Could have something to do with the fact we have around 10 sicknotes in our squad who seem to get an injury picking up a piece of paper !
That 11 would get slaughtered, Willock should be fine for Saturday Warburton said but will come a game too soon for Wallace. He expects both Wallace and Field to be in contention to start after the International break !
I know that 11 would get slaughtered...that is my worry. But you cannot expect mush else if 10-12 of yoyr first team squad is unavailable or below par. The international break cannot come early enough for us Slight modification on what you said Hammersmith I think he expects Wallace and Field to be on the bench for Luton, surely...not to play 90 minutes. Willock should be back, but depending what the problem is ...is how he will play Fingers crossed for Johansen, Chair and Dykes
I take your point about injuries. However, I still think he tinkers. Our injury situation has fluctuated, sometimes with more injuries, sometimes less. I think Warbs is guilty of tinkering because I've been present at plenty of games where I know certain players are available/are on the bench. But he elects to try something new in many games, even when he isn't pushed into it. Don't get me wrong, I like Warburton. I want him to stay. Seems like a good guy. I'd prefer if he picked his best and most consistent team each game, and then tinkered via 2nd half substitutions. One thing we have to accept, though, is that Warburton has been in charge of more than one transfer window now where he has elected to bring in players with injury problems, and every single one of those players has had a spell of injury or two. I actually don't see an issue with Ball and Dozzell, excepting that they are less familiar with each other than other combinations. Ball has been one of the better players this season and he's not afraid to get stuck in. Dozzell is proving to be a good little player, and he's so young! Moses and Kakay... well, they've both picked up a bit recently, so let's see. But surely they'd be playing on opposite sides. With your team there, I think we'd be ok if we Dozzell and everyone in front of him pushed up a bit, put the pressure on and tried to get the ball in to Austin or anyone else who's in and around their area. If Austin does play, we need to play him and his teammates in such a way as to get the ball to his feet in and around the D, so that he can shoot. His ability to turn and shoot is good, but we always try to make him play Dykes' style.
Probably because the "more successful teams" Fulham, Bournemouth, WBA are successful in this League because they have parachute payments, bigger budgets, therefore bigger and better more experienced playing squads. So they dont have to bother themselves so much listening to sports science, Doctors and with resting 1st team regulars in case of injury. They can just play them and if they get injured, tough ****, they just play the next best on the Bench. I hope these teams find too many in key positions get injured ( all their strikers for example) and run out of good reserves, play worse and worse as the season grinds on and we end up in the top 2. Though I doubt it!
Hate to say this but the QPR + commentator Nick London(?)' thought Dickie may have injured his groin when he got that yellow 15 minutes or so from the end. Reckoned he was feeling it a lot but guess you'd notice d that more than Sinton or me.....
We pick up good players with injury history..it's part of our "plan". If we can keep them fit... Last season we did quite well on the injury front. This year less so.
Only quoting what Warburton said, and that was he was hoping they'd both be in contention for the Luton game. Alot of the players we bought in have been players that have had injury troubles or other clubs aren't willing to gamble on given those histories. Wallace, De Wijs are obvious ones who seem to get injured regularly. Odebajo no one seemed interested in apart from us, whether it be through injuries or clubs not thinking he's much cop. Johansen and Charlie are both entering the twilight of their careers and more injuries can be expected. Dykes' style of play will cause him to pick up the odd injury here and there, just hope this foot problem is more of a niggle than something more long term. Willock is young and doesn't seem to be a sicknote thankfully, the same with Dozell although he hasn't played enough yet to judge. Praying that Field isn't gonna be another who's injury prone and that after recovering from this injury he doesn't get another and is as decent as he was before it. We really need to get in 2 wing backs who aren't injury prone and are half decent in January as Mccallum looks like he's gonna have hamstring problems forever unfortunately.
This is what worries me about Field. People have put a lot of hope in him but there's just as much chance of him getting injured again shortly after coming back. I'd actually make him fight for his place in the team via substitute appearances, and maybe that would guarantee that we don't rush him back and push him into another injury. With that said, the club seems to be handling the Amos situation well, easing him in gradually. I'd actually like to see both him and Johansen start together soon, to see how that works. But maybe we'd need a more traditional 4 at the back for that?
Blackpool really is the start of three consecutive games that really could change around those top positions. Away to Blackpool who have been much better than they will have expected and coming away with a point won’t be bad - though other teams who win will be leapfrogging us. Home to Luton is again another difficult game against a team who are getting some great results. This is a game we would hope to have more fit players available than some time - we need to take all the points for this and the following challenge against Huddersfield who are improving over last season and like Luton will want to push us down and create a gap around the play-off positions. A tough set of games where we will definitely need to be performing better than we have of late. This could be our ‘dip’ or our ‘bounce back’. If we want to keep up with the pack we need to be looking at 7pts minimum.
At our best, and with hopefully Wallace and Field back close to match form for the last 2, I think we are good enough to beat Blackpool, Luton and Huddersfield, and if we are seriously targeting a top 6 finish we should most definitely be going out to win each one, which happily Warburton seems to do. Huddersfield looks the toughest because if memory serves they did the double on us last season, so revenge needed too.
Did anyone else feel like there was an absolutely huge gulf between our defence and our attack today? Holding midfielders were too deep and the attacking midfielders were very close to the strikers. Appreciate it's a lack of pace at both ends that leads to this. Can't play a high line with the speed of our three CBs and we can't sit deep and counter given the lack of pace up top. Solution? No idea really and look to wise fellow posters. Push the defensive line up a little and drop the strikers a little deeper? Have one of Willock and Chair close to Dykes and the other deep? Aim to play something more akin to 5-1-2-1-1? That probably makes no sense - thinking three at back, wing backs, then a diamond with Dykes up top. Frustrating viewing today.
We definitely need someone to link the play between the lines. Should probably be Chair who doesn't do it regularly enough and often makes the wrong choices. In between that he's pretty good mind. The biggest problem we have in midfield is that we nearly always only have two in the centre. This means we're over run and chasing shadows a lot of the time.
Neither Amos or Dozell got forward enough tonight, we needed more players from deep making runs. Dykes was poor tonight , didn't win much in the air, was bullied off the ball alot and missed a huge chance at the end that he should've gone for with his head.
I think you are right. Hopefully it will be better when Field is back playing the holding midfield role, with Stefan or Dozzell better able to get further forward. I often think Chair should be getting back closer to the midfield. We've missed someone with real pace since BOS went, and I would love to see us bring in someone like that again if we have the Budget, but Albert and Moses aren't slouches, plus Gray is supposed to be quick up front though I haven't noticed that yet.
