We always talk about saving money by finding the next player before joining a big club and gaining notoriety, I think we've done that in Joe. He's going to be a big player at our club.
Yeah he was rattled because Stoke targeted him all day, and he just about survived.
I've seen a few remarks about Stoke that they've moved on Pulis, and they keep it on the deck now, which just strikes me a rote-repetition of handy soundbite about Stoke that people can repeat without ever having to sit through the shit they serve up.
Their primary tactic all day yesterday was long diagonals from the back line and the goal keeper, even straight up the line, onto John Walters head and then try to pick up the pieces after that. They did it because it's a strength of his and he was up against a debutant teenager who'd never played in the Premier League.
I'm not saying it's in anyway invalid, but they certainly do play extremely directly nearly all the time still as far as I can see.
(Their other tactic what big loopy passes down the channel to let Diouf pressurise Skrtel with his pace. Again, extremely direct.)
Thought Joe Gomez just about survived in that he was beaten a few times by Walters and once that put us in real trouble when Lovren came out to clean up and did't get there. It lead to Johnson's chance which was the best of the match. But he
did survive, and at least some of the other options for that position (Enrique, Moreno, Can, Flanagan) would've folded or come up way worse against that kind of bombardment.