I agree. I would be more than happy with lower mid table, never mind mid table.
It is easy to forget just how dire we were last year at times. Sometimes I can't believe that Jose got us out of it.
Losing a game doesn't relegate us. It's losing 5,6 or 7 on the bounce that can do that. Hence why our response at home to Bolton and in the following fixtures will be so vital. We are never going to win all our games. We just need to ensure that we don't lose too many.
Two games this week are now crucial. We are lucky to be in our position as we have been outplayed on a regular basis. This squad not big enough and not good enough.
Need to look past what's happening on the pitch for a moment and see the bigger picture. New owner who has started to turn around a failing football club. Massive changes in personnel both behind the scenes and on the pitch. New pitch and money spent on stadium. Changes made to match day experience in catering and ticketing.
This project RD took on was not a one year wonder. Progress has been made at every level of the club including the team. I doubt that progress is planned to halt any time soon.
Build slowly and on firm foundations. I will be chuffed to have a season out of a relegation scrap.
Goals have been drying up and performances dropping for the past few weeks. Perhaps the fear of losing our record was stopping us from playing the football we were at the start of the season. Hopefully we may now start being more adventurous again.
From the general gist of threads on here it is obvious we are running out of steam a bit up top, but I think this is a good way to look at it. Hopefully as Queensland says we can kick on again now, coz we do need to play with a bit more adventure
Need to look past what's happening on the pitch for a moment and see the bigger picture. New owner who has started to turn around a failing football club. Massive changes in personnel both behind the scenes and on the pitch. New pitch and money spent on stadium. Changes made to match day experience in catering and ticketing.
This project RD took on was not a one year wonder. Progress has been made at every level of the club including the team. I doubt that progress is planned to halt any time soon.
Build slowly and on firm foundations. I will be chuffed to have a season out of a relegation scrap.
Exactly! In terms of adding to the depth and talent / value of the squad I would suggest they are only half way there so far. Injuries and tiredness (Bulot) will take their toll so acquiring enough points between now and 1 January to stay in the mix becomes a bigger challenge plus we are no longer an unknown entity. Church is virtually gone, Reza, Piotr and Piggott out on loan - we all know where the squad needs strengthening and it ain't the back five. I've always thought that having arrived at the right end of the table these three games (including yesterday) would be a test of whether we can compete. 0 points out of 3 not an issue but 2 or 3 out of 9 would ring alarm bells. Apart from Derby in the cup we've not had to come back from a loss so Tuesday against a team that are right down the bottom will tell us a lot about where we might be by Christmas.
Lightweight attack needs sorting a s a p .. defence is superb but we will win nothing without goals (sorry to state the obvious)
only just started reading posts today and I'm not going to read anymore as this says it all. Any striker in our team would struggle to score without service and seeing as Cousins is not a winger then that leaves just Gudmonson to supply the crosses- and he seems to prefer to cut in onto his left. The answer is out there - Big Bob just needs to see it.
PS. Although it looks good bringing players through the youth system it is only worth it if they are good enough. Point proved yesterday was we have Aherne Grant starting his first game & Millwall come back from 3-0 down by having Fuller to come off the bench. Hansen was right about not winning anything with kids - Man U were an exception that year as their kids included some worldbeaters by the names of Beckham, Giggs & Scholes.............sorry, but I don't think ours are quite up to that standard.
How did we line up? I assumed that because Ahearne Grant started we went two up top. Did that mean Cousins was pushed out left again? If this was the case then for me I think it's becoming a bit of a problem now. I don't think that system suits either Buyens, Jackson or Cousins.
We had no midfield and I had to sit next to a middle aged couple who commentated the entire second half and said "let's be having you" a good three or four times.
We had no midfield and I had to sit next to a middle aged couple who commentated the entire second half and said "let's be having you" a good three or four times.
a dangerous case of the Delia's exacerbated by a dose of the Motson's .. it is treatable but requires patience, care and complete isolation
I don't mind losing, but it's the way we lost that I didn't like. Every player bar Henderson was disgraceful yesterday.
Couldn't string a pass together had something like three shots all game. The team is so static it's a joke.
Vetokele doesn't look as hungry as he was when he first started, same with buyens.
It's no coincidence that we were winning more games with tucudean in the team and if Ahearne-Grant is the answer then dread to know what the question is.
We need reinforcements in before Bolton and certainly before Fulham. Hopefully this defeat will give us a kick up the arse that we need and we can go back to playing the football we played at the start of the season and attacking with some intent.
1 defeat at this point is still an amazing start but the last few performances have been disappointing.
