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Sidewards/backwards football

Omg I'm surprised I've got any voice left. I must spend 75% of the game shouting FORWARDS ! I cannot understand why we spend so much of the game passing the ball sidewards or backwards. Unless we place another goal on either side of the pitch i cannot see us scoring in the near future ! I know people will say the players are low on confidence blah blah but surely they can see we need to get forward. At Reading we cheered when we touched the ball for about 20 passes and ended back where we started ! Also no one seems to want the ball in front of goal or to have a shot. They must know that if the ball is put in the area with plenty of pace on it anything can happen.. at least try for gods sake !

Comments

  • Because if they go forward they lose the ball. The performance was dross last night (don't get me wrong), but the crowd were shouting forwards when the Charlton player had 3 men in front of him.
  • Because if they go forward they lose the ball. The performance was dross last night (don't get me wrong), but the crowd were shouting forwards when the Charlton player had 3 men in front of him.

    Just a pity one of them wasn't a charlton player busting a gut to get forward !
  • I mentioned this in the match thread on Tuesday night. There were two minutes of injury time in the first half, we got a free kick about the halfway line. We kept the ball for almost all of the remaining time and not once did we get it into their box, bearing we were two down at the time. A goal then would got the crowd going and would have given the team a base to build on in the second half. In the second half we got another free kick in a similar position and the taken (can't remember who) was looking over to the bench, to get instructions on what to do with it.

    I have to ask the question, what the fook do their do in training if their don't know what to do?
  • Confidence is shot to pieces so nobody wants to take responsibility to pass the ball forwards. Also, nobody is moving off the ball .
  • There's a huge gap between midfield and the strikers. There's no off the ball movement and all we do is little triangle passes which doesn't advance us up the field. The way we have been setup in the last few month's has been awful.
  • wmcf123 said:

    Confidence is shot to pieces so nobody wants to take responsibility to pass the ball forwards. Also, nobody is moving off the ball .

    Exactly... Why risk passing forwards when you risk losing the ball and so earn the wrath of the fans.

    Have always said that if your going to boo at a Football match you have to beware of the consequences
  • angrybird said:

    Omg I'm surprised I've got any voice left. I must spend 75% of the game shouting FORWARDS ! I cannot understand why we spend so much of the game passing the ball sidewards or backwards. Unless we place another goal on either side of the pitch i cannot see us scoring in the near future ! I know people will say the players are low on confidence blah blah but surely they can see we need to get forward. At Reading we cheered when we touched the ball for about 20 passes and ended back where we started ! Also no one seems to want the ball in front of goal or to have a shot. They must know that if the ball is put in the area with plenty of pace on it anything can happen.. at least try for gods sake !

    When you see the fact we've had 2 shots on target in the last 2 games, you'd think someone high up in the club would have the nous to see this.

    It's intensely frustrating, but to me they are either playing to orders ( why are you going to go against your boss and get dropped / not picked).

    Or a complete lack of trust in each other's ability.

    Whatever it is, we need someone with the Cahoonas to suss it out & affect positive change.
  • Sadly we do have someone who can create chances (Ceballos), he proved it when @ Spurs with their U21s but only had a few games for us before getting injured
  • If we keep the ball (regardless if it goes forwards) the opposition will know they're not going to score, that means they'll try to rush our player with the ball putting them under pressure but at the same time they'll create a huge gap where they should have been...

    What our players need to learn to do (Which'll only come with confidence) is to pass to a player who'll be left free in that gap rather than playing from Fox to Bauer... back to Fox and then back to Bauer (You get the picture)

    Instead if its Judge that comes forward, Cousins (as two players for an example) should then occupy that spot, Fox can then pass to Bauer, who then passes it forwards to Cousins gaining us a few yards... If he doesnt get anywhere (because he's got no one to pass to going forwards), it can then go backwards (or sidewards), till we can try it again.

