Back from the game-saints

[sandman]

Agreed. His passing has improved over the last year and it's clearly something he's working on.

[Ian Royal]

I think the thing we can learn from reading BFTG comments is that most people watch the team with a one-eyed view, only seeing the good stuff from their favourites and the bad stuff from the players they don't rate.

And that in every performance where we don't win it has to be someone's (or several players) fault for performing badly, and not just that we weren't quite good enough or the other team were better / lucky.

You can pretty much tell which posts to bother reading by looking at the username. As there are some who are far better than most at being objective and accurate.

[peterroyal76]

i cant help thinking that joe mills is getting a fair bit of stick by people unhappy with the attitude of his brother. ok , he makes a few mistakes, but then so have quite a few of the team over the last couple of months.most of those players have improved, so i cant see why he shouldnt. by the way, has anyone else noticed that williams is getting regular 7 ratings at sheffield utd. maybe its a lot to do with confidence. just my opinion folks!!

I think you maybe right about Mills getting stick by people unhappy with his brother. I actually thought he played ok yesterday, not brilliant just ok. His corners were not great, but Harte's haven't been great either when he played.
Also Williams is playing a division below

[Ian Royal]

I can't stand Matt, but quite like Joseph. Just as a counter point to people disliking him because of his brother.

[melonhead]

great game, great atmoshphere-which was surprising since the crowd was 1/3 kids and newbies there for the day out
we out did southampton in all areas for 99% of teh game(yet again let down by 1 moment where we switched off, but hey, cant have everything)pressed them hard, they struggled to have any meaningful play, no real incisive moves(goal aprt), and we managed some real pressure on their box without(again)fashioning many major chances. great to watch, and 7 unbeaten, matched/outdone some teams up the top.
we are a home win, and a striking partnership away from going on a great runof wins imo.

fed- 7 did very well with the one or two bits he was asked to do
cummings- 6 - slightly off his recent best, didnt deal with the run for the goal, but thats hard to deal with.
gorkss- 8 rocklike, knows exactly what hes doing- brilliant buy, but has got dragged asround a bit in teh last two games
pearce-8 rocklike alongside an experienced head, didnt give them anything in the air, never let a man get by him, dont remember any horrific passes
mills -6 got forward well, but little end product, defended better, but out of position a couple of times, but when you push forwrd as told to by the management, that will happen
HRK-6 worst game of the season for me, but still ok
mcanuff-7 worked very hard, captains performance- tracked back, tackled and pressed all over the pitch, and constantly talking and geeing up the players(not that the moaners will have noticed that), gave everything, but still doesnt produce enough for the talent he has, great free kick
karacan-8 everywhere, pressed hard up the pich, always available, never stopped, passes of all lengths, offloaded quickly,didnt see many misplaced at all.
liegertwood-9 back to his best, superb stuff, a wall in the middle, and got forward to support too, great goal
church- 6 worked hard, supported well, couple of good crosses, but still not enough in teh box, but was aginst a very good defence
lefondre - 7 worked hard, but didnt get much joy in the box, hold up and offloads very well though


i think hunt deserves his chance with ALFie now. we are extremely close to being a very decent team now. yet again proving brians management works, as do our club policies

[melonhead]

I thought Karacan was great, except for the one time he was through on the right wing and crossed the ball into the stands.

its reading not barcelona.....and even messi misplaces a pass sometimes

[winchester_royal]

I thought Karacan was great, except for the one time he was through on the right wing and crossed the ball into the stands.

its reading not barcelona.....and even messi misplaces a pass sometimes

It's the simple passes that Jem fcuks up sometimes though. I thought he was excellent yesterday, him and Ledge completely bossed the Soton midfield... I just find him frustrating because if he was a good passer of the ball he'd be something very special indeed.

[melonhead]

Yeah, and you have to play to eachothers strengths as a team. I thought he did great, except for that one time.
Similarly, I thought Mills was pretty good if you disregard his set pieces.
My theory is that perhaps in practice sessions he takes great set pieces, and then when faced with 22,000 spectators he is too nervous to get them right.

agreed- also harte took all the free kicks and corners when he was there, and his corners were consistently awful, and a fair share of free kicks were blasted over, or into the wall, and he rarely tried to get them to other players, always going for the shot.
no ones perfect

[manny96]

they struggled to have any meaningful play, no real incisive moves(goal aprt)

I though we played well but TBF Federici made two very good saves when I thought they should score and Gorkss at least one goal saving tackle-block

[Ian Royal]

they struggled to have any meaningful play, no real incisive moves(goal aprt)

I though we played well but TBF Federici made two very good saves when I thought they should score and Gorkss at least one goal saving tackle-block

Pearce got a good one in against Chaplow early on too.

I think they probably had the majority of the better chances, but we created far more chances.

We're just lacking a little in creating really good chances, or shooting strongly and accurately. It'll come.

[melonhead]

they struggled to have any meaningful play, no real incisive moves(goal aprt)

I though we played well but TBF Federici made two very good saves when I thought they should score and Gorkss at least one goal saving tackle-block

3-4 decent chances in the game, and only once really cut us open- thought the others were from scrappy passages of play, that just ended up at their feet in the box.
whichever it was, it wasnt what i expected from the league leaders



but i could easily be misremembering through my rosy glasses, granted.

