There were hardly going to be if any good times to experiment during this season unless were 5 0r 6 goals up and completely dominating the game as i say hardly if any ! But we need to do it with players good enough to hit the ground running and only one at a time not to mess up the flow when we`re doing ok ! but strength in depth will need to be addressed if we are going to experiment with good effect come next season. Bloody money again ?? So we`re still building and learning and the longer we survive and progress the better the players we will get in to improve our team . This season could have been terrible if the experts were right but hey we are finishing above 17th place and did`nt do a Derby or Blackpool ! helps make today a little less of a pain in the arse aye ?
Absolutely Swantastic - we are still Premier League!!!!! Couldn't give a f**k that todays 'experiment' didn't work - we got the point that guaranteed our PL survival! And next season I will be watching PL football! Again!!!
"Let's not forget where we have come from, guys". Swimaway, this performance was a stark reminder of EXACTLY where we have come from - and a warning that we will be back there PDQ next season unless several burning issues are addressed. How many times times were we battered in the second half in the NPC after dominating the early stages? How many times were we left hanging on to salvage a result in games where we should have been out of sight and kicking on? I lost count of the number of times that I posted about it, usually moaning about our midfield totally running out of steam. Look, we all love Leon and Joe. When they are on song and running things they look like world beaters. But let's be honest here, they lack stamina; they lack strength; they lack pace; they lack physicality. And don't quote Barca's minnows to me. They are several classes above and beyond the highest level that our lads can aspire to and have the skills, the stamina the everything that is needed in this game. No comparison. Joe and Leon hustle, harry, scavenge and intercept but they do not possess the muscle, or the ability, to consistently go past people or power them off the ball. When in possession they habitually slow our play down with a backward or sideways pass. Observe, for instance, how fluent and incisive Wigan have looked of late in comparison. They play like us but are two yards faster and break at a pace we can only dream about. They have strong men, athletes, in their team and recently have made us look like slow motion cream puffs. Yes, I know we beat them and are above them in the league but they have found form and would hammer us right now. A lot of this is down to fitness, another thing that has been bugging me for a long time. Now I'm not claiming that our team isn't fit. I am saying that they are not as fit as they should be for this league. The moment any pace is injected into the game we start to struggle. Certainly Wolves powered their way through us at will in the second half - as did QPR (twice), Norwich (twice) and others. Deja vu anyone? Now to Buck. We all seem to agree that his attempt at a plan B was a disaster but there are other issues. Did he not think to warn our defence about Fletcher's heading ability? Yet there the man was, not a tall guy, in splendid isolation, heading the ball into our net. Was he not aware that Jarvis, like Sinclair, likes to cut in from the left to strike with his right foot? He was allowed all the time in the world to do it and, as we know, he scored. Do we do any homework on the opposition? Actually, I'm sure we do but is anyone in the team listening? One thing is for sure, as well as we've done in our first PL season, and we have been superb at times, there remains a hell of a lot of work to do for next season. It would help a great deal if we could find some momentum in our final two games to take us forward with a bit of confidence. Oh, and without Garry Monk, please.
Strength and fitness improvement would be a good thing in some of our players but a bit more height would help two ? anyone got a spare rack for the little uns ? When we beat man u we`ll be the darlings of the prem again for a little while in this fickle game .
I agree Ivor that we look slow these days, tired legs I suppose, with season's end just 2 games away, with regard to Wigan, we have played like that on times this season, but Wigan have better players in the final third in my view, and I rate Moses highly, but you are right our fitness levels do need looking at, something for next season. What worried me today was, how Rodgers tried naively to copy Wigan's current formation, but he chose the wrong setup at the back, the only good from today, from what I could see, is that Orlandi still has mileage at this level, and is a player I have always rated, as I do Dobbie, but what worries me regarding Rodgers, is he seems hit and miss with his evaluation of some of the squad players!............
Formation correct, personell wrong. agree with dragon 100% Monk was disaster yet again and gets slower the more he plays ,why play caulker wide to experiment when he wont even be here next season?? Caulks should have played in monks position then i think the system would have worked far better. Bucks inability to change it was key for me, it was clear caulker was getting murdered out wide and monk was playing like a clown in the middle(along with ash) i felt he didint want to sub monk for personal reasons not professional ones,we paid the price for that.
Agree with you Ivor ...and another thing everyone is blaming monk but it was poor defending by ash for two of the goals yesterday and poor goalkeeping by vorm for the other two goals. what about blaming them and not monk for a change....
Yes Ash was at fault also, but the problem is that once there is a weak link in the chain it affects all defence. Monk has been amazing but every game seems to take a bit away from his legacy. Rodgers ballsed it up with a new formation but it was nice to try some thing different.
Agree in total Ivor, but in particular we are struggling for fitness and stamina required for our style of play over 90 esoecially when the other team doesn't fatigue but keeps up the chase. Another thing from yesterday is that we had better find another gear in what we do in just about every dimension of our style, because one thing is clear, when the opposition shutdown our short ball out by pressing very high and we play long ball out neither Graham (who was beat by a centerback on just about every long pass by Vorm) nor the midfield / wingers have much of a clue on how to play in that style. Wolves put us in a straight jacket second half and we had no response other than to swap Graham for Moore. If we have to go long why not have two strikers playing off each other ... surely that would have been yesterday's Plan B. We either get a Plan B to respond to the high pressure tactic or we shift gears and get tricky with our Plan A.
Phil, yes we do have tired legs with the season drawing to a close but it's also drawing to a close for Wolves and they ran us into the ground in the second half - the same Wolves, demotivated, relegated with nothing to play for; the same Wolves who closed us down at will, won the 50/50 challenges, picked up most of the loose balls and still found time to play fluent, passing, scoring football that we had no answer to. You'd swear that they were the team playing for their bonuses and £800k a place. No excuses, imo. On other points mentioned I agree that Vorm was poor, Monk atrocious, Caulker at sea (playing out of position in fairness). Ash played like he wants to devalue any incoming offers and our central midfield, Siggy included, was just blown away. Danny fought a losing and lonely battle with two physical centre backs whilst our wide players did try to produce. For me, the only good thing about the game, apart from the precious point, was the encouraging form of Orlandi who looked like he could thrive at this level IF he is given enough regular game time.
I agree. He was the only one who did well yesterday I thought. Personally I'm frustrated that Rodgers has consistently shown that he can only get us to play one way, just as Barca do, yet he chooses a game that could have propelled us into the top half had we won it to have a tinker.....which turned out as a stinker.
It was working yesterday, we were 3-0 up. The defense then cocked up. Hardly bucks fault, we did want him to try something new.
But yesterday BEFORE the first whistle? Come on. When we reverted to our usual set up the backs (Caulker in particular) were all out of position. Great to be versatile (changing the back formation isn't THAT versatile btw) but what happened yesterday could have been avoided and was alluded to by Lawro in MOTD when he said we'd gone all experimental. Mental more like.
Agree kj. No need to daft things in this game or use players that might not be around NeXT season. We all know we can play attacking football, its defending that we cant do when we go offensive! To compound that he plays caulker wide and monk in the middle! Really stupid! We have seen gary struggled for years when exposed why buck thinks being in the prem league Will give him pace to play There ive no idea
