Going to be a tough one. Ipswich are the in-form team at the moment. In their last 6 games: * 13pts out of a possible 18 (as opposed to our 3pts) * scored 13 goals (as opposed to our 7) * conceded 6 goals (as opposed to our 15) No direct info from the Club but I don't believe we have any 'new' injury worries - obviously Tunnicliffe is the main man missing. On the availability front, Jack Grimmer is back in contention and Adam Taggart has returned from his loan to Dundee United. Doubt if either will start though. If I were Gray, I'd drop Richards - just hasn't produced his Wales performances and is so poor defensively. Also, if as Gray predicts Ipswich will attack with long balls I'd revert to 3 at the back and press them high in midfield. And change things a tad to get more mobility in that midfield. Therefore: ..........................Lonergan................. ........Stearman........Hutchinson....Ream..... ...Fredericks......O'Hara.....Hyndman....Garbutt... ...............................Cairney.................. ........................ <McCormack>.... .............................Dembele............ PS not impressed with Fredericks at the moment but not a lot of choice if LVC struggling with fitness. Also might go for Matilla instead of Hyndman but again not sure how fit the 'Atilla is.
If I were Gray........now there's a song in that somewhere. A lot of players are just off form probably due to confidence, probably, likely, no definitely due to the idiot that is the DoF! I've got to be honest it's difficult not to be affected if you're a player. Very unsettling as you just don't know if the new boss will like you and play you. However, Ipswich are on a run at the moment so I can see it being a close nil-nil draw as we're tighter than a gnats chuff at the back at the moment! Joking aside, I can't see us getting anything from this one. Totally depressing. Thanks Rigg!
In his article on the Official site today, Stuart Gray focuses on Ipswich and Mick McCarthy. However he makes a telling point - “You play to your squad’s strengths". Let's hope he practices what he preaches, 'cos ours is 3-5-2 and Cairney in the middle. Here's a link to the full article: http://www.fulhamfc.com/news/2015/december/15/grays-ipswich-preview
And, we kicked off! Not sure what to say after tonight ... oh, I know .. Hey rosc, what about Hyndman? - "The boy done well" ... nope that's really all I want to say.
Thought I'd just cut & paste what my comments were after the Brentford game, as nothing has changed, this team seems to have an obsession with keeping possession in their own half. Do they get a bonus if the have a passing accuracy rate of over 70%!!!! (Three changes in coaching and I haven't seen any improvement or any change in the way we play, slow movement out of defense allowing the opposition to get back and defend in numbers, the same old inability to pass a ball properly to a team mate, keeping possession in our own half getting nowhere fast, allowing teams to hit us on the break when we lose possession)
Defence let the team down again and I agree also on the above comment of slow ball. All in all we gifted Ipswich the points. I did see some positives tonight. I thought the team worked hard once they had woken up 10 minutes into the game. The main obvious positive was that of Hyndman. I can't remember him featuring before this season but his touches were good and forward - a good option to replace O'Hara who I think needs a rest. I also applaud Stuart Gray for making the subs fairly early, gambling on Hyndman and going for the equaliser with 4 up front. I didn't think it was the worst performance I've seen but we are terrible still at set play, poor and panicky in defence, narrow, slow to build the attack and shy at running into the box and taking a shot - but we can play football though. Ipswich were not great. It was a good away performance from them and as I say we gifted them.
My man had a great performance once again,but irrespective who we have as a coach the F Backs & C half are to just not up to it, so whoever we should employ his priority is to rid the club of these brain dead players.
Remember when Roy joined the first think he did was to sort out the defense... Simple... I am staying away from any commentary...
I'm not being sensationalist when I say this but if we're not careful we'll be relegated. Gray isn't the man to get the club back on an even keel. Nice chap that he is. A couple of losses over Xmas and we're in the poop my friends.
Difficult to add to the perfect summary of our situation that SuperBri gives here and on the ‘What’s happening’ thread. However the irony of “Stu’s” headline in his blog on twitter and the Official site before the game shouldn’t go unmentioned: “Stuart Gray wants #ffc to start quickly tonight” [Link: http://www.fulhamfc.com/news/2015/december/15/gray-start-brightly ]
Picking up on COYW’s earlier point about substitutions. Agree making changes quite early (with about 25 minutes left) was the right thing to do but I’m afraid that’s where our opinions diverge. Bringing on extra men up front and lumping the ball forward in the last 10 minutes against Brentford was one thing. However that wasn’t what “Stu” did last night. He took off two midfielders (O’Hara and Cairney) and Kaca; brought on one midfielder (Hyndman) and two forwards (Smith and Woodrow). In practice though “Stu” pulled McCormack (very) deep, stuck Woodrow out wide right and Smith was actually the only one added up top. So, we never actually ever had four men up top. Moreover, being the experienced manager that he is, McCarthy immediately made his own changes and one consequence was three men were constantly on Smith, nullifying his input. Sure he won a few glancing headers but always being under pressure he couldn’t really direct them anywhere meaningful. In the final 10 minutes we were incredibly disorganised and created zero chances and only Hyndman came out with any credit. In my view it would have made much more sense to make fewer changes and go 4-3-3. The subs could have been, Hyndman on for O’Hara (who seems to be losing interest) and Smith for Dembele (who was ineffectual). Why he took Cairney and Kaca off is a mystery to me. Cairney was the one looking for the ball and creating things. Okay Kaca wasn’t brilliant on the right but presumably he was there because we had 7 left footers on the field at the start and that was the ‘spare’ space. But now was a chance to move him to the left. And perhaps we might even have managed to get a cross in to Smith when he was facing their goal - if we could had gone: …Cairney..Hyndman..Garbutt.. …MCormack..Smith..Kaca.. All in all the substitutions “Stu” made were ‘old school’ and easy to defend against. It really is false thinking that bringing on more front men at the expense of creative midfielders puts pressure on the opposition.
Sorry I disagree with that, I've seen Burn have good games and bad games, but I haven't seen many good games from Hutchinson. Against teams who try the long ball Burn is an asset and is better at heading than Hutchinson who gets bullied off the ball, Burn is also better at passing a ball than Hutchinson, neither can tackle properly and both lose possession too often in tackles.
A good c/h must be priority followed by full backs," oh how I wished we got the Brighton lad at the start if the season.
