Agreed, they defended excellently from the front to the back. It's another reason why I am not Yoshida's biggest fan. In the modern game you need centre backs that are comfortable on the ball and bringing it out. Fonte and Lovren were excellent at that last season. (Lovren especially - I think his long range passing is criminally underrated. I didn't even notice how good it was until he played against us last weekend!)
It was a disappointing game yesterday, but i half expected it to be although like others i was hoping for a 3-0 win ! Although some of our posters are saying WBA contributed to our below par performance by coming to defend, i thought that the Baggies played an away game very well. They could also have sneaked a win if Forster hadnt lived up his billing. Our attack was extremely disappointing and Pelle's performance was the worst centre forward performance that i have seen for a long time. However early days and we can hope for a big improvement from him and the team in general away at West Ham. JWP's free kick was the highlight, would have been a great goal if the ball had gone a couple inches further to the right !
Interesting to compare the cameo PL debutant performance from WBA's Brown Ideye vs Pelle. Ideye looked sharp, had good movement and almost created a goal for himself with a great turn vs Pelle who huffed and puffed and didn't create anything. I was excited by the Pelle signing, however, we really do need to play someone up with him and he needs to adapt quickly as we haven't got a 10 game transition period to play with.
I think one of the main reasons we couldn't utilise Pelle effectively was that we didn't go down the flanks enough. Clyne took on the full back once in the entire game, and on the other side Bertrand and Tadic only put in a couple of crosses from the wing. I am sure Pelle would be better facing the goal when he receives the ball so we need to play to his strengths by getting to the byline. Whether Clyne was having an off-day or whether he was following orders, he was ineffective in attack, unlike at Liverpool. Isgrove should have come on instead of Cork when Tadic went off to provide service from the left. Or give McQueen a run out down the left, it's not like we don't have any wingers at all!
I agree with Chilco. I can't understand why Isgrove played all pre-season but didn't come on yesterday. He was exactly what we needed (but maybe not quite as good!).
I think Koeman recognises that though in his quest for a winger. Agreed though, the Cork substitution was odd.
Forster 8 Clyne 5 Fonte 8 Yoshida 8 MOTM Bertrand 6 Wanyama 7 Schneiderlin 6 Davis 5 Ward-Prowse 5 Tadic 6 Pelle 5 Long 4
We absolutely do have a 10 game transition period to play with; probably more. This team is a work in progress and we can't expect it to be hitting the right formula straight away. If you do expect that, then you should prepare for some disappointment this season. Building a team takes time and you have to allow for ups and downs. Last season we went on a run of games (about 10) where it seemed the wheels were coming off, but this is why happens in sport unless you are the very, very best and even then it can go wrong. We are in a change period with a new manager and new players. If after very game Pelle are going to judge the team by that single performance each week them fasten your seat belts. Last week everyone was 'great performance, did well, Linekar said we'll be fine, quite excited now'... Etc, etc. this week were not very good and we are not up to it. Take a look at how we progress and how we have done over a long period of games.
And on those odd times, the mighty Ollsen didn't look quite so mighty. Good post Chilco. Last season we didn't get our full backs behind the opposing full backs enough; I said if nearly every week. From the two games we've had I think that Bertrand may just get in behind a bit and Pelle's one shot came from a pull back that Betrand did from near the goal line (great peel off by Pelle). If that had gone in it would have changed quite a lot.
I can do what I want with my ratings. I didn't realise this thread is all about you and your opinion. Perhaps you have missed out an 'I' at the start of the comment. Yoshida passed the ball out fine, better than Fonte. He completed 85% of passes and passed the ball much better than he normally does. Your comment makes me wonder if you even watched the game. His passing was not poor. Not even close to poor.
The trouble with the pass competition stat is about just how many of those passes made a real difference or started a decent attack. Yoshida & Indeed Hooiveld are competent enough defenders. They may occasionally get the wrong side of their man, but overall they carry out their main objectives very well. One issue which was pointed out by others earlier is that what Lovren added to the team was an ability on the ball and a vision to start attacks from the back. With Yoshi he has to wait for a midfielder to drop deep to get attacks going. This means that midfielder has one fewer passing option going forward meaning a compact WBA were stopping us before we even got started. I feel sorry for Yoshida as it's likely that when Gardos is fully fit that he will lose his place and that would happen even sooner if he was to make a serious mistake, so can understand him being cautionary with his passing.
Ha ha. That's funny. Yes I watched him hit lots of 30 yard balls on to the head of their CBs.... Yes, I missed the 'I'
Last season Wanyama, Cork or Schneiderlin were dropping deep to pick the ball up from the centre backs. It's standard for a midfielder to do that in side wanting to play possession football. Yoshida lost the ball four times in the match with long balls. Every now and then he's going to have no options on other than a risky pass. He decided to go long, to a big strong player in Pelle, rather than risk losing possession in his own half. The other option is to go back to the keeper. Forster is probably going to have nothing on either and be forced to hit an accurate long ball from much further away. Yoshida may be under instructions from Koeman to hit a long ball in this situation. Whilst we're on the subject of funny, their centre backs were much further than 30 yards away when Yoshida had the ball at his feet. Do some research on the dimensions of a football pitch and learn what a yard is.
If Cork was going to come on it needed to be earlier. I must admit I was thinking that if Cork couldn't get a game when the midfield were playing that poorly then he might as well leave 'cause he's never going to play. I agree that for a 10 minute burst it needed to be Isgrove or even Tadier.
Got a bee in your bonnet with me I think? All in this new age of non-confrontational posting too Just a little FYI, which isn't meant as anything other than information, but I took my mate to the game yesterday who is a UEFA A license qualified coach. Now I know this doesn't mean he is right all the time, but I certainly take note of a few things he says (usually correcting my view ), but one of the key things he pointed out to me was that Yoshida played well defensively (I'd said before hand he may be a weakness and my mate made a point of telling me I had that wrong on his defensive display) but pointed out that too often he didn't make his decision to play a pass quick enough that lead him to playing quite a lot of high balls (30 yards plus ) in the general direction of our CF and their CBs. Just one of several interesting points made by a fully qualified coach who reads a game better than me. Ps. He and I had a long discussion about big Vic, but I'll leave that for now.
