BFTG Wigan

[cmonurz]

Half the problem is our full backs don't get up and support. We can't double up on their full backs because ours are shit.

I think that's a lot of the problem. Looks at how Chelsea play the system, and when they have the ball Cole may as well be a second left-winger, and Ivanovic spends a lot of the game up and down the right-hand side.

It should be a flexible system, but we don't have the players to do that, so it becomes a very rigid, defensive setup. Which has worked pretty well for us the last couple of months, albeit with the odd slip-up.

Our failure to invest means we've had to take a more defensive approach and it has worked to an extent, but it still looks like we are ultimately going to fall short on quality.

[SPARTA]

Pogrebnyak hate is just pathetic. A few weeks a go he could do no wrong and '4-5-1' was the way forward and not starting Le Fondre was 'the right decision - because something was working' - and now, all of a sudden, he is a waste of space. Absolutely no perspective whatsoever.

Were you reading the board a few weeks ago? If you were then you'd have seen the many comments that 4-5-1 clearly wasn't working, and it was only when we went to 4-4-2 and threw the kitchen sink at it for the last 20 minutes that we managed to steal anything from the game.

4-5-1 was working so badly that we had our best run when we switched to it.

But it wasn't though, was it? It was only when we went 4-4-2 and all out attack did we nick those wins. At 4-5-1 we are conceding too many goals still, and when all is almost lost, we go to plan be and fine the goals.

[Twix]

Players like McAnuff and Leigertwood have been excellent servants for this club, they are just not up to this level. Ditto for our manager. The level of abuse they get is fcking pathetic. Yet players like Guthrie, who has done absolutely fck all for Reading FC somehow has the sun shining out of his arse in some people's eyes. If thats you, then take a look at yourself. Sat watching today's game was painful, but not half as painful as being sat with spoilt for success fcktards abusing players whose only crime is to take the club into the PL.

This.
It almost deserves it's own thread.
Hell it deserves to be printed out and handed to people outside the ground.

[Basingstoke Royal]

We cannot play 4-5-1 with three defensive midfielders. Pog had no support and the gap between the midfield and forward was huge. 4-5-1 needs a player like mcanuff, Guthrie, blackman behind pog.

Why is morrison playing instead of pearce? He played earlier in the season when we were shipping loads of goals and its no coincidence he comes back in today and the defence is all at sea. No one commanding the back line and morrison was at fault for at least one of the goals - probably more.

The biggest problem today though was that none of our outfield players turned up. I agree with others that this felt exactly like the spineless effort we gave last time we were relegated.

The players need to grow some bollocks quickly and the manager needs to play out best players not his favourites.

[cmonurz]

Ouch, yep, that was a red card. Frustrated but ultimately pretty vicious lunge. Very poor.

[Big Ern]

I am not going to slag the players off. There is only so far you can go with Championship and League One players.

It is with a heavy heart that I have to give Brian some stick. Since winning MOTM his tactics have been puzzling at best. Blackman at Stoke? The unwelcome reintroduction of the entirely limited Karacan. Pearce not playing. I can perhaps understand Morrison playing today to some extent - he got on the end of set pieces at the DW Stadium in November and caused Wigan plenty of discomfort that day - but it is rank arrogance frankly not to play our best defender. Pearce will go in the summer but he should be playing every game, just as Sidwell did so successfully in 06/07 before getting his big move.

The most galling thing is that all the hard work in that amazing run last year will almost certainly be put to absolute waste. Biggest TV deal in history starts next season, all we wanted was some serious investment in quality to give us a chance of establishing ourselves. For that reason, I am wondering exactly what Mr Zingarevich is doing here.

Sums up my thoughts exactly, however surprised it took you so long to come to this conclusion as it was obvious after the first 10 games of the season. No more transfer windows to save us, the board has fooked up big style and don't deserve a Premiership team.

[Royal Ginger]

Nothing wrong with the 4-5-1, a lucky goal and a Morrison f**k-up sunk us today. If Kebe's effort had gone in (and i must admit i thought it had and had most of the stand up behind me at my reaction) it could have been been very different today. It was a blip. Pearce back in next week, we move on.

