Is Solidity the Key to a Good Season?

I’ll be honest, I wasn’t looking forward to the Stoke game. The place, the fans, the players and most of all the manager are all quite unlikeable. I did say a little prayer of thanks to the fixture computer though, giving us this game in August as a opposed to proper rugby weather in January.
My enthusiasm was tempered a little more by the news that Mannone was playing. I was petrified, I’m not ashamed to admit I don’t rate him. Sure I know he is young, but he’s made two or three fairly ridiculous errors in the past, and Stoke away is the last place you want to be without your number one keeper.
As it turned out, he had little to do, and what he did have to do he performed with efficiency and composure that I’m not certain that Fabianski could have managed. The fact he was largely a spectator was in the main down to a superb defensive performan...