Well that was boring. We were muscled off the ball far too easily. Morgan did well, good saves from Adrián and once again Origi not much contribution but with an absolute showstopper
Alright. Wasnt their worst player by any means. Largely in troubled by our players but that is not saying much
Bit of a snooze fest really until late on, seemed we needed a goal before we realised that we can actually have a go and take players on... Pleased for Williams but should've rolled the last one across for a hat trick of assists, Ox was actually ok on the eye but his end product is rusty as ****
Always a struggle these games. The team rarely ever play together so it’s hard for them to just click like the first team who have hundreds of games together. the pitch looked proper slow which didn’t help getting the ball moving quickly so everything was slow which allowed Preston to get back into shape and sat so deep that was hard to get behind them much. The couple of times we did, we scored or created a chance. I think it’s one of those were you just take the result andany kind of positive. Morton and Williams looked good. Minamino scored a nice goal and Adrian made some good saves. Gomez got some game time and bar one **** up looked very assured and handled everything came his way. We know that players like Origi ox Minamino aren’t good enough to be first team regulars in this team so don’t want to batter them. Would it be nice if they did more, but we know we don’t have Man City depth so have to just take what is produced in these games
Morton and Bradley were the ones that really caught my eye last night. Williams bagged a couple of assists but his all-round game is really lacking IMO. Looks better as a winger rather than full back.
theres only 2 or 3 that don't regularly play. I think personally the CL kills off the team's ability to stay sharp as klopp would have a midweek game 11 v11 and these lads would be expected to all play that with same intensity but once the LC kicks in the levels of players who don't get a game drops off. The pitch did look fairly sodden alright but reasonable. Once gomez got his hea dout of his ass and started passing it past phillips and out to williams/bradley we started to open them up. we were taking far too long to get in a position to go pass and then there was little movement to pass to. you are right though, take the win and a few positives where possible. Morton was decent. a bit too much forcing of passes but he did his job there and didn't look out of his depth v a championship side at least. Williams was ok. I don't think he can actually run in a straight line with or without the ball but he is a trier so two assists was great. Harvey blair had his night as a debut which was a complete shock so good for him but what can you expect at the same time for a lad who would be one of several in a queue.
Bradley is an international he should be catching your eye. Morton might even get a loan later on to championship. he wasn't out of that depth imo. Williams, lets not make a half decent full back into a bang average winger. theres a reason the lad need to learn how to play full back. He never had to defend so you didn't get to see if he's improved there last night. don't fix your opinion based on games as a callow youth, see where he is at in his development. There's improvement there this season.
I know I'm writing him off too soon but he is really really poor. Zero intelligence, no brain, head down. If he can work on those things, then maybe he will have a career. But he's nowhere near good enough to be a back up for us.
I completely agree with this. We tend to forget how our first team works like a well-oiled machine and everybody knows what to expect from everybody else. Last night's players are fine as individuals, but it would need a lot of time together to become a unit. It's the reason I've always bemoaned wholesale changes in the past. I realise that now the domestic cups are given short-shrift that this is the sort of team we're going to see, but we can't expect much more from them really.
Give him time, Jim. He does come across as the Welsh Moreno, but there might be something there. And we're hardly stuffed with options in that position.
