Some right **** on here. The sendings off killed the game and you can't judge that second half performance. It was a bizarre situation to be in. In the first half we had a spell where we strung together about 500 passes and thats only a slight exaggeration. They couldn't get close. I was thinking to myself, I'm watching the best spell of possession football a Hull City team has ever produced. It was beautiful.
I don't understand why we crossed the ball for 50 minutes - generating a situation of 1 or 2 of our attackers, vs a back 4 + keeper? We had two extra men, and should have passed the ball around to take advantage of that. Once it got nervous with 15 minutes left - we should have passed the ball around the half way line - either seeing the game out, or forcing Sunderland out and leaving gaps. Incredibly frustrating to watch. But, I suppose our strength is an organised team, and once we don't need to do that, it became a little strange for us. We got 3pts so I'm happy, and I don't think it is a bad omen for the future, because of the strange nature of the situation.
I was wondering the same thing about the crossing; it clearly wasn't working, so why didn't we change the way we attacked? I think we rely too heavily on crosses, which makes us predictable and easy to defend against. Good 3 points and fair play to Sunderland for hanging on.
the problem is we could not move around the box it was so compact.any drive would have been easily cleared. So we were forced to shoot far out or cross. That's why Sagbo became useless because there was no space for him to run and push his way into. Otherwise I have been impressed with him. Decent signing, will get better as well. I can see him getting 8/9 goals this season.
My criticism would be we needed to up the pace and tempo to try and get in behind them. I'd of put another striker on at half time and dropped to three at the back. But really, it's pretty hard to analyse that that second half. I could see how it would pan out from the first minute.
Most people will comment on our inability to score and sunderland's strong effort but at the end of the day we got the 3pts.
We needed players running into the box with the ball at their feet to force them to tackle and give away a penalty. A second goal could have opened the floodgates.
Yep, we lacked urgency in the second half. I was more shocked at there time wasting just 10 minutes in!
I think the most frustrating aspect of the second half was Elmo's lack of positivity - given loads of space to run into on the right he consistently played the ball back or hit hopeful crosses for the Sunderland defenders to head out. I was just hoping for him to take the chance to get towards the dead ball line and pull it back but he just didn't look interested. Giving him the benefit of the doubt though, he did play in both games at Spurs and was on the end of Cattermole's sending off so he may well have been running on empty for the last 45 minutes.
I agree, his persistence to cross the ball from deep and not take on the man was frustrating in the second half (especially since the crosses were poor), although to be fair he was more positive in the first half when the game was more open.
Crossing in the second half aside, this was Elmo's best game for a while. He was a bit more positive and linked up with Rosy well. Rosenior has been the biggest surprise for me this season, I thought he'd get found out, but he's rarely put a foot wrong and looked comfortable.
I have to say whoever sits behind me on the back row is a complete idiot. Every time we passed it sideways or backwards he moaned and just shouted get it forward or score. Well i am pretty certain they where trying to score! Sunderland where trying to frustrate us and hope with five minutes left they where still in the game. Also why the mass exodus? It was 1-0 the game was in the balance. I was really pleased with the first half, i think it showed that when teams don't just sit back we can pick them apart. Second half it was very hard to pick them apart due to sitting so deep.
Just got back from the match. A strange game, 11 v 11 we looked really good and Sunderland hardly had a sniff. Once they lost those 2 players it spoilt the rest of the game and it was always going to be difficult to break them down, especially when we aren't the most blessed attacking wise. We could have used more urgency and tempo going forward but a win is a win and it takes us further away from Sunderland and Palace. I don't think we can afford to be picky as new boys in the top flight and every win should be welcomed. Elmo could do with a couple of games on the bench as his crossing wasn't as good as it could be.
As others have said, the first half performance was good across the team - City just looked a bit confused when they were up against 9 men. Obviously Elmo had used up his reserves of adrenalin in the second half.
I loved today's match. The sendings spoilt it in terms of a contest. Poyet did what any manager would do, shut up shop. It is hard to play against, no matter who you are. The main influence today was the wind. We had to play the ball on the floor, and they had to punt it up the field. If we had been playing with it behind us, we would have peppered their goal in the second half. Our possession in the first half was fantastic.
