Back from the Arsenal game/TV

[melonhead]

thought Ledge was pretty awesome last night tbh

Really?

First half yes but 2nd half and extra time he was shocking and he was at fault for one of their goals, giving the ball away on the edge of their box. He can't pass the ball, he panics when in possession and looks lost when players start running at him.

played really well all game
giving the ball away on the edge of the oppo box should never really be a problem, and will happen time and again, even with top drawer players, it was our inability to stop that from turning into a goal that was the problem

[RoyalBlue]

In more loslworthy times, I'll reflect on how around 80 mins I thought Feds had had an excellent game.

I think he did - and that's nothing against McCarthy.

I think any of our keepers would have been picking the ball out of their net 7+ times last night due to the woeful failings of their teammates and manager.

For all of those (a surprising number) who keep saying Legs had a good game, please bring yourselves to watch a recording of the match and see how many times he put us into trouble. It was an awful lot. Like Tabb he is a great guy, gives his all but is barely PL standard. We need a lot more than 'barely PL standard' if we are to stand any chance of staying up.

[melonhead]

Sick of his woeful subs, stubborn grudges with players, bias towards his mates and shit tactics.

Garbage.

lol- the woeful subs that have scored 3 goals in two games?
no way am i having that the way he has dealt with a player with an attitude problem is wrong in any way.
what bias towards his mates? church is his mate- hasnt played all season, fed was his mate-dropped for being dodgy, cummings was his mate, but gunter stepped straight into the team when he arrived, etc etc

shit tactics didnt lose us that game, the tactics got us 4-0 up. im pretty sure when he set out his tactical stall at the start of the game and 2nd half it didnt in any way involve letting players walk through our midfield and into the box, or gifting them possession with shit clearing headers etc. it was shit defending, and an increasingly porous midfield that lost the game.
the only issue with brian imo was not having guthrie on the bench(but if theres a problem, its totally understanable), and not starting with pearce


the players we brought in were all top championship players, of a kind that would fit our style(guthrie aside, and that was with a view to varying out tactics when needed) in the same way that swansea/norwich strengthened last year.
was our biggest summer spend ever, bringing in more quality players than ive ever seen before.
the problem is we came up a year too early, and the core of the squad arent quite good enough. but you cant just bring in 12 new players and start again(like QPR have) thats daft. imo

[pea]

Ledge looked good in extra time, didn't see the whole match

[bobby1413]

We can turn to the referee and moan about the time added on at the end of the day it is a MINIMUM amount of time to be added on, we simply shouldn't have let Arsenal have a chance for us to moan!

This sums up my thoughts. For the last 2-3 mins of injury time I stopped watching the game itself and was watching the ref for him to whistle but he didn't.

Like everyone said - 4 up, close down defensively. I'm dreading BM's comments - haven't yet seen them.

[melonhead]

For all of those (a surprising number) who keep saying Legs had a good game, please bring yourselves to watch a recording of the match and see how many times he put us into trouble. It was an awful lot.

was one of the best three players on the park.dont need to watch it again, i watched it last night.
tired second half, but was still absolutely everywhere, playing dangerous balls, keeping the ball in tight situations, scoring a blinder, tackling and stealing the ball time and again.
and was let down by the defenders and his even more knackered midfield counterpart.imo

[cmonurz]

shit tactics didnt lose us that game, the tactics got us 4-0 up.

I really don't think they did. It was just a freak 45 minutes.

It's also incredibly disingenuous to praise tactics that give us the lead, but say they are blameless when we lose it.

[Royal Lady]

No, no, no...not Redknapp. If anything poach the fascist bastard from Swindon, DiCanio...

I'd prefer Brian to stay, just sayin' if a change "has to be made".

Can you imagine Roberts playing under Di Canio?!

[Rev Algenon Stickleback H]

and looks lost when players start running at him.

The problem is "who doesn't?"

If teams come here with the wrong attitude, we're well capable of getting into them.

Unfortunately when the tide turns and they get their tails up, every team just passes round us as if we were traffic cones on a training ground. Every time a team goes forward against us, you expect them to have a shot, as they normally get to the penalty area before there's a challenge.

[melonhead]

Like everyone said - 4 up, close down defensively. .

have you seen us defend?!
imo you cant just sit back and invite it on, or we'd have been even more buggered, our best chance of winning was keeping thgem stretched at the back and ensuring their full backs/DM werent getting forward

I'm dreading BM's comments - haven't yet seen them

he was gutted, criticised the gifting of the 4-1 goal, said he couldnt figure out why there was 5 mins extra time but thats not the reason we lost, and said he was looking forward to putting it behind us with the QPR game

[Royal Lady]

I knew Bendy would be positive this morning. Just knew it.

[RoyalBlue]

For all of those (a surprising number) who keep saying Legs had a good game, please bring yourselves to watch a recording of the match and see how many times he put us into trouble. It was an awful lot.

was one of the best three players on the park.dont need to watch it again, i watched it last night.
tired second half, but was still absolutely everywhere, playing dangerous balls, keeping the ball in tight situations, scoring a blinder, tackling and stealing the ball time and again.
and was let down by the defenders and his even more knackered midfield counterpart.imo

Yes, dangerous balls alright. Dangerous for us. As has already been pointed out by someone else, he was directly culpable for one of their goals when he should have had the experience and ability to play safe. Lost count of how many times he wanted too long on the ball and then turned into trouble. True, he made some good challenges but quite a few were after losing the ball by doing just that!

