Any Swansea supporter looking in would think 'wtf'. We had endless attacks, without scoring, yet a defender, in a team that kept a clean sheet, it taking all the flak. O'Nien makes mistakes, show me someone yesterday who didn't. Neil can't seem to get a shot on target for example. But O'Nien has young lads across the defence and three inexperienced midfield players ahead of him. You can see he's continually trying to organise things and doesn't always manage it. So, either the other defenders we have aren't ready or Mowbray, an experienced centre half, is an idiot. I'll go for answer A.
Pretty pathetic hitting the report button about an argument on here btw. Like being back at school and trying to grass someone up to teacher.
A midfielder playing 5-10 yard passes all game has high passing accuracy, who’d of thought! If only he can learn to defend before he turns 30 we might have a player in there. I’ve just had a look on whoscored as that’s what was mentioned above and if we’re going off his average rating over the season is the worst of the 4 defenders we had on the pitch yesterday and his passing accuracy is less than Ballards which I’m surprised about! Sunderland as a team have 2 weaknesses listed against them and they’re “defending through balls” (see South Shields) and “aerial duels”, exactly what’s been highlighted on here from the middle of last season. There could also be the fact teams target him as to why he normally has more attempted aerial and ground duels than Ballard. On a positive note Hume had another good game seems to be rediscovering his form from last season.
A decent Mod would simply have a private word with Chunk/whoever ... ... not posting attention seeking drivel and acting the big man. That's my last word, this is another great RTB thread, that's great for this board, it shouldn't be derailed with this nonsense imo.
But that’s TM’s fault for making him captain when in reality he probably shouldn’t be a starter. Now that he’s captain he has to start him. We chose to sell Batth and not replace Evans, 2 players who’ve played at a decent level all of their career and know their role inside out. Why not make Ballard captain? He had 2 seasons under his belt in which he gained promotion in L1 then a solid championship season, he’s played more at CB than O’nien has whilst being younger and someone who’s going to be a mainstay in the team. We’ve handicapped ourselves into playing O’nien because he’s viewed as the only “experience” we have (Pritchard won’t be a regular starter for us again) and most of that has came as a midfielder in L1/L2.
I agree with much of your post but not that. Who could he make captain if not O'Nien, it wouldn't do Ballard any favours ... for a big lad he's very quiet. Batth isn't the future imo, can't get a game at Norwich and I don't want two huge central defenders, especially at home.
Reet then I’m not as angry as I was yesterday full of ale. We were class before the sending off and still played good football after but for me the intensity wasn’t there against 10 men that I’d have expect. We didn’t wear them out. But we hit the woodwork 2/3 times and their keeper had a great game another day we’d be doing the 5 fingered shuffle over 5-0 away win. I still don’t understand Adil not getting on or why Hemir didn’t throw his head at the ball in front of goal instead of trying to extend his big toe at it. HTL KTF
Yeah he's slightly behind the other defenders this season, don't think that was the case last season, but the point is it's only by a little bit. It's not the glaring problem it's being made out to be and no I'm not going to take preseason games into consideration. When Ekwah and Jobe play, and Ballard, we should have enough tall players to defend set pieces. It's not all O'Nien's fault and he wins his fair share of aerial duels anyway.
Clean sheet yesterday, one goal from Ekwah's mistake last week, the Leicester goal not O'Nien's fault ... ... so, I agree, not the mountain a molehill has turned into.
Before every game, when I see our team sheet, I always think ‘how can we lose with that team and bench’ Just about all of us on here have a very high opinion of many of our players and seem to expect to lose them to Premier Clubs quite soon. We think Ballard, Ekwah, Neil, Clarke, Roberts, Patterson, Cirkin and Hume are all ready for the next level. Then we have the likes of Bellingham, Huggins, Rigg, Ba, Jewi and some others who look like they have great potential. Older pro’s like Evans, Pritchard and Dack give us some experience and there’s the new boys like Seelt and Rusyn who we expect to come good. So many really top players. Do other supporters have so many riches as we do. Do they all think their lot are the tops just as I do with our lot. I can’t understand why we are not winning 4/5-0 every game with our squad. Is it because they are mainly young and a lacking a bit of experience that we sometimes play fantastic and other times can’t pass to our own players. If so then the future looks great as they improve and become more consistent. Is it just me or do you lot feel similar? If I could change one thing it would be to speed up our play. We seem to cause far more problems when we attack quickly instead of passing sideways and backwards until the opposition have all their players back in position.
I spent most of the second half shouting 'quicker' when we'd played out of defence and got into the final third. Clarke seemed to want to have a close contact dribble rather than beating his man and whipping a cross in. It was blocked so often it became seriously annoying.
Another point towards a play-off spot is all I'm saying. We're not getting automatics. Stacks of football still to play.
Your last paragraph is what I’d change the most, mate. I think we’re capable of playing with intensity for 90 minutes and I’d bring it in immediately.