[melonhead]

and a quick mention for their fans.

made a great noise in periods, but were utterly graceless, "top of the league" yes, "going up" not yet, so calm down a bit, and try not to celebrate a lucky away draw like youve won the league.

[Stevie G]

Substitution timing cost us the win. Normally Big Mac gets it pretty damn on, but I think Kebe on for HRK straight after the goal would've put them a little more under pressure at the back so early on from our goal and we might've seen better out of him than the cameo 10 minutes that he gave which didn't inspire. HRK had a good game, off his best and was clearly tiring at the point that he swiped at a shot from nowhere to go wide, hence the average 6 for performance in this thread.

[Negative_Jeff]

Once again we have been let down by failing to take advantage of playing against ten men late in the game. Everyone knows that the key is ball retention and stetching the opposition by getting the ball wide. Our failure to do this against ten men highlights the lack of composure and tactical awareness throught the team. Despite this yesterday was a half decent performance. As for Mills he has an uncanny ability to look a really classy player when he can`t do the basics. And as for Jack Mills wasn`t he the train driver in the Great Train Robbery?

[Royal Lady]

i cant help thinking that joe mills is getting a fair bit of stick by people unhappy with the attitude of his brother. ok , he makes a few mistakes, but then so have quite a few of the team over the last couple of months.most of those players have improved, so i cant see why he shouldnt. by the way, has anyone else noticed that williams is getting regular 7 ratings at sheffield utd. maybe its a lot to do with confidence. just my opinion folks!!

I think you maybe right about Mills getting stick by people unhappy with his brother. I actually thought he played ok yesterday, not brilliant just ok. His corners were not great, but Harte's haven't been great either when he played.
Also Williams is playing a division below

I bloody loved Matt Mills actually. I also thought in his first few games for us, Joe Mills looked pretty good - however, in recent games, he's not looked as good and has made some silly errors. It is perfectly possible to like a player and still be critical you know!! I bloody love Kebe too, but he's a shadow of his former self imo. Doesn't mean I won't still love him until he leaves the club though.

And was Matt Mills still on our books when Jack Mills was given his squad number? I thought he was, but I'm happy to be proved wrong. And, whatever, I have no chip on my shoulder about you Ian Royal - other than your, frankly, appalling contribution to a politics thread saying how every Tory you'd ever met was utter scum, shortly after we invited you to join us at our table in a bar prior to a Palace game a couple of seasons ago.

[Royal Rother]

Once again we have been let down by failing to take advantage of playing against ten men late in the game. Everyone knows that the key is ball retention and stetching the opposition by getting the ball wide. Our failure to do this against ten men highlights the lack of composure and tactical awareness throught the team. Despite this yesterday was a half decent performance. As for Mills he has an uncanny ability to look a really classy player when he can`t do the basics. And as for Jack Mills wasn`t he the train driver in the Great Train Robbery?

Half decent? It was terrific! And they call you Negative Jeff?

[Rex]

and a quick mention for their fans.

made a great noise in periods, but were utterly graceless, "top of the league" yes, "going up" not yet, so calm down a bit, and try not to celebrate a lucky away draw like youve won the league.

Lol at the guy in the pink tshirt mooning at all and sundry outside the Jazz. Needless to say i was indignant and he failed to get into the ground Such bravado and the fun of seeing him bleat into his phone on his walk of shame just topped the experience.

Claiming to have won the league so early on is pretty amazing

[Royal Lady]

I didn't like having to walk past them all on my journey around the ground to get home. A lot of them were very mouthy.

[West Stand Man]

i cant help thinking that joe mills is getting a fair bit of stick by people unhappy with the attitude of his brother. ok , he makes a few mistakes, but then so have quite a few of the team over the last couple of months.most of those players have improved, so i cant see why he shouldnt. by the way, has anyone else noticed that williams is getting regular 7 ratings at sheffield utd. maybe its a lot to do with confidence. just my opinion folks!!

I think you maybe right about Mills getting stick by people unhappy with his brother. I actually thought he played ok yesterday, not brilliant just ok. His corners were not great, but Harte's haven't been great either when he played.
Also Williams is playing a division below

Too right. He did not have a great game yet you would think from some of the tripe written on here that he had a stinker. There were some really good bits to his play and some less so. He is, sadly for him, tarred with being Matt Mills brother; that, for some people is a real negative. He also fills a role where we have had top talent in the recent past, from Shorey through Armstrong and Bertrand. Expectations for RFC LBs are high and so far he isn't up there at that level. That doesn't make him a liability, or a useless player though.

Before someone asks me an example of his good play I give you the excellent headed interception when he had to track back and was left one on one with a Saints striker (at the end of the first half). It would have been too easy to mess up and leave his man one on one with Federici but he dealt with it very well indeed, leaving Gorkss with a simple tidy up job.

[melonhead]

Substitution timing cost us the win. Normally Big Mac gets it pretty damn on, but I think Kebe on for HRK straight after the goal would've put them a little more under pressure at the back so early on from our goal and we might've seen better out of him than the cameo 10 minutes that he gave which didn't inspire. HRK had a good game, off his best and was clearly tiring at the point that he swiped at a shot from nowhere to go wide, hence the average 6 for performance in this thread.

pagree- but pretty much every manager in the league would have kept him back after the goal, and then again after the sending off, just to assess what was going on.

also not sure kebe would have even been in position to lose his man