Just looked at the match thread and it appears that we had more possession than we've had all season relative to the oppo yet ended up losing. First match I've noticed us with more than 50% from the stats.
Need to look past what's happening on the pitch for a moment and see the bigger picture. New owner who has started to turn around a failing football club. Massive changes in personnel both behind the scenes and on the pitch. New pitch and money spent on stadium. Changes made to match day experience in catering and ticketing.
This project RD took on was not a one year wonder. Progress has been made at every level of the club including the team. I doubt that progress is planned to halt any time soon.
Build slowly and on firm foundations. I will be chuffed to have a season out of a relegation scrap.
I never care about how much possession a team has - its what you do with the ball that counts. In that case I always look at just 3 things - number of shots on target, number of shots off target, number of corners given, In virtually every game this season we've had less than our opponents in at least 2 of the 3 in every game. It was only a matter of time that we lost - its been coming for weeks (ever since Wolves at home)
Until we turn this around & start having more attempts at goal then we will struggle to win games. I can see us losing the next 3 or 4 games...........then we play Millwall
Watched on stream, very disappointed with how we played and let in a simple goal. Agree with Henderson's saving many chances, but why oh why does he take so long to distribute the ball. I said on here a few weeks ago, that he will get himself booked if he does not get rid of the ball quicker and when we are 1-0 down it does not make sense. BP wants him to roll the ball out to defenders but all the opposition are wise to this, so kicking long to who? Come on BP think of something different. It is not all doom and gloom, and I am not expecting promotion, as long as it is not relegation
I agree with Len in as much as we need to discover if we can react. We have not seen yet how we react other than the decent 2-2 draw at Brighton after the Derby county cup defeat. In the old fashioned terms there would be a wall punching growling determination amongst the players. Maybe the exotic continental approach will be more cerebral in adversity. My advice is to play the fittest of our current squad even if we have to adapt our shape a bit.
I also think we have to suss out our opponents more in scouting and preparation. I listened to Eddie Howe being interviewed pre match and his understanding of Charlton was thorough and detailed, pre match Big Bob recognised Bournemouth were a footballing side and left it at that. I would humbly say that looking at stats and videos of opponents is maybe not thorough enough, you can get a feel for the type of team you're playing but we need a bit more. Perhaps the strangeness of English league football to many of the new faces at the club is proving tricky to come to terms with. An improving Bolton and Fulham are going to be very tough and it is possible to lose both matches. We must not let that happen.
Felt the game was crying out for George to come on. I feel he would of help link the play up a bit and get the midfield into the game more allowing us to pull there organised defence around a bit.
I never care about how much possession a team has - its what you do with the ball that counts. In that case I always look at just 3 things - number of shots on target, number of shots off target, number of corners given, In virtually every game this season we've had less than our opponents in at least 2 of the 3 in every game. It was only a matter of time that we lost - its been coming for weeks (ever since Wolves at home)
Until we turn this around & start having more attempts at goal then we will struggle to win games. I can see us losing the next 3 or 4 games...........then we play Millwall
Notwithstanding Golfie's built-in pessimism it's not too difficult to imagine this after yesterday.
You could write it off as a bad day at the office, or try to play it down in the bigger scheme of things - but it had the feel of an inevitable culmination of recent performances imo.
Up until now Bob has insisted that we stick to the plan of playing the ball out from the back, even though we had become predictable and had started to struggle as successive teams pressed us from the front.
Yesterday, either Bob or the players gave up on the plan completely. Henderson launched everything in the air to players who were not equipped to win the ball (mostly to Cousins on the left in the first half - why?). Consequently we constantly lost possession and were unable to pressure or dent the confidence of a decent Bournemouth side, who passed crisply, switched play and mixed it up a bit - if they had a Vetokele up front they might have been out of sight by half time.
Second half Bob did try to change things, and the team did come out pumped up and with a bit more tempo and determination. But ultimately we were unable to offer anything in the final third. The final act of sending Bikey up front bizarrely seemed to coincide with us ceasing to hoof it long which was surely the reason he was put there. As a result Bikey became increasingly agitated, as is his wont and in the end looked like he wanted to murder somebody (possibly Bob).
I strongly suspect that game will dent our confidence and belief and now we face a rejuvenated Bolton and Fulham.
As I said earlier in the thread it is going to test Bob's mettle to turn the teams mentality and performances around. And yes, I do realise it's "only" 1 defeat and we are still 8th. Let's not be ostriches, eh?
Those who were there, does the team spirit still look good!