[Libertine]

Having had the opportunity to watch the game from the comfort of home, now that I am unemployed, just some general observations.

I think the cup game on Monday really hurt us. A couple players were absolutely shattered by the end of that game and did not recover in time for this one, which was a far more important one for us. Leigertwood had to be subbed out early in the second half Monday, either from fatigue or from a knock he picked up, and he was completely ineffective in the game yesterday. Why Pearce didn't start is a complete mystery to me. His return to the starting 11 was a big part of Brian being Manager of the Month for January, but there he was again back on the bench. Morrison was at fault for the 2nd and 3rd goals. I think Sean will be a fine player, with a long career with the club ahead of him hopefully, but he was not up to it on Saturday. We were still in the game, and I thought we could possibly get something out of it, until Morrison decided to be a spectator on the 3rd goal. But to have zero, I repeat nada, nil, zilch, attempts on goal for an entire game at home, and such an important game, is inexcusable...down to 10 men for 40 or so minutes or not. Zero attempts on goal, at home, in the midst of a survival battle, in a game against an opponent below you in the table, is the dictionary definition of "not showing up". For Saturday's game at least Wigan showed me that they are serious about staying up and Reading didn't.

[moo]

I was feeling really positive before the game today. Reality has now sunk in.

We are doomed.

[joeroyal]

I was feeling really positive before the game today. Reality has now sunk in.

We are doomed.

It took you this long to grasp it

[moo]

I was feeling really positive before the game today. Reality has now sunk in.

We are doomed.

It took you this long to grasp it

We had a positive few weeks until today, did we not?

You racist minge

[joeroyal]

I was feeling really positive before the game today. Reality has now sunk in.

We are doomed.

It took you this long to grasp it

We had a positive few weeks until today, did we not?

You racist minge

Have you got a problem of sorts pleb

[Wimb]

I am not going to slag the players off. There is only so far you can go with Championship and League One players.

It is with a heavy heart that I have to give Brian some stick. Since winning MOTM his tactics have been puzzling at best. Blackman at Stoke? The unwelcome reintroduction of the entirely limited Karacan. Pearce not playing. I can perhaps understand Morrison playing today to some extent - he got on the end of set pieces at the DW Stadium in November and caused Wigan plenty of discomfort that day - but it is rank arrogance frankly not to play our best defender. Pearce will go in the summer but he should be playing every game, just as Sidwell did so successfully in 06/07 before getting his big move.

The most galling thing is that all the hard work in that amazing run last year will almost certainly be put to absolute waste. Biggest TV deal in history starts next season, all we wanted was some serious investment in quality to give us a chance of establishing ourselves. For that reason, I am wondering exactly what Mr Zingarevich is doing here.

Sadly a pretty fair reflection of events.

[Mike Hunt]

I am not going to slag the players off. There is only so far you can go with Championship and League One players.

It is with a heavy heart that I have to give Brian some stick. Since winning MOTM his tactics have been puzzling at best. Blackman at Stoke? The unwelcome reintroduction of the entirely limited Karacan. Pearce not playing. I can perhaps understand Morrison playing today to some extent - he got on the end of set pieces at the DW Stadium in November and caused Wigan plenty of discomfort that day - but it is rank arrogance frankly not to play our best defender. Pearce will go in the summer but he should be playing every game, just as Sidwell did so successfully in 06/07 before getting his big move.

The most galling thing is that all the hard work in that amazing run last year will almost certainly be put to absolute waste. Biggest TV deal in history starts next season, all we wanted was some serious investment in quality to give us a chance of establishing ourselves. For that reason, I am wondering exactly what Mr Zingarevich is doing here.

Well said as always Floyd.

Anyone else have the urge to do this?

[l0y4l R0y4l]

It was a bad result but to me a tad predictable.

Wigan are a team that like to control the game by keeping possession of the ball and passing it out from the back.
They are well drilled and do not panic when in control of the football.

To me there are only three other teams in this league that do that: Swansea and Arsenal and more recently Liverpool have adapted to this style.