    As said, all the time we have the ball, the opposition dont have it and so cant score... Eventually out of desperation to get the ball they'll make even mistakes for us to capitalise on, putting pressure on the players to move themselves wont help... Yet another reason why I dont shout or boo at them when they're not moving quick enough.

    There are 90-mins in a game of Football, only takes a second to score.
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  • Thing is ForeverAddicted you also have to score to win a match and one shot on goal in 90 minutes, unless fired out of a cannon will probably not do it. Possession is OK if you make the opposition work hard but if all they have to do is hold their line 10yds from the halfway line you are neither making them work or threating their goal, ergo you can't win the game but you can easily lose it. On Tuesday it was even worse players started hiding, if you have played the game you know that if you don't want the ball you stand next to an opposing player. There was more than one occasion on Tuesday night when Watt went on a run and had nobody to pass to because they were all practically cuddling the nearest Preston player it was obvious.

    That means the team has no confidence, individuals won't take responsibility and we were unable to find a killer pass. You are right it only takes a couple of seconds to score a goal but currently we could pay all week and not win.
  • Sideways ,backwards =possession
    Makes the stats look good
  • Thing is ForeverAddicted you also have to score to win a match and one shot on goal in 90 minutes, unless fired out of a cannon will probably not do it. Possession is OK if you make the opposition work hard but if all they have to do is hold their line 10yds from the halfway line you are neither making them work or threating their goal, ergo you can't win the game but you can easily lose it. On Tuesday it was even worse players started hiding, if you have played the game you know that if you don't want the ball you stand next to an opposing player. There was more than one occasion on Tuesday night when Watt went on a run and had nobody to pass to because they were all practically cuddling the nearest Preston player it was obvious.

    That means the team has no confidence, individuals won't take responsibility and we were unable to find a killer pass. You are right it only takes a couple of seconds to score a goal but currently we could pay all week and not win.

    Trouble is we need to go back to basics... To win a match you have to work from the back and first have to stop the opposition scoring.

    Fail to do that and your making the job harder for yourselves
  • I mentioned in the post match views that you can't pass the ball forward if there's no one to pass it too.

    Watch KAG and Watt, both have their back to goal, both screaming for the ball but neither of them move for it. It's so easy to defend against and the player in possession has a split second choice - keep the ball or lose it.

    Twice we played it down the left channel to Watt in the first half and when that didn't work we totally ran out of ideas. One player needs to show for it the other needs to try and run the channel or behind the back line to try and stretch the defence.

    The other problem we have is that no-one in the team is willing to take a player on. The pattern is get the ball, get closed down, pass the ball sideways. Repeat. It means to opposition can keep their two banks of4 or 5 without ever being moved out of position.

    With Watt and JBG in the team we have people willing to run with the ball but if we're going to have Cousins / BA / Kashi playing so deep we really need another outlet which is why our decision not to sign a proper left winger seems even more bizarre.
  • The problem is the lack of movement off the ball - the opposition don't cover the space in front of them so the backwards/sidewards pass is usually the only possibility apart from hoofing it long. Luzon was addressing this problem that grew up under Peeters and (cough, cough) Chris Powell - but has all gone to pieces in recent weeks. Perhaps they need to look at the training/coaching routines?
  • Agreed FA you can't lose a game if you don't concede wouldn't argue with that all great teams (even just good teams) have a solid defense. But it has been pointed out there is no movement to make space, back to the players hiding they don't want the ball. Easy to defend against.
  • I think when we're playing well, playing patiently at the back works... I much prefer switching sides, sometimes via the keeper, until there's a good option to work it forward, instead of playing a fairly unaimed long ball up the line/middle, yeah it's in the area of a striker maybe... but they're up against it to win the header and the knockdown, less-so with Big Mak playing admittedly. (On a side note, whilst I like him, I think that's Fox's biggest problem - getting into dead ends on the left and hitting it up the line to no one).

