Has Dougie got a plan B?

I see it the same way too to be honest.
Last night, pretty much everything tried to come through Zaha. I love Wilf, don't get me wrong, but there is very rarely a worthwhile end product. If you are a defender and Wilf goes past you, you know you will get another(if not two) chances to get a tackle in before any cross or pass is attempted.
We have it badly wrong in terms of attacking. I think we have scored around 9 goals in 14 games with this system. How can this be adequate?
Since Dougie was a top striker, you would think he would have this sussed. We have Poppa and Lennie as defensive coaches so can't he sort this out?
Surely if we did plenty of attacking, the opposition would spend more time defending and less time attacking themselves? As illustrated only too well last night.
I am still finding last night difficult to come to terms with. I applaud the effort of the team and appreciate the fantastic defensive endeavour but for all that for a team that took it to United and did so well, we were pretty toothless last night. I think we may well have been humiliated if we had got to the final to be honest. Cardiff will do the division more justice than we ever would on that showing.

I am also in agreement regarding the ultra defensive tactics.

I expressed my concern on Hol after the Ipswich game, that we were far too defensive minded.

Defending so deap and in depth, places the team on the back foot this in turn restricts your attacking options, as you tend to get penned into your own half with not enough players up front to hold the ball up long enough for the midfield to push up in support.

The best method of defence is attack, and that is what I coached into my teams, if your pushing forward in numbers it enables you to press early when your attack breaks down.
Palace don't start to press until the ball is in the last third of the pitch, thats too late, it's effective but has it limitations. These tactics are used by struggling teams or away sides, to try and reduce the risk of conceding, normally it's hardly ever used by home teams.

Where Zaha is concerned he's been sussed, like Hastingseagle says due to his showboating a defender will get 3 or 4 bites of the cherry, and what Cardiff done was the right tactic against him by having a second line of defence and he could not see that, he was too busy with the Wilf Zaha show. To make your defensive opponents think more and not know what comes next, he needs to use a receive, give, and go tactic giving him a chance of getting into the penalty area, where he can do his showboating knowing defenders are not so willing to get to involved with aggressive close contact, for fear of giving away a penalty or worse a red card, and not on the halfway line where it only benefits his opponents.

From my perspective Cardiff were there for the taking, they were made to look good by very very poor Palace performance, Cardiff needed an own goal from Gardner to get a result, they could not get a goal in open play, if they had played all night Cardiff would never have scored, and if Palace had turned up for the game they would have got a result.

I've said it before that I'm not Zaha's biggest fan and that he does give the ball away a lot. There's not point dancing about if you're going to give the ball back to them. He reminds me of Nani that they do all these tricks and then get a sudden rush of blood to the head and give the ball away. I won't mind if, like sgbilko said, he was messing about in the penalty box because he'll lure them into fouling him or he'll send the ball across to Murray. That's what we did at the start of the season and that's where we got our goals from.

Not to be all negative it's good to see that if Dougie is rebuilding this team he's starting from the back and building a solid defence. I have no doubt the goals will come again but it's better to get a point from 0-0 draws than losing 2-1, 3-1, etc. However as a spectator I'd rather we didn't have 0-0 draws

The best method of defence is attack, and that is what I coached into my teams, if your pushing forward in numbers it enables you to press early when your attack breaks down.
Palace don't start to press until the ball is in the last third of the pitch, thats too late, it's effective but has it limitations. These tactics are used by struggling teams or away sides, to try and reduce the risk of conceding, normally it's hardly ever used by home teams.
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Bilkos right. This is one of my pet hates.........soak up the pressure then counter. It's like a boxer taking constant blows 'hoping' to land a lucky punch...........it sucks as a strategy and rarely ends in victory. Should the game change hugely, ie Paddy for an early bath, then obviously formation/strategy will change. But for so many games now this seems to be the way we set out. We have an attack that is comparable to most of the top teams in this league (imo) yet we set our stall out to defend on a regular basis as APPOSED TO PUT THE OPPOSITION UNDER PRESSURE!!!!!
Does Dougie have a 'plan B'? Apparently not.
Stat...........Our first 6 League games produced 10pts, ave possession of 48.5% and an ave 'attempts at goal' of 9.6 per game.
Our last 6 League games are 7pts, 47.1% and 8.8.

The latter 6 opponents would be considered harder than the first (i can't be bothered to list them, just trust me) so there is not a 'huge' difference in the stats tbh but we're sliding down the league at a fair rate of knots all the same.
No-one progresses knicking a point here or there. Wins are what count, so let's go for it!!!!!!!!

TUX agreeing with me "OMG", either he's forgot to take his medication, or I'm right in which case I better go and have a lie down.

Look on the bright side. At least we don't have De Gea in goal!