Our results under McDermott against these teams:

Wigan (Martinez) 2012-13

2-3 L
0-3 L

Arsenal (Wenger) 2012-13
5-7 L
2-5 L

Swansea (Laudrup) 2012-13
2-2 D
0-0 D

Liverpool (Rodgers) 2012-13
0-1 L

Swansea (Rodgers) 2010-11
0-1 L
0-1 L
2-4 L

We just always struggle against these teams. However Our season does not end here, I expect a far better performance against Everton.

[RoyalBlue]

Nothing wrong with the 4-5-1, a lucky goal and a Morrison f**k-up sunk us today.

Yes, it was Morrison who lost the ball in the end but he is a very inexperienced 'kid' and it was the very experienced and exceptionally slow Harte that got us into that situation in the first place. With just seconds remaining, we needed to get the ball forwards quickly but he decided to mess around passing it across the back. Then when Morrison pushed up, who was covering in behind and where was 'the snail' as Kone broke down our left? We're told that we need players like Harte for their experience and influence on the younger players. Where was that experience and influence yesterday? And what did Shorey do so wrong in the ManU game to lose his place?

What really sunk us was a lack of fight, energy and a determination to win from players and also, to a certain extent, from management.

[Pandoras Box]

That bloke who sits a few rows near me - who gives a running commentary throughout the match and gets everything wrong. Sudden shock at 60 minutes when he shouted 'what the fvck are you talking about - Karacan's not in the team today - is he? well that bloke who is him is sh1t. Anyway..... FFS - IT IS POGREBNYAK - not Pashnikov, Poganovski, Pavshenski, Pashov, Pogmentov or Pagrenovic.

[sandman]

Yeah Harte was passing it, that's passing it not trying to do a Messi impression and dribble the fcuking thing like Morrison. Yes Harte should've put it in the box, I was certainly shouting at him to do so but even keeping it tight by passing it and getting to HT at only 1-0 was preferable to what Morrison did to take us in to HT 2-0 down.

[paultheroyal]

One moment early doors summed up the whole match.

Mcanuff receives a simple two yard pass out on left wing. He then proceeds to pass it to a player two yards away but passes it out of play. Then has the audacity to check and blame his boots!

Summed up the whole day.

[West_Reading]

That was almost (Reading) career suicide by Brian Mac yesterday. I've always supported him, and will continue to do so, but if he's going to pick out the mistakes of players (e.g. Pearce) then he has to accept his own mistakes too. Yesterday I feared the worst when I saw how appallingly negative our starting lineup was. THREE holding midfielders? Our best performance in recent weeks, in footballing terms, was at home to Sunderland. Why on earth we changed the lineup for the Stoke game and then again for yesterday's game, I do not know. The lack of technical ability in our whole club and absence of creativity is frightening.

I don't know what the issue with Guthrie is again now, but if Brian really cares about what's best for the club, him and Pearce both need to play against Everton.

Yesterday was so bad, I don't even know where to begin. We're playing at home against the second bottom side in the league and we're happy to sit back, allow them to have time on the ball and then hope for something on the break. This is Wigan Athletic, not Athletico Madrid! Brian needs to watch how Southampton have been playing under Pochettino and try and implement that style of high-tempo, high pressing game. The service to Pog, or whoever will play next week, is non-existent, so until we can begin to create genuine chances and not percentage balls into the box or down the channels, we can not compete.

We went in 2-0 down, perhaps a bit flattering for them, but Kebe aside (in the first half) we were pretty dreadful. I said to my mate at HT, that I hope we bring HRK in for Karacan, put Jobi in the middle and see how it goes for 10-15 mins and then bring Alf on. But we went 442 and went 3-0 down straight away and then down to 10 men, and Brian went with a weird 4-3-2 formation without a right winger? Not that it would have made much difference, even with Kebe on the pitch, but I struggle to see what he was trying to do. The rest of the game was a training ground exercise for them with Kelly having to deal with two men all the way through till the end.

Fed kept it respectable yesterday and is the only guy to come out with any credit. Kebe and Kelly were maybe worth a 6/10, with the rest mainly at 4/10, with Pog and Morrison a 3/10.