I thought he did alright considering he was up against 9ft 11 jake Cooper. I can live without this mythical goal machine if we can win 2-0 away. Roberts isn't a striker, as I've said before. Willock, Chair and Roberts as an attacking 3 will do for me. It was a different type of test last night and one that we came through. A very good 3pts.
Agree, Roberts looked OK. He is capable of good movement (and definitely not a striker, he looks much better behind the front - moving, passing and trying to create openings). He looks a little … err, up himself at times. Maybe just my impression but he doesn’t quite look as though he feels he should be here and should be playing everyday in the Prem. Great opportunity for him to build his rep here if he could see it that way (and believe it). Willock and Chair are on fire atm. Despite teaming up in them they are still creating opportunities - and converting them. Step stepping up after criticism. Defense is slowly improving. Great to watch. Great to see the defensive line achieve their clean sheet at last. It felt as though the team wanted it for them too, with support from others late in the game to ‘get the job done’. Strong result on the night (and it didn’t feel as though we played fully to our potential. Now 5pts away from relegation.
Yes It was a pretty good team performance. We looked very good on the ball and solid. The 2 old ones Balogun and Johansen provided a really solid fundament down the middle. It was an excellent full debut from Balogun, showed his experience, pace, reading of the game, hardly put a foot wrong all night, and looked to be organising us. He was certainly having a long word in a laughing Roberts ear after the game where he was obviously banging on about something, finishing practise perhaps.... Paal was great defensively, 3 vital clearing headers I think. Laird a goal saving block and got down the right side well, including a cut back for the Roberts chance he blasted over. Tim on his full debut got much better after a few poor passes early on. Chair 2 assists. Same again Saturday please.
Sounds like excellent man management to me. Beale is quoted as disenchanted with our midfielders and lo and behold Johansen is no longer coasting his way through games but actually putting in a shift.
I've not been able to see a slowmo of the 'miss' but you're right, it did come quick to him but from the one angle i've seen, it did look like a miss. I did note that he didn't play quite like a true no. 9 and ended up playing in a similar fashion to Dykes so i'm not really sure what extra he actually brought to the team.
The point is a decent goalscorer buries it, and he isn't one. Not buying a proper finisher will ultimately cost us a top 6 spot this season I reckon. Hopefully we can loiter around the play offs until January and then finally address a situation we should've sorted out ages ago !
I totally agreed with the not getting a no.9 in was ludicrous,however there is literally nothing we can do about that now, so I think we should stop going on about it until January, where we have another opportunity to get a No.9 in. As it stands we have made some very astute signings/loans, Paal was absolutely awesome last night, Laird I wish was ours as would want to celebrate more, Tim was extremely weak in a tackle, and sauntered around a lot, again if not a loan might be better/ was his 1st start so will improve under Beale.Roberts isn't a no.9 so unfair to judge him so far , but like his attacking prowess and did have a big part in the 1st goal. Have players coming back so this season looks promising let's get behind Beale,and forget about the striker situation until Jan!
I know there is some concerns about not having a natural born goalscorer in the side but what it did show last night was how effective a mobile front 3 can be and the number of problems it causes defenders....... The movement of Roberts, Chair and Willock was very good at times and they took it in turns to be the furthest forward, working by rotation so that the defenders didn't know who to follow or when to hold their line, plus it meant that we closed down from the front a lot quicker tahn previous....... Also I thought that when both Dykes and Bonne came on they also put in a shift so that the intensity didn't drop and it also gave us a focal point for Seny to go long rather than playing out the short ball...... Kudos to Beale for getting everyone to buy into his thought process.........
Just to make the result even more satisfying I’ve just remembered that the odious Rod Liddle is a big Wall fan and has a history of bad mouthing us in print. Ha ha you talent free twat.
I was there last night and I thought Roberts looked a bit isolated. Not only was he left on his own with a giant defender when Seny booted goal kicks in his direction (why?) but there didn’t seem to be a great understanding between him and the rest of the midfield. Whether he is ‘up himself’ or whether he needs more time to adjust his game, I don’t think he offered enough to warrant a starting spot ahead of Dykes. Balogun on the other hand looked fantastic - no surprise we got our first clean sheet of the season with him in the team.
Another look at the Willock goal shows just how good it was, from Seny out to Jimmy, Steff waving him forward, crisp passing all along the floor, into the back of the net in less than 20 seconds......... lovely football....
It’s a lovely placed pass from Chair, the right side and distance to allow Willock to push the ball away from the defender to shoot. Beautiful.
Have to say, I can't see why everyone is having a pop at Roberts now. Do we always have to have someone to slag off? Until now Dykes was the easy target. Before his injury a couple of years ago nobody had a good word to say about Amos. As long as it continues to work does it really matter who scores the goals? We're doing alright and I am quite enjoying our football at the moment.
