Wigan & Sheff Utd both superior to us in terms of physical strength, ball winning & desire to win. They were both limited teams but they both had a job to do & stopped us from playing. I think we will have more room & opportunity to play football against the remaining 3 sides, two of which have nothing to play for.
Having said this we have to get out of this long aimless punt down the middle stuff, this is one of my main problems with Borat & Diawara - they have done quite well defensively in recent weeks but as the guys often playing the ball out from the back, they just hit & hope - meat & drink to the likes of Morgan & De Zeeuw.
I still think we can win at Blackburn but it's time for a rethink team wise. We have been poor recently & this looks like costing us dear. My side would be (if fit)
Carson
Young - Borat - Diawara - Thatcher
Romm - Holland - ZZ - Thomas
JFH - Bent
I would be tempted to bring in Bougherra for either Diawara or Borat, as he looks more likely to play teh ball out of defense. Song has been poor in recent games & should be dropped - JFH is the kind of player who will snatch a goal from nowhere & thats what we need right now. Ambrose/Thomas/Rommedahl are interchangeable - all are too often ineffective but again all can be match winners if given the chance. ZZ looks like he cares & can hold his own with Holland next to him. Lets get back to 4-4-2 & pass the frikkin ball not lump it.
My favourite moment today was "expert" TV pundit Trevor Francis saying that Charlton have Jimmy Floyd Hasselbench on the bank - clueless twerp.
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Comments
When we were in front Song gave the ball away in some daft places and put us under more pressure.
His booking was plain dumb too, nothing to be gained from that and he was on egg shells for the rest of the afternoon same as against Reading.
Thatcher was crap too.
According to Pards Thatcher picked up an injury and he wanted to substitute him before the scored but couldn't get the officials to do it.
I expect people wil take the Mick but Kish would play well in that midfield. Today was just the type of game for him. Song could do with Kish's support.
Don't really want to single people oput too much though. It just wasn't a good team performance. We lack the quality that, dare I say it, Andy Reid might've been able to offer.
Spot on, Ambrose, Rommedahl & JT can't tackle for toffee
He has had only 1 striker to pass to in the last 2 games which I can;t fathom. I would rather have played Rommy up front as a pair with Bent.
I think you'll find Thatcher was totally at fault for the goal he completely missed the ball ..
I think you'll find, according to Pards, that Thatcher was totally injured for the goal and he was trying to substitute him.
As for Kish, I don't think he is "past it" and I would have loved to have him on the park at 1-0 to close people down and grind it out. Song was terrible in that spell after we scored although he is clearly a decent player.
Also, I think Pardew should really encourage the Elk to run the ball out of defence a lot more rather than hit those dreadful long balls down the middle when we have no height up front, its such a waste.
I would like to see us be a lot more patient in possession, try to really play more possession football to try and draw teams out of position.
On the wide men, Thomas was dreadful again whereas Rommedahl looked the goods and would have been more effective if we could have got him more ball. The bloke can't do much if the ball is being pinged around 20 feet in the air.