thats a fair comment, but you have to admit we were bloody excellent tonight. gave you no time on the ball, bossed the midfield without cattermole in the team and did it in both the 1st and 2nd half. it was definitely not the case of just you making us look good
Luckily we have Bolton to bounce back against. That's assuming 4 or 5 don't have mares on the same day as they have tonight. On tonight's performance alone, we have looked a Championship side. When I saw their line up I thought we had a chance. I was shocked that Crofts was playing instead of Pilkington and thought Jackson may have got the nod. I think PL got it wrong tactically and that was perhaps our worst performance of the season. I absolve Holt and Morison from criticism because they were supplied with crap all night. The defence came under pressure but I put that down to midfield that was dire tonight and it was left toAyala and Whitbread to hoof it. I don't think it pays to keep changing the team. We beat a Premiership team away Saturday and we changed it. I would like to see a settled formation now and again barring bad form and injury and if we are going to play Holt and Morison up front then we've got to give them the right service. No tears yet of course and we look forward to Saturday and the right kind of response.
Without a shadow of a doubt you were excellent tonight and perhaps the SOL will become a fortress for you this season. 3 games without conceding a goal is good going The only minor criticism I could level at you guys tonight, considering the gulf between the two teams was the low shots on target count - I think it was 6 but it's hard to criticize when you score from 2 of them! (the other being an OG). Somehow we still managed 11 shots that were off target and 3 (I think) on target, shame none of them actually troubled the goalie.
Dreadful evening; but however woeful they were no team below us tonight won, and we are still in a good position. Lambert won't let that happen again any time soon; neither will the team. Expect a major performance on Saturday. Let's not single out any particular players; they were all below par, and none of them will need us to point out their shortcomings. This is not the team of unmotivated no hopers we rightly moaned about three seasons ago. And Sunderland were superb.
We just had players all over the pitch whose first touch was abysmal tonight - Johnson, Crofts in particular, Morison to name a few. Couple this with how well Sunderland closed us down and it was no surprise to see the defense creaking.
Very poor display tonight especially by the midfield. Hopefully now that's out the way and we do better in a very much important game at home against bolton.
I actually don't blame the centre backs for the goals. First was pure class, second was Martin's fault for not covering the run into the area an third was just an unlucky break. They actually mopped up quite a lot of additional pressure at times.
For the first time in time in a long time we had few options when on the ball and didn't press the ball as a unit (unlike Sunderland who proved to be exremely effective at it) You have to give them credit though - as poor as we were - they made us look poorer tonight.
Broadly agree with your ratings, though I'd lower Johnson. I also thought Surman was poor- his delivery from dead balls was not good enough and he got caught on the ball nearly as many times as the other midfielders. I thought Whitbread and Ayala were a bit better than the scoreline- the midfield was just completely dominated and they were hopelessly exposed. Morison's free header I would have expected him to bury. If we'd got a goal then we might have got something from the game. Holt also had a golden chance in the first half I would have expected him to bury, but otherwise Holt did his best. Positives? Just the one yellow card for Naughton...
Well thats the perfect end to a ****e evening ! The kids have started projectile vomiting ! hey ho, just when you thought it couldn't get worse ! Roll on saturday and hopefully the chance to put it right !
weren't we below you......?? just kidding. gutted i missed this one tonight, still haven't seen the goals but hear the first was a cracker. good luck canaries, you've got more than enough to stay up comfortably, and i've got so much more time for you than the other two promoted teams, qpr who have just chucked money at the problem and swansea who are starting to believe their own hype. ponces.
Problem: Playing Morison, Crofts and Martin together on the RHS, Martin was left exposed far too often by crofts who went AWOL, and crofts was not helped in any way by morison in terms of back-tracking. Solution: Play Pilkington, Jackson/Fox/Bennett and Tierney. Simple. --- For Bolton game, I would like to see: Ruddy Naughton-Ayala-Whitbread-Tierney Pilkington-Fox-Bennett-Surman Jackson-Holt
You're right Billy. And now you deserve to be above us. Good luck to you for the rest of the season, now that the friendly cup has been competed for. Always been my second team; was a regular at Roker Park when I lived up there.
Punished by the demotion to the bench: Johnson Morison Martin Hoolahan Crofts --- Must maintain a "if you play like a bellend, you will be dropped" mentality or we will slip faster than the titanic down this league
Absolutely. Credit where it's due- Sunderland looked dangerous every time going forward. The pace of McClean, Sessegnon and Larsson (who incidentally didn't have his best game I thought!!) was impossible to deal with. Campbell was spectacular. Aside from their attack, Richardson dominated in defence and John O'Shea refused to be bulllied too. Finally, to top it all off, MON got his tactic spot on. I can't believe the stats look so favourable towards us, because anyone watching the game would see Sunderland absolutely massacred us today. I think we have to hold our hands up and say we got stung by a Sunderland team playing very well. Every now and again a team clicks. I don't think we need to panic at all.
I disagree about Morison. He got very little offered to him, he's far too useful. Also while I agree about Johnson and Crofts, I don't think we can drop both. Johnson is great when other midfielders aren't giving the ball away, but he tends to drop (or rise) to the level of the players around him, so while he was at his worst today, I think he should play on, especially as were up against Bolton
Just as Andy Murray occasionally comes across mindless-ball-bashers in grand slams and gets knocked out by a lifetime-best performance, Norwich happened to run into a FORM team who are flying at the moment. A different view on tonight.