There was no bickering as far as I could see but losing in that manner doesn't do it any good. One or two senior players need to stand up and be counted Tuesday night. Team changes are inevitable, bring Morrison in and play 5 at the back, Wilson in for Solly who can't play two games in 3 days, Tucadean up front on with KAG if Igor is still injured which is highly likely. Drop Buyens (Jackson plays because he is captin) play a three man midfield of Cousins, JJ and JBG or if not fit Harriott. Now shoot me down. :-) Edit ; It also gives the option of pushing Bikey up front if need be but the main aim, without a decent strike force, is not to lose no matter how negative some may view this approach for a home game. With the personnel we have available our choices are limited.
Any criticism of KAG is out of order imo. He needed the rest of the team to be on their game but they were not. No service and just hoof balls to deal with. No way was the plan for him to play 90 minutes but the injury to Igor and the necessity to change things at h/t meant he had to. He never hid and on the rare occasion he saw the ball he did ok. It seems some fans expect a 17 yr old to come in and bang in a few straight away. Not going to happen. It comes with experience. Experience comes with playing and we need to accept that until they gain that experience there are going to be bad performances, bad misses, misplaced passes etc etc but I for one am prepared to accept that because the academy is the way forward.
Age is completely irrelevant in my opinion. You get picked for the first team because you can do a job for the first team. If you can't do that job, you shouldn't be on the pitch.
Any criticism of KAG is out of order imo. He needed the rest of the team to be on their game but they were not. No service and just hoof balls to deal with. No way was the plan for him to play 90 minutes but the injury to Igor and the necessity to change things at h/t meant he had to. He never hid and on the rare occasion he saw the ball he did ok. It seems some fans expect a 17 yr old to come in and bang in a few straight away. Not going to happen. It comes with experience. Experience comes with playing and we need to accept that until they gain that experience there are going to be bad performances, bad misses, misplaced passes etc etc but I for one am prepared to accept that because the academy is the way forward.
Age is completely irrelevant in my opinion. You get picked for the first team because you can do a job for the first team. If you can't do that job, you shouldn't be on the pitch.
How many times have you seen him play mate? Serious question.
Had to lose at some point. Nothing we can do but just focus on Tuesday and get the win against Bolton. A disappointing game yesterday, surely the better side won. But we move on and get back into good form
Just looked at the match thread and it appears that we had more possession than we've had all season relative to the oppo yet ended up losing. First match I've noticed us with more than 50% from the stats.
Possibly a function of the fact we went behind early on? It was only the second time in 12 matches we had fallen behind (Huddersfield being the other).
Just looked at the match thread and it appears that we had more possession than we've had all season relative to the oppo yet ended up losing. First match I've noticed us with more than 50% from the stats.
Possession counts for nothing Len if there is no end product and unfortunately that was the case yesterday. The BBC Sport stats say 3 attempts on target. I presume the JBG free kick first half, the KAG shot and Wilson header late in injury time second half, the latter two however never looked like going in. Toothless I'm afraid. :-(
Any criticism of KAG is out of order imo. He needed the rest of the team to be on their game but they were not. No service and just hoof balls to deal with. No way was the plan for him to play 90 minutes but the injury to Igor and the necessity to change things at h/t meant he had to. He never hid and on the rare occasion he saw the ball he did ok. It seems some fans expect a 17 yr old to come in and bang in a few straight away. Not going to happen. It comes with experience. Experience comes with playing and we need to accept that until they gain that experience there are going to be bad performances, bad misses, misplaced passes etc etc but I for one am prepared to accept that because the academy is the way forward.
Age is completely irrelevant in my opinion. You get picked for the first team because you can do a job for the first team. If you can't do that job, you shouldn't be on the pitch.
How many times have you seen him play mate? Serious question.
A full 90 minutes yesterday and that's it. My comment wasn't solely aimed at him though, I would feel the same regardless of who it was. It's just a pet hate of mine that people bring age in to it, he's a professional footballer like everybody else in the squad.
Works the other way as well, if an ageing player was underperforming I'd want to see him dropped, not defended by people solely because he was 46.
Comments
It is easy to forget just how dire we were last year at times. Sometimes I can't believe that Jose got us out of it.
Losing a game doesn't relegate us. It's losing 5,6 or 7 on the bounce that can do that. Hence why our response at home to Bolton and in the following fixtures will be so vital. We are never going to win all our games. We just need to ensure that we don't lose too many.
This project RD took on was not a one year wonder. Progress has been made at every level of the club including the team. I doubt that progress is planned to halt any time soon.
