Wheels on fire ! We have started the season well enough but could easily have lost a couple of those games too. The team is being rebuilt and there will be some dodgy performances here and there no doubt. My problem is and always has been the manager. His frankly disappointing attitude where he fails to take any responsibility at all for poor performances. I know he has lost his new skipper and I am sure he is sorely missed but again he finds his team out battled by another side. The side is crying out for an old experienced centre half who doesn’t lose his ****ing nerve everytime things start going badly. It needs another Ashbee to pick up the midfield by the scruff of the