07 Jan 2024 19:36:03
I notice a few posts singling out certain players. For me, it was just a bad game for most of the team.
More worrying is that trying to keep possession seems to be the root cause of most of the moaning. Possession based football (that some folks moaned we weren't playing enough under the old boss) means not just passing forward - passing forward only is just direct or counter attacking.
You can't have both possession based football and not have sideways and backward passing. It is impossible. Think about it.
We aren't that good at keeping the ball. We either carry on struggling to improve at keeping the ball (and pass forward, backward and sideways) or play direct and/ or counter attacking knowing we won't have much possession. The boss has to do one or the other.
But moaning that a player basses sideways or backwards, but also wanting lots of possession, is nonsense.
07 Jan 2024 23:03:41
Yes Red but it was the lack of urgency for an hour that was frustrating. Players received the ball and didn't appear to know what to do with it, nobody moving into space or shouting for the ball, which led to the sideways and backwards passing being over elaborated. There was a lot of pointing where to pass the ball which makes it obvious on your next move and in general it was back to a defender
When teams gel with whatever coach or manager is in charge they get an understanding of each other, knowing when to pass ect. They can just move the ball or run into space as they know how players play and what their next move will be. But today was just one of those days, it happens to better teams, there was better urgency for the last half an hour but on the day just not good enough. Fantastic support in the ground not many teams nearly sell out for a cup clash with Blackpool. Bring on the bees, bring on Bloomfield let's right the wrong from last season and we owe Brentford they were lucky this season against us and most definitely last season.
08 Jan 2024 10:02:30
I have no problem with sideways passing if it means keeping control of the ball, but it’s the lack of movement and pace of the passing, that bugs me, we seem to take an age to get the ball across the pitch, also against Blackpool a lack of movement from the forward players didn’t help. Hopefully just a one of game.
08 Jan 2024 15:38:37
I always think back to the best teams I've ever seen. Brazil (various times), Spain when they won the world cup and Barcelona (with Spain's midfield). They keep the ball, probe, pass in every direction, but their players were sharp enough so that as soon as the chance opens up, play direct - bang, GOAL.
Those teams didn't mind passing back to their defenders 20 times. The opponents could not score as they couldn't get near the ball. The point I'm trying to make is that we need to stay off players backs when they don't pass forwards if we want to keep the ball. You can't have both.