to Everton, I figured it’d be a good time to look at three possible replacements for Hughes should he leave, just to reassure you that it wouldn’t be the end of our high hopes as a club.
David Moyes
My personal favourite from this list is ironically the man who (Arguably) made Everton the club they are today. When he first joined Everton in 2002 he took the club to 5th position in his first season, the first time they had been in the top half of the league since the 1995/6 season when they finished 6th.
What followed were 10 years of stellar performances from Everton football club under David Moyes, until he signed for Manchester United in 2013. The club only dropped out of the top 8 on two separate occasions (2003/4 and 2005/6), a record which Stoke fans should be absolutely jumping for.