[TBM]

thought Ledge was pretty awesome last night tbh

Really?

First half yes but 2nd half and extra time he was shocking and he was at fault for one of their goals, giving the ball away on the edge of their box. He can't pass the ball, he panics when in possession and looks lost when players start running at him.

played really well all game
giving the ball away on the edge of the oppo box should never really be a problem, and will happen time and again, even with top drawer players, it was our inability to stop that from turning into a goal that was the problem

It is a problem when there was 2 easy passes on and he decides to hold on to the ball and then pass it straight to them, they then counter attack, 4 on 4 and end up getting the 4th goal

[melonhead]

shit tactics didnt lose us that game, the tactics got us 4-0 up.

I really don't think they did. It was just a freak 45 minutes.

It's also incredibly disingenuous to praise tactics that give us the lead, but say they are blameless when we lose it.

th etactics were- get at them, pass it about, keep possession, play it to the wings, get lots of balls into the box, get your shots in early, if we get ahead, make sure we shut the game down when needed.etc

the tactics were not- let them waltz through the middle of the park, pass the ball to their attackers in dangerous areas, totally lose your shape at the back when under pressure.

and thats what lost us the game

[TBM]

shit tactics didnt lose us that game, the tactics got us 4-0 up.

I really don't think they did. It was just a freak 45 minutes.

It's also incredibly disingenuous to praise tactics that give us the lead, but say they are blameless when we lose it.

th etactics were- get at them, pass it about, keep possession, play it to the wings, get lots of balls into the box, get your shots in early, if we get ahead, make sure we shut the game down when needed.etc

the tactics were not- let them waltz through the middle of the park, pass the ball to their attackers in dangerous areas, totally lose your shape at the back when under pressure.

and thats what lost us the game

I think when Hunt went off it benefited them too - he won every header and his closing down was superb, not giving the Arsenal back 4 any time on the ball. Pog came on and kept heading the ball towards our own goal

[melonhead]

I knew Bendy would be positive this morning. Just knew it.

im not being positive at all. was a nightmare, and the worst game/result ive ever witnessed
im just not blaming brian for the way we capitulated

[melonhead]

For all of those (a surprising number) who keep saying Legs had a good game, please bring yourselves to watch a recording of the match and see how many times he put us into trouble. It was an awful lot.

was one of the best three players on the park.dont need to watch it again, i watched it last night.
tired second half, but was still absolutely everywhere, playing dangerous balls, keeping the ball in tight situations, scoring a blinder, tackling and stealing the ball time and again.
and was let down by the defenders and his even more knackered midfield counterpart.imo

Yes, dangerous balls alright. Dangerous for us. As has already been pointed out by someone else, he was directly culpable for one of their goals when he should have had the experience and ability to play safe. Lost count of how many times he wanted too long on the ball and then turned into trouble. True, he made some good challenges but quite a few were after losing the ball by doing just that!

1 misplaced pass on the egde of their area didnt lose us that game

[cmonurz]

th etactics were- get at them, pass it about, keep possession, play it to the wings, get lots of balls into the box, get your shots in early, if we get ahead, make sure we shut the game down when needed.etc

That's my point - we didn't really do any of that, except approach the game with a bit of energy and get plenty of balls into the middle, it just all came together for the first half. We certainly didn't play possession football, Arsenal were just as slack with the ball as us in the first half.

[andrew1957]

I know most football fans are the biggest load of pessimists and suffer from huge knee jerk reactions - but most on here really are pathetic in my opinion.

Last year Arsenal lost 8-2 to United. They did not sack Wenger - despite a lot of their fans calling for his head as it was "their most embarrassing result ever" and they went on to win their next match 1-0 against Swansea.

Wenger is still the manager by the way as far as I recall.

Come on Brian - gee the lads up and use the above as an example. A 1-0 win at QPR would restore confidence and stop the idiots on here calling for your head.

[MouldyRoyal]

Posted this to the "Tactics" thread below but that doesn't seem to be a starter, so am reposting here:

The way I see it is that our direct, straight attacking style is good for scoring, but we have no viable mechanism for controlling a game when we're leading. We seek to do what we did last year, absorb pressure and counter-act but that doesn't work when teams have vastly better forwards. We're always allowing teams a route back into games.

This seems to be coupled with our lack of ability against pace. Of course, last night's opposition will be one of the quickest we face, but I've got to wonder about Brian's tactics against such strike forces. He was actively pushing up the defence and trying to play with a high-line last night. This just seemed allow their midfield to play weighted through balls into the acres of space behind our defence and watch as Walcott and Arshavin run onto them.

We also seem to have problems with players who sit in the hole between midfield and our defence, like Berbatov last week. We're not sure whether our midfield should drop back (and get awfully squashed and compressed) or a CB should step up (leaving more space to play balls behind).

I'm sure I'll be accused of hyperbole and knee-jerking by most nobbers (Dirkers et al.) because I levying criticism. Honestly, not my intention and the above are things that have been apparent in recent games not just last night. There are problems that need sorting, if there weren't, we wouldn't be in the mess we're in now.