Look forward to watching matches over holiday period but wasn't sure what to expect after our poor away form and WBA patchy home form.
Spence and Byram in made sense, but not Gruev for me, would have had Gray in midfield.
Cooper steps in for injured Struijk and Gnonto in for James and ultimately that is a whole lot of changes when switching LB and RB and with Darlow in as well.
We start well in terms of possessions, but nothing on goal, it feels like its one of those lightweight displays and every time WBA get a ball forward they look dangerous.
Whenever I've watched Gruev he's done nothing so was looking forward to seeing what he could offer but it was more of the same, passing backwards or sideways and seemingly;y always positioning himself in such a way that no-one passes to him,. literally as if he doesn't want the ball.
And as for his corners and free kicks, he had free kick near end of match, it was probably the worst free kick I have ever seen in 50 years of watching football. He is a complete dud.
Next up Piroe, almost completely anonymous, I think he is being played in wrong position, we need a target man up top, not in midfield.
I thought Rutter ran his socks off but with no one ni box, there is just no end product.
Summerville had lots of teh ball, but same thing, no end product.
Gnonto, very disappointing, just shooting at wrong time all the time, was no surprise to see him subbed off. It's not often I miss VAR, but I'm sure if we'd have had that, we would have had a penalty for Gnonto....very diplomatically handled by Farke.
Compare Spence going forwards to Ayling going forward and there is no comparison, but Spence made crucial block on line otherwise this would have been 2-0.
Full backs had tough time, maybe because playing with different players in front of them, but that is really no excuse, I think it is very lightweight midfield that allows us to get cut through with ease, Ampadu was doing his best but Gruev did nothing, I really felt we missed Gray in there, earlier this season he was effective in midfield, much better than Gruev.
Rodon and Cooper relatively solid at back and Rodon standout in terms of trying to drive things forward.
Farke got timing of subs right, early enough to make a difference, but the switches were utterly bizarre, taking off both full backs and bringing on two wingers making 3 in total on pitch and Bamford for the ineffective Gnonto>
I think he got those wrong, I would have had Bamford for Piroe who did nothing and James for Gnonto or Gray for Gruev.
I felt we got worse after that, we created no shots on goal, stats say we had a shot on goal in first half, I dont remember it.
Commentators say we're so good going forward, but we're not, we're slow and have no target man.
The mix that we have up top usb isn't quite right and a result of buying players that we're not quite sure what to do with - Rutter and Piroe, and exchanging genuine game changers like Sinisterra with Anthony.
I feel this performance could well be a turning point for Farke. Not in terms of his position, you have to give him time, but in terms of support from the fans.
What concerned me tonight was how poor Piroe and Gruev were, yet they stayed on.
I now feel that we won't make top 2 and gut feel is we have to really work now to stay in play offs and would not put money on us going up through play offs at this point in season, we're not showing we have enough to go through.
We're having a bad run, we can't panic, just have to leave it with Farke to address the issues, play people in right positions and work out how to get best out of Piroe and how to use Gray.
Side note, thought Courtney was great in adding perspective in the studio.
Thoughts from today
posted on 30/12/23
comment by Jonty (U4614)
posted 9 hours, 23 minutes ago
comment by Shaun M - supercalifragilisticOrtaisatrocious (U9955)
posted 48 seconds ago
Bubble has burst. We looked clueless tonight, out thought, out played and out battled. Tactically it ain't working at all, we look found out and we have no plan b. Playoffs it is unless we conjure up a stunning run of 8 wins, but we don't look like winning 8 more this season.
Announce Rooney's Birmingham winning 1-0 with a goal from the usual 35 year old nuisance Jutkiewicz.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Birmingham won about 1 in 10......you just know they're going to turn it around against us....
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Dreading it actually. They beat us earlier in the season and we have a bad habit of ending other teams terrible runs for them.
posted on 30/12/23
comment by tslufc (U12903)
posted 5 minutes ago
comment by Jonty (U4614)
posted 9 hours, 23 minutes ago
comment by Shaun M - supercalifragilisticOrtaisatrocious (U9955)
posted 48 seconds ago
Bubble has burst. We looked clueless tonight, out thought, out played and out battled. Tactically it ain't working at all, we look found out and we have no plan b. Playoffs it is unless we conjure up a stunning run of 8 wins, but we don't look like winning 8 more this season.
Announce Rooney's Birmingham winning 1-0 with a goal from the usual 35 year old nuisance Jutkiewicz.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Birmingham won about 1 in 10......you just know they're going to turn it around against us....
