Binxy
Winger
If we go off the teams before and after us and yourselves.Pardew does as he's a fuckwit. Ben Arfa was playing superbly at the back end of the 2011/12 season in a 3 with Cisse and Ba. We lost one game with that three at Wigan (their usual end of season comeback) and he completely shit himself and abandoned it.
This made him go back to using Ryan Taylor as a defensive winger, sidelining Ben Arfa but deciding he needed him in the last twenty minutes if we were either drawing or behind.
Aye, I mean, just look at their career paths after they played for us. Ben Arfa (after playing for another fuckwit at Hull) moved to Nice where he scored 17 goals on the way to Champions League qualification before moving to PSG, Rennes and now playing for Valladolid in La Liga whereas Sessegnon went to West Brom, then mid-lower table Montpellier and now plays in Turkey.
Similar indeed.
On your last point, you weren't as reliant on the results against us in 2008/09 as you were in 2012-16. For four straight seasons until we were relegated the points you earned against us were the difference between survival and relegation.
Sess
PSG - 77 apps 9 goals
SAFC - 87 apps 17 goals
West Brom 79 apps 8 goals
Fatty
Marseille - 63 apps 9 goals
NUFC - 76 apps 13 goals
Nice - 34 apps 17 goals
I'd say pretty similar with Nice being the anomaly.