Nice lively debate here. And of course that is all it is. And that is the brilliant thing about football. 90 minutes a week and 900 minutes talking about it. But I do believe that, apart from one or two things, CH won't be roasting the lads. He has been around football for so long to accept defeat and know that the error might have been on his part by altering our style. I guarantee he won't be losing sleep over it. I doubt his brief was "keep us in the Prem and also we want a good cup run".
Agree with Munky and Supers on this - beaten on the day so move on. We can't win 'em all and, as Supers mentioned, Villa are an improving side. On to Wigan - I just hope that Tettey is fit as we do look a far more solid outfit with him and Johnson hunting down in midfield. Don't apologise Thurnby - if you feel it say it. I do and as Supers will tell you I am often a minority of 1 !!!
nobody should ever feel the need to apologise for a thread. i think people can analyse too much, especially following defeat, and i think tuesday was just a matter of not quite being on the money both tactically and performance-wise. that's just one of those things and it'll happen again this season. its nothing to worry about - i think that's all munky and certainly i was saying
Cheers guys and appreciate all of the comments. I think what the game did highlight though was the fine line between success and failure and the quality of teams in the league make it pretty unforgiving. Miss a couple of chances and all of a sudden it all goes pear shaped. the Wigan game is pretty important though and hopefully we will come out of it with something, a win would be massive and should see us in the top half!
I don't understand it either! Maybe he's trying to provoke a reaction from people? Desperate for attention? Think his latest one is, apart from Reading all the teams below Norwich will improve, so Norwich will get relegated! It may happen, but what evidence does he have?
That's the key phrase that I always come back to when I have many conversations about success/failure with regards to football, cricket or indeed any sport. Yes of course skill and ability are massive factors, but it is those fine lines between a key decision being given/not given, the ball going just inside/outside the post, the odd deflection here and there etc etc over the course of the season that make all the difference when the dust settles. Another day Moro would have bagged a hat-trick and we'd possibly have won the game 4-1 ourselves, but then conversely Whittaker's goal on saturday might have crept wide and the Swans would have gone on to beat us 3-1 (or another scoreline). It's all about which side the coin falls at any given moment on any given day, and we're all in agreemens that the rub of the green has been going our way in the past couple of months whereas at the start of the season it wasn't. Had the Indians decided to use DRS in the current test series then Alistair Cook wouldn't have scored a single hundred this winter, however they chose not to and he has absolutely destroyed them (well, in the first two tests anyway) and had the Russian linesman stuck his flag up in 1966 we would still be chasing our first World Cup win - and probably wouldn't have the level of expectation we seem to every major tournament comes around. The morale of my little tale is to not over-analyse or look for an answer to every situation, and as flippant as it sounds sometimes it truly is just down to being 'one of those days'
had holt's header not been saved by given (a save he basically knew nothing about) i'm pretty sure we'd have gone on to win the match. fine lines, as you say...
...or the deflected goal against Spurs wouldn't have gone in and we'd have been knocked out in the previous round. We could be here all day (and then some!) listing all the little incidents but I hope you get my point
In a way I think it's good that we're analysing the defeat so carefully - it's a reflection of how far we've come.
I think we had quite a lot of hard luck at the start of the season, where incidents could have gone differently and we won the game, rather than getting only one point, especially Spurs, QPR and West Ham. Sounds as though this game was pretty similar. I am not too disappointed to be out of the cup, think it gives us a bit of a reality check, plus we can just concentrate on what I feel has to be are ONLY target this year, which is survival. I honestly don't care if we lose to Corby Town in the FA Cup the first round we are drawn in. Adrian Durham just plays devil's advocate a lot, probably doesn't mean what he says, he just likes the reaction. Also on Bunn, he just needs the backing. Big gloves to fill and think he's done a decent job so far, not been as bad as people make out. Few people said he was hesitant coming out for crosses against Swansea, remember he is only 6 foot which is small for a keeper. Had he gone out up against Michu he would have lost out, which he did at one point and got away with. Probably something worth remembering. More use on the line than reaching up to a 6 foot 3 player who has a knack of scoring headers. Thurnby, say what you like mate, otherwise this place would be boring as ****.