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Dreading it actually. They beat us earlier in the season and we have a bad habit of ending other teams terrible runs for them.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
We're the gift that keeps on giving in that respect.
posted on 30/12/23
comment by Jonty (U4614)
posted 12 minutes ago
comment by tslufc (U12903)
posted 5 minutes ago
comment by Jonty (U4614)
posted 9 hours, 23 minutes ago
comment by Shaun M - supercalifragilisticOrtaisatrocious (U9955)
posted 48 seconds ago
Bubble has burst. We looked clueless tonight, out thought, out played and out battled. Tactically it ain't working at all, we look found out and we have no plan b. Playoffs it is unless we conjure up a stunning run of 8 wins, but we don't look like winning 8 more this season.
Announce Rooney's Birmingham winning 1-0 with a goal from the usual 35 year old nuisance Jutkiewicz.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Birmingham won about 1 in 10......you just know they're going to turn it around against us....
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Dreading it actually. They beat us earlier in the season and we have a bad habit of ending other teams terrible runs for them.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
We're the gift that keeps on giving in that respect.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
It is quite incredible how many times this actually happens.
posted on 30/12/23
For me, this form table is a real worry.
WBA, Hull and Sunderland all significantly in same place above us and all could well overtake us and jeopardise our play off chances. Bristol and Boro also up there form-wise:
https://www.footballwebpages.co.uk/championship/form-guide
posted on 30/12/23
Yep, wonder what it would show last 5 matches as our 0-2 win at Blackburn would drop out of the averages.
posted on 30/12/23
comment by The Light Brigade (U22847)
posted 2 minutes ago
Yep, wonder what it would show last 5 matches as our 0-2 win at Blackburn would drop out of the averages.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Found it:
https://footystats.org/england/championship/form-table
posted on 30/12/23
I’ll never understand why we play so badly every
Christmas/New Year. It doesn’t matter which league we are in, it always seems to happen. Even the one season when we were the exception. under Bielsa, and were top of the Championship on Christmas Day we managed to disprove the theory that the team at the top would be promoted!
To drop from top of the form table to where we are now is just inexplicable. I’m not feeling particularly “happy New Year”-ish atm but at least Lowfields is ecstatic!
posted on 30/12/23
comment by MaidinLeeds (U2464)
posted 16 minutes ago
I’ll never understand why we play so badly every
Christmas/New Year. It doesn’t matter which league we are in, it always seems to happen. Even the one season when we were the exception. under Bielsa, and were top of the Championship on Christmas Day we managed to disprove the theory that the team at the top would be promoted!
To drop from top of the form table to where we are now is just inexplicable. I’m not feeling particularly “happy New Year”-ish atm but at least Lowfields is ecstatic!
----------------------------------------------------------------------
I believe that this year it's down to your choice of kit purchased
posted on 30/12/23
comment by Jonty (U4614)
posted 43 minutes ago
comment by MaidinLeeds (U2464)
posted 16 minutes ago
I’ll never understand why we play so badly every
Christmas/New Year. It doesn’t matter which league we are in, it always seems to happen. Even the one season when we were the exception. under Bielsa, and were top of the Championship on Christmas Day we managed to disprove the theory that the team at the top would be promoted!
To drop from top of the form table to where we are now is just inexplicable. I’m not feeling particularly “happy New Year”-ish atm but at least Lowfields is ecstatic!
----------------------------------------------------------------------
I believe that this year it's down to your choice of kit purchased
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Nice!🤣 🩷
posted on 30/12/23
Form tables were mentioned above.
Was thinking that we seem to have played a lot of the tougher teams away already and was wondering what our run-in looked like…especially away from home, versus those above us.
Found this
https://www.soccerstats.com/table.asp?league=england2&tid=10
It does seem that, if we can keep the home form going, we’ve got far ‘easier’ away matches to come versus those that Ipswich and Southampton have.
Eg
Southampton have to play away at Norwich, Ipswich, Plymouth, Cardiff, Bristol, West Brom, Leeds
Swansea, Leicester.
Ipswich have to play away at Norwich, Coventry, Hull, Plymouth, Cardiff, Preston, Millwall, Swansea, Leicester.
Whilst probably our hardest away matches are Cardiff, Bristol, Middlesbrough, Swansea, Plymouth, Coventry, Watford
Our last match is a home game versus Southampton!
Could be all on that last match !!!