Calmer thoughts - frustrating but not a disaster

It is just so so frustrating to lose a game in the final minute. Nothing but time can take away that feeling of wanting to break one's head on a wall. Overall a point at Sunderland is a good point, three points was so close, but one must remember that one point is better than none.

Despite the sloppy late goal Sunderland were restricted to very few decent openings, generally we defended reasonably. The equalising goal was sloppy and this makes things even more annoying. Sagna appeared to be way out of position, the back four were not in the right shape as that high ball came in, our defensive unit was not organised at that point.

Neither Kosielny nor Clichy attacked the first ball, it was won too easily by Sunderland, two Sunderland players were then left to Squillaci where I thought Sagna should have been and It broke and Clichy mishit his clearance, an unfortunate ricochet of Koscielny then presented Bent with the goal. None of the midfielders were in there helping out or challenging at any point.

The goal was a mixture of luck, bad defending and bad defending. Song should have known better than to pick up two such stupid yellow cards, Dowd's rank inconsistency in punishing foul play compounded this decision. Rosicky's penalty miss was salt in the wound, but even the greatest miss penalties.

Irrelevant of this game I think Clichy's defensive form has been too erratic in the last couple of years, now is the time for Gibbs to be give a chance to displace him. Gibbs has the potential to be a better defender, his is tougher, more robust in the tackle and stronger aerially.

We should not get carried away in optimism or pessimism after such a draw. Our defense is bound to be dodgy at times when the back four have hardly played together before. This was evident with the goal, but also the lack of help from the midfield also stood out. If Song and Diaby had been on the field then would the first ball have been left unchallenged. There were positives, Almunia was strong, there were the negatives too. Still, all this talk hasn't made me feel any less like attacking the wall with my forehead!