So far these are the formations I have witnessed from Bob Peeters this season.
4-5-1, 4-4-2, 4-4-1-1
Not too sure why he has to chop and change during the course of the season, Is he experimenting or is he still trying to work out the best team?
I personally feel 4-4-2 is the best option so we need to sacrifice a midfielder, maybe Jackson? I think Vetokele needs someone up top with him and I don't think Tuccedean did bad at the start alongside him, even he was not scoring enough goals. We were winning more games at the start and that was the formation we played.
Also, what is everyones view with zonal marking, especially with our defenders? The fact we have beastly Bikey and experienced Ben Haim, does zonal marking really suit them? I don't think so somehow.
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I posted in the post match thread that I feel a diamond in midfield would work, I'm not too concerned if we play an extra strikeror if it's an attacking midfielder supporting. I think Gud would be best suited to that tip of the diamond role. However, that would mean letting the full backs get forward more. I just don't think Bob is willing to do that. Perhaps rightly so, our defence has been and continues to be very solid. The dilemma is, and everyone knows it, that Igor needs support.
On zonal marking, it's always brought up when wanting to criticise. It hasn't been part of our national game as long as other nations but I don't have a problem with it. Isn't it 4th in the league for goals against? Hard to argue with the facts. I'd also say zonal probably suits those two as well, Bikey isn't exactly a slouch when running as shown today and both can dominate and attack the ball when needed.
Tactically, Peeters was superb though. Some good attacking football and solid defensively. We were undone by two factors:
- Poor final ball
- A situation where the CB went maverick and the LB fluffed his clearance up
Not a Peeters issue there.
We got a last minute winner against Wigan, Huddersfield and Norwich. These things happen
There wasn't to much wrong with yesterday, considering the resources we have. We lost a good game of football yesterday to a team, I would think, will be in the top six at the end of the season.
Definitely a better way to lose than we have done in the 7/8 years, at least we tried to vary our setup.
If we had that other striker, which bizarrely I got abuse for on twitter for criticising us not getting one, we would be so much more of a threat. We are one striker away from being a major player in this league. Considering where we were last year I'm so much happier this year but we do need that other striker.
When Ipswich sensed their were 2 extra points up for grabs, they made changes to play with 4 strikers on the pitch for the final minutes.
In contrast with us, where Pope and others were trying to run the clock down for the last 10 mins.
Peeters just didn't have that luxury, did he?
Henderson
Solly/BenHaim/Bikey/Wiggins
Wilson/Coq/Cousins/Harriot
JBG
Vetokele
A few thoughts:
-Think we have gotten over the initial hump of changing to zonal marking, we look comfortable defending set pieces
-JBG needs to play in the hole think that could be his best position
-Bob needs to drill the team into shooting from range more often, to many games this season Ive seen the guys look for a pass on the edge of box when a shot would have been the better choice, players like JBG, Harriot, Cousins etc all the ability to do it 'Plenty of shots' and all that
-Getting Le Coq signed up for the rest of the season could be a huge boost
-Think worth experimenting with 4-2-3-1 at some point aswell
It won't have gone unnoticed in the football world that Bob is working very well with somewhat limited resources and he will soon start to appear on clubs radars. He's ambitious and why shouldn't he be. I hope Roland has the sense to extend his contract and offer him enough support to encourage Bob to stay loyal.
No, fair point, they are playing for Bournemouth and Swindon
Some people seemed convinced we need to buy and play as many strikers ad possible. I think they must have been to the Pardew school of management.
Murphy/McGoldrick/Sammon/ Noel Hunt - all described as strikers by the Press association.
Hunt replaced midfielder Anderson on 83.
Pardew's team is 8th in the Prem !
As for us:
Igor - no problem, but the stats don't lie..........
Church (when he was playing) (1) ?
Ahearne Grant (0) ?
George (2) ?
Harriot (0) ?
Moussa (1) ?
We had a 10 foot tall fella on the bench yesterday, heaven knows what he has to do to get a game.
Why not bring him on and let Bikey play the last 5 minutes up front ?