Build slowly and on firm foundations. I will be chuffed to have a season out of a relegation scrap.
In terms of adding to the depth and talent / value of the squad I would suggest they are only half way there so far. Injuries and tiredness (Bulot) will take their toll so acquiring enough points between now and 1 January to stay in the mix becomes a bigger challenge plus we are no longer an unknown entity.
Church is virtually gone, Reza, Piotr and Piggott out on loan - we all know where the squad needs strengthening and it ain't the back five.
I've always thought that having arrived at the right end of the table these three games (including yesterday) would be a test of whether we can compete. 0 points out of 3 not an issue but 2 or 3 out of 9 would ring alarm bells.
Apart from Derby in the cup we've not had to come back from a loss so Tuesday against a team that are right down the bottom will tell us a lot about where we might be by Christmas.
PS. Although it looks good bringing players through the youth system it is only worth it if they are good enough. Point proved yesterday was we have Aherne Grant starting his first game & Millwall come back from 3-0 down by having Fuller to come off the bench. Hansen was right about not winning anything with kids - Man U were an exception that year as their kids included some worldbeaters by the names of Beckham, Giggs & Scholes.............sorry, but I don't think ours are quite up to that standard.
The important thing is how we react or "bouncebackability" to quote the ugly rocket scientist.
If I have a concern it is that teams below us are finding form and the cushion from danger is not that great.
If we can avoid defeat Tuesday it will look brighter.
Couldn't string a pass together had something like three shots all game. The team is so static it's a joke.
Vetokele doesn't look as hungry as he was when he first started, same with buyens.
It's no coincidence that we were winning more games with tucudean in the team and if Ahearne-Grant is the answer then dread to know what the question is.
We need reinforcements in before Bolton and certainly before Fulham. Hopefully this defeat will give us a kick up the arse that we need and we can go back to playing the football we played at the start of the season and attacking with some intent.
1 defeat at this point is still an amazing start but the last few performances have been disappointing.
Until we turn this around & start having more attempts at goal then we will struggle to win games. I can see us losing the next 3 or 4 games...........then we play Millwall
In the old fashioned terms there would be a wall punching growling determination amongst the players. Maybe the exotic continental approach will be more cerebral in adversity. My advice is to play the fittest of our current squad even if we have to adapt our shape a bit.
I also think we have to suss out our opponents more in scouting and preparation. I listened to Eddie Howe being interviewed pre match and his understanding of Charlton was thorough and detailed, pre match Big Bob recognised Bournemouth were a footballing side and left it at that. I would humbly say that looking at stats and videos of opponents is maybe not thorough enough, you can get a feel for the type of team you're playing but we need a bit more.
Perhaps the strangeness of English league football to many of the new faces at the club is proving tricky to come to terms with. An improving Bolton and Fulham are going to be very tough and it is possible to lose both matches. We must not let that happen.
You could write it off as a bad day at the office, or try to play it down in the bigger scheme of things - but it had the feel of an inevitable culmination of recent performances imo.
Up until now Bob has insisted that we stick to the plan of playing the ball out from the back, even though we had become predictable and had started to struggle as successive teams pressed us from the front.
Yesterday, either Bob or the players gave up on the plan completely.
Henderson launched everything in the air to players who were not equipped to win the ball (mostly to Cousins on the left in the first half - why?).
Consequently we constantly lost possession and were unable to pressure or dent the confidence of a decent Bournemouth side, who passed crisply, switched play and mixed it up a bit - if they had a Vetokele up front they might have been out of sight by half time.
Second half Bob did try to change things, and the team did come out pumped up and with a bit more tempo and determination.
But ultimately we were unable to offer anything in the final third.
The final act of sending Bikey up front bizarrely seemed to coincide with us ceasing to hoof it long which was surely the reason he was put there.
As a result Bikey became increasingly agitated, as is his wont and in the end looked like he wanted to murder somebody (possibly Bob).
I strongly suspect that game will dent our confidence and belief and now we face a rejuvenated Bolton and Fulham.
As I said earlier in the thread it is going to test Bob's mettle to turn the teams mentality and performances around.
And yes, I do realise it's "only" 1 defeat and we are still 8th. Let's not be ostriches, eh?
Edit ; It also gives the option of pushing Bikey up front if need be but the main aim, without a decent strike force, is not to lose no matter how negative some may view this approach for a home game. With the personnel we have available our choices are limited.
Works the other way as well, if an ageing player was underperforming I'd want to see him dropped, not defended by people solely because he was 46.