Well at least...

Our attacking play is beginning to take shape. Thought some of our forward play today was on a different level to what we've seen lately.

With Di Maria, he gives us an added dimension and we look FAR more threatening with him in the side. Whenever he got the ball today, you just knew he was going to do something positive with it. Makes a huge difference and he seems to link up very well with those around him.

Ander Herrera also looks a good buy in my opinion too, been crying out for a forward thinking and intelligent midfielder like him. He has scored two and the fact that we are getting goals from him and Di Maria is an absolute pleasure considering we hardly had any goals or assists from midfield last year. Watching him and Di Maria combine is far more entertaining than seeing Valencia smash crosses into the 1st man and Young just being Young.

Falcao still looked slightly rusty which is to be expected but he put in a peach of a cross for Van Persie's goal and he nearly scored a volley which would've made it 3-1 at the time. Interesting performance and reckon he could be deadly when he gets his fitness up to scratch.

Jury is still out on Juan Mata for me, LvG was justified in not starting him today. He was bullied off the ball for one of their goals and I still think that the games pass him by sometimes. I hope I'm going to be proven wrong and he produces his sparkling form at Chelsea when he was at his best.

Seems very odd to be praising our midfield, which I do think has been much improved with the summer signings. I have no concerns with that area and over the course of the season, will guide us to some important victories. I'd say we are up there with one of the best midfields in the league (can't believe I'm saying this) and have one of the most potent attacks too. Much improved from the Moyes area, and I won't let today make me completely lose my ishhhhh as a combination of the ref and defensive naivety cost us very dearly.

The thing that has worried me the most today is how easily we conceded 5 goals to a side who did their best to emulate Stoke (fair play to them, they went for the jugular). Their main tactic was to bombard the channels with long balls and we got murdered down our left. Luke Shaw hasn't had next to no football lately but think he would of coped far better than Rojo who is better centrally in my opinion. We lost the vast majority of the 50/50's and we need to somehow develop a nasty streak, which is quite hard when we don't really have many players who possess it. Vardy, Ulloa and Nugent bullied us all game and there were large parts of the first half where our defending nearly gave me a heart attack despite us going in at 2-1 ahead. The warning signs were there.

I know it may sound like a ridiculous suggestion and many people speak about us needing a world class centre back but in the meantime, a signing like Shawcross could really help us at the back. Granted, he isn't a star name and he can be a bit of a dirty bogga but he has attributes we clearly lack. You can't question his leadership and he is a strong character, an organiser and at 26 (27 next month), he is the right type of age.

For me, we need to stick with the 4-1-2-1-2, I hope LVG doesn't change back to the 3-4-1-2. Its imperative we try and play as often as we can with a settled back 4 and continue our progression with our improved attacking play.

Top 4 is still more than achievable, Everton lost today, Liverpool are Suarezless and weaker than last year, Spurs aren't pulling up any trees and Arsenal are only 4 pts ahead of us despite us only averaging a point a game from our first 5 matches. All of the above have had much harder fixtures but I have faith that LVG will be able to piece together the puzzle.

Bad day at the office for sure, but our style of play is TEN times better than the dross Moyes had us playing.