Blues will be away at Bournemouth in Round 5

Pleased considering the teams left in it.

A big step up however from the first two rounds and arguably the Cup properly starts now for us with a trip to the place where it all started going badly wrong on the last Saturday in November.

Got to at least get them back at Goodison for the replay.

It started going wrong around two seasons ago.

Considering the pressure at home and the fact we’re better on the counter, I’m not unhappy to be away.

I was thinking the same thing too. Without Stones and Barry, albeit against poor opposition, we looked a little bit quicker and fluid, but we’ll have to see how we play without those two in the Premier League. But the manager probably will never do without Barry unless he has to.

Think you will find that we were cruising at two-nil up with McCarthy & Barry holding the middle, both these guys were also covering the right or left side’s which allowed our full backs to attack. However, RM being RM, took McCarthy off and put Cleverly on; total fuck-up, because we all know what happened next. Yeah, Barry did have both sides & the middle to cover as dream boy Cleverley did whatever it is that Cleverley does – usually "totally disappear".

For me, Barry has been a stand-out player this campaign.

Normally, McCarthy covers middle and right, leaving Barry to cover middle and left, as he did in his first season. The old No 4 and No 6 roles. Unfortunately, Barry no longer has the legs to continually get across to cover the left-back so we are left with a big hole. An 18-month-long hole. Ask Garbutt, ask Galloway, ask Oviedo, ask Baines.

In the Bournemouth game, the huge hole was there from the beginning and, during the half-time break, Eddie Howe decided to do something about it. They came out for the 2nd half with ex-Spurs lad, Adam Smith, in the right-back position and he immediately pushed forward into the hole and started to give us trouble. McCarthy went off in the 67th minute but Bournemouth were already all over us. Gosling, Stanislas, Ritchie, King and Co fighting like tigers and protesting every decision.

In the 80th minute, we were defending deep and blocking one shot after another but Adam Smith finally smacked a rocket into our net. You know the rest. We thought we had won the game in the last minute but the ball came across to Adam Smith who went on a run past statuesque Barry and Cleverley before slipping the ball to the guy on the left who made the assist for the equalizer.

Against Carlisle, before the subs, We had Cleverley in the No 4 role and McCarthy in the No 6 role where he could cover Oviedo. A very balanced line-up. No holes, apart from Jags trying his suicidal high line now and again.

Let’s get this straight. Barry is a favourite of mine but, for over 18 months, we have conceded goals by the bagfull and he and Howard are always present. Something is not right. Something has to change. Yesterday, whilst discussing our defensive weaknesses, a pundit suggested that our back four were not getting proper protection and he might well be right. Let’s hope we fix it.

Same with Lukaku regards Kone. When we are on top and getting at teams this system might work, but when the attacking intensity dies, we have nobody filling in on the left, which makes Barry’s job virtually impossible.

How good is Lukaku without that help from Kone? I personally don’t think it’s worth sacrificing our shape to find out, and also think it’s a major reason why we are conceding way too many goals. No wonder we are 12th.

4-3-3 or 4-1-4-1 would solve the issue. We don’t have the players to play our current system, in my opinion.

Apart from a brief spell last season when he made forward runs and scored a few goals, when McCarthy plays with Barry, he seems to do less. When Besic plays with Barry he still seems to do more. Maybe Barry and McCarthy are just too similar, or perhaps McCarthy is overawed in some way by Barry?

Barry has been very good this season but the time will come for a big decision there. I also got the impression that McCarthy would make a good ball-playing centre back if needed.

Big decisions, just Roberto’s thing. I suppose the Grim Reaper will be back in goal on Wednesday.

The issue is the positioning of the team. We are either too deep and are not able to press properly, meaning that we concede a huge number of shots on our goal (there are statistics floating around showing a substantial increase in shots on our goal this season which is comparable to relegated teams), or, when we attack, the DMs are not sitting but instead further up the pitch, trying to win the ball back in the opposition half.

How often have Barry or McCarthy sat between the two CB providing cover when we are attacking, as you would expect a DM to do? Or wide covering the full backs? Not too often. McCarthy can be found near the halfway line applying a press on his own (whilst his team mates watch on), Barry a little behind him, positioned to pick up anything lose. If the opposition go route one and have pace upfront, on numerous occasions are two CB’s are left alone to battle it out.

This was borne out by an appearance Martinez made on MNF where his tactics were questioned by Jamie Carragher. He was shown a still where his two CBs were the only 2 players back and he said he expected them to win their individual battles if we were facing a direct counter attack.

I think if Barry and McCarthy were instructed to play as covering midfielders, sat in their half ready to fill spaces behind the full backs, you would see them providing better cover.

With Barry in the middle and our other DM, Besic, marking Willian, Oviedo was getting murdered by 2 or 3 Chelsea lads in the 2nd half. With no halfback on that side and Deulofeu in his own little world, Oviedo was being unfairly blamed for all crosses coming in from their left wing.

Another interesting point from the Barcelona game the other day. With every man in the box defending a corner or free-kick, whenever the ball was cleared, even to the opposition, every player dashed out of the box at full speed. We tend to stay deep.

I don’t know what the answer is but most teams get it right while we remain wide open.

Barry is not in the team for his speed as even at Villa he was no "Husain Bolt". However, his positional play and ball winning is second to none hence the mega transfer fee paid by City. But yeah, I will agree that your game analysis is fairly spot on but for me, will RM replace Barry?? Even with a fit Besic and McCarthy I don’t think RM will do that..

IMO I thought Oviedo had a good game at Chelsea, even playing at RB. But oh yes, you are so right, whoever plays at full back for us and has Deulofeu playing in front of them must know that they are in for a long afternoon.

Supporters keep calling out one player or another all season, and making them the sole reason we’re defensively inept, but the bottom line is the system.

The reason we concede so many goals, is never down to one player alone.

Totally agree. We are seeing teams coming to Goodison and using this high pressing game, with their forward players doing a double shift and really earning their wedge.

Then I watch our lot!!! Pressing, do they have any idea what this means, we all know who they are; Kone, Deulofeu, Lukaku to an extent and Barkley – they will all watch the opposition play the ball out of defence. Actually Deulofeu has had me in stitches, I think it was against Stoke, as he seemed to be having a conversation with his opposite number who was in the process of playing a totally sweeeet ball to his forward players. You know what, I think Deulofeu actually acknowledged that it was a totally sweeeet ball.

Yep, we can take it that RM has absolutely no time for the pressing game.

Other than that I can't put too fine a point on it either!