My point about strikers is just by buying and/or playing an extra one wouldn't necessarily mean more goals. Yesterday was better but chances created have been very low in recent weeks so the lack of goals isn't just poor finishing, in fact more of the better chancres fell to midifelders and defenders running from deep yesterday. Lumping an extra striker in probably wouldn't have made much difference.
Yesterday .. McCarthy outthought Peeters .... As you say we looked nervous and were playing for time towards the end so MM sent on extra strikers, the big tough Sammon and the crafty Hunt to really wind up the pressure .. it worked. McCarthy has years of managerial experience, he also has a well resourced team of players, he can almost sniff out weaknesses in the opposition and metaphorically knows when to go for the throat. Peeters is a new boy, he will learn and hopefully before too long he will have a new player or two to work with
You can't buy experience.
McCarthy has been round the block again and again.
And he would have done his homework on Charlton.
He'd have known that we sit behind the ball late on when we're running out of steam and have something to hold on to.
And you bet he set up his bench to pose us some fresh problems, when we start to flag.
More important than easy to understand schematics for the hard of reading is having the right players in the right positions (as far as squad depth allows) - not having square pegs in round holes - making sure each bloke knows what his role is and giving the shirkers and thickos a thorough lambasting when they slack off or get it wrong.
Eg asking a youngster who has done most of his youth football as a right back or centre half to play as the left sided midfielder of a 4 is just plain daft. It gets worse when there is a hopelessly one-footed so called winger whose right foot is barely useful for standing on and never for kicking let alone crossing, Bob plays him on the right and for the half hour or so that the workshy icelandic show pony is asked to play on the left he hides away and doesn't try a leg.
4-4-2, 4-5-1, 4-3-3 are all equally irrelevant and dismantled by this kind of thinking - we end up playing with 8 outfield players at best cos 2 are so easily snuffed out by their own limitations/attitude before the opposition has to worry about them.
Let's remember that this season wasn't about "mounting a serious challenge"
Harriott not good at crossing and played well with Sordell at the end of last season so he's been given a chance up front with Vetokele.
Church - gone
Piggott - out on loan
Reza - out on loan - could he have done a job?
Tucudean - not so good at Liege - occasional flashes but...
Let's face it CAFC has built a decent squad (with cover) for ten out of 11 positions after the squad of the last three years was dismantled. And they've done with just one big money signing and some decent loans.
Whether the club invests in January or the summer we are on the right path. Those criticising our performances this season either forget last season's fun in the bottom six or like to write flame like messages to get a rise from other fans.
We have been in the top ten all season and it's as obvious as the dogs proverbial as to what is required to move onwards and upwards.
We had a below average team (on budget) and only one decent striker.
So he decided to play to our strength, which was our defence.
Keep it tight and try and nick a goal. It worked, we were unbeaten, but after about 10 games the opposition had worked us out.
Bournemouth, our first defeat, showed that if the opposition scored first, we had no plan B.
We went one down at the start of that game and still carried on defending.
So more teams went for us early on and we had no reply.
I think Peeters, was rightish, to keep this tactic away from home and maybe at home against the top teams.
But where he really lost the plot, was keeping the same tactic at home against the poorer teams.
He still defended against Millwall (D) Blackpool (D), Cardiff (D) and Brighton (L).
We should have attacked those 4 and I believe we would have gathered 12 points instead of 3.
I can imagine Bob Peeters said this when we played the mighty Blackpool and Millwall !
Under Bob, it was like watching paint dry,
Since Norwich H/t It feels like we want to paint the town red.
I said Luzon started with the biggest deficit any Head coach as ever had,
Manly because of the process of selection.
He's winning me over because not only does he have some idea How to set the team up
to play attacking football but when a opposition player is giving us grief, as Antonio did last night. He can delegate Gomez and Bulot to negate the threat.
He was very Pro active as we were 2-1 up, but spotted the danger( I don't have too tell him what to do at H/T since Norwich).
Hearing Guy Luzon say we played beautiful Football against Huddersfield( we did)
Sexy football must be coming soon.
Our squad may not have been the best but there was no ambition in our play and it was pretty dire to watch.