    But, as we've quite clearly gone to shit, it looks pretty terrible now where our only good touches are the boring ones in our own half and then we play it forward and lose it. So we need a more direct Plan B - what I found massively frustrating was when we won free kicks on the halfway line, 2-0 down, and instead of getting it in the box - we persist with the slow play that just hasn't worked for the last hour/7 games, and never get it anywhere near their goal from it! I think sticking with something that's not working in those circumstances is something you can definitely blame management/coaching for.

    Short version: Generally prefer the patient/slow stuff, need a back-up when it's not working at all (e.g. vs Preston).
  • Complaints about it only generally appear when we are not doing well, I have no problem with it passing around the back, its not like the other team will just roll over when the ball goes forward. However we need either creative wingers or a creative central midfielder for this to work. Without them the ball is lumped forward aimlessly at forwards not equipped for this.

    This is why I think Makienok is important and has been sorely missed, you can't lump it up at Vetokele, KAG or Watt but you can at him, in his 20mins on the pitch I thought he created more than the rest of the team by virtue of being a lump. If Watt can stop playing so deep and get on the end of his flicks we might start playing effective long ball football.
  • edited October 2015
    Keep possession, don't conceed. Can not believe some of the 'booers' who constantly shout for it to go forward. We can score goals with possession football and change to hoofball if required. Things are shit at the moment, but screaming for the forward ball is not helping. Some fans are too impatient and piss me off, as does this thread.
  • 'FORWARDS!'-merchants are my absolute pet hate at football matches. You will hear this screamed from the same blokes regardless of where the ball is, our current form, who the player is on the ball etc.
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  • Sometimes you need to create space to go forwards, by dragging players out of position. You can always go forwards, like Pulis & Big Sam do?
  • edited October 2015
    We are set up with three tiers - defence midfield and strikers. They need to move forward together and back together with 10 metres between them unless we are attacking with pace on the break; making simple passes easy. If defenders sit in our half, MF don't commit forward and no movement up front, each pass to a red shirt is 30 yards and more likely to go astray. When we are tackled the ball is more likely to go into a space with no red shirt near. Quality players can paper over the cracks of this lack of shape but we have very few fit ones. Over to you Guy.
  • sm said:

    The problem is the lack of movement off the ball - the opposition don't cover the space in front of them so the backwards/sidewards pass is usually the only possibility apart from hoofing it long. Luzon was addressing this problem that grew up under Peeters and (cough, cough) Chris Powell - but has all gone to pieces in recent weeks. Perhaps they need to look at the training/coaching routines?

    But it's chicken and egg isn't it?
    Having watched carefully over the weeks particularly in away matches, it is clear that the forwards have given up making diagonal runs and the like because they know they'll never get a pass. That's because there is no vision or ability behind them to make the killer ball. So why would they waste their energy?
    No one at the back or midfield even looks up quickly enough to see a run into space, let alone make the pass. Solly and Cousins have, I'm afraid to say, been serial offenders.
  • Possession is great but we try and overplay it...there are opportunities to go forward and yet we will always play the backwards pass...if you can see that it is going to lead somewhere, then I have no problem with playing that style of football but, so far, all I have seen is constant negative football...we're still tapping it around on the edge of the opposition box, trying to pass it in to the net when we should just have a shot (only TW and JBG seem to want to ever have a go - yes I know Fox scored a goal..). Similarly, the same can be said with the free kicks - we pass it 2 yards and get nowhere....the kick to Ba on Tues in the centre circle which he then lost was a prime example of a waste of opportunity... Sometimes you DO need to get it in the box and see what happens...especially when their is a wet/greasy pitch (which ours always seems to be).. So, I will scream forwards every now and again, as I can see where there is a player/space/easy pass that we don't take.... It doesn't make me less of a fan, it just makes me someone who wants Charlton to do well but at the same time, if I am giving up my saturday afternoon and my hard earned cash (I pay for two season tickets), I don't want to sit there thinking 'why am I here, this is rubbish' (for me, you can add the crowds booing of players, the sarcastic applause for Pope and the 'you're getting sacked in the morning' chants to the reasons why it's all a bit rubbish at the moment too...)
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