Just saw the film Theory of Everything at the cinema. A thoroughly entertaining 2 hours of the life and loves of Stephen Hawking and his studies of time.
This study is not quite as drawn out and is unlikely to form the basis of a sequel. Hawking would sit down, mull it over, before coming to the scientifically backed conclusion that we are indeed total and utter turd.
No doubt we struggle to unlock opposition defences. The real worry for me is the way we collapse in the second half. Have a look at the half time table. If we were judged on our first half appearances we'd be doing fine; but we aren't.
Thinking about why this might be, I reckon there are three major things to be sorted:
- Strength in depth: At the beginning of the season our first XI looked good but our subs looked very weak. Five months on and the transfer window behind us and this still hasn't been adequately addressed. Roly's penny pinching is in direct danger of sending us down. - Fatigue: The result of running a thin squad is that tiredness and injuries take a far greater toll than for teams with more options. If our first XI looked good back in August, it certainly doesn't any more. - Playing to the end: Successful teams are ones that don't rest on their laurels and don't give up in the face of adversity. They always play to the whistle. How many times have we conceded injury time goals? We have a team whose mentality is to play for 90 minutes (on a good day), we need a team that will keep playing on regardless of the time but until the ref says it is over.
I think this has very obviously been the problem for a long time. To some extent we even suffered from this during the League 1 promotion campaign when we were not the most prolific scorers even then.
Take the build up to yesterday's goal as an example. The poke round the player by Buyens was instinctive and you can tell by the way he starts to run after the ball he didn't know JoBerg was there.
It's a good hit from JoBerg but the final two balls were scruffy again, Watt puts it behind Buyens and then he does well to not lose possession completely but it wasn't a controlled, planned pass to a team mate in space, just a lucky poke into space which happened to be filled by a Charlton player.
I can't remember the last time we scored a goal involving crisp controlled build up play ending in a pass to a teammate in space who finishes well. When we do rarely create shooting chances at the moment there often seems to be an element of luck involved which is why I still believe our lack of goals is more to do with a lack of creative, quality passers of the ball than just a plain lack of a finisher. We create bugger all for our strikers to finish.
Normally a side with our limitations would look to be more direct but we fundamentally lack the physicality for that approach.
Genuinely believe we sealed our fate when we didn't get the required attacking players in January. Hope I'm wrong but feel we are staring down the barrel of relegation.
We lack just about everything you need to score goals in the Championship. We lack vision in central midfield. We lack pace and direct runners on the flanks. We lack crossing ability. We lack a physical presence up front. We lack delivery from set pieces and we lack players who really want to attack those set pieces when the ball arrives in the box.
As always I have to admit this is just the impression I pick up from radio commentary and CAFCPlayer highlights but as far as I can tell we're now just relying on the fact that JoBerg and, to a lesser extent, Cousins have a decent strike on them. We're not just missing chances, we're not even making them and that is when it is time to get really worried.
Comments
This study is not quite as drawn out and is unlikely to form the basis of a sequel. Hawking would sit down, mull it over, before coming to the scientifically backed conclusion that we are indeed total and utter turd.
Thinking about why this might be, I reckon there are three major things to be sorted:
- Strength in depth: At the beginning of the season our first XI looked good but our subs looked very weak. Five months on and the transfer window behind us and this still hasn't been adequately addressed. Roly's penny pinching is in direct danger of sending us down.
- Fatigue: The result of running a thin squad is that tiredness and injuries take a far greater toll than for teams with more options. If our first XI looked good back in August, it certainly doesn't any more.
- Playing to the end: Successful teams are ones that don't rest on their laurels and don't give up in the face of adversity. They always play to the whistle. How many times have we conceded injury time goals? We have a team whose mentality is to play for 90 minutes (on a good day), we need a team that will keep playing on regardless of the time but until the ref says it is over.
Take the build up to yesterday's goal as an example. The poke round the player by Buyens was instinctive and you can tell by the way he starts to run after the ball he didn't know JoBerg was there.
It's a good hit from JoBerg but the final two balls were scruffy again, Watt puts it behind Buyens and then he does well to not lose possession completely but it wasn't a controlled, planned pass to a team mate in space, just a lucky poke into space which happened to be filled by a Charlton player.
I can't remember the last time we scored a goal involving crisp controlled build up play ending in a pass to a teammate in space who finishes well. When we do rarely create shooting chances at the moment there often seems to be an element of luck involved which is why I still believe our lack of goals is more to do with a lack of creative, quality passers of the ball than just a plain lack of a finisher. We create bugger all for our strikers to finish.
Normally a side with our limitations would look to be more direct but we fundamentally lack the physicality for that approach.
Genuinely believe we sealed our fate when we didn't get the required attacking players in January. Hope I'm wrong but feel we are staring down the barrel of relegation.
We lack just about everything you need to score goals in the Championship. We lack vision in central midfield. We lack pace and direct runners on the flanks. We lack crossing ability. We lack a physical presence up front. We lack delivery from set pieces and we lack players who really want to attack those set pieces when the ball arrives in the box.
As always I have to admit this is just the impression I pick up from radio commentary and CAFCPlayer highlights but as far as I can tell we're now just relying on the fact that JoBerg and, to a lesser extent, Cousins have a decent strike on them. We're not just missing chances, we're not even making them and that is when it is time to get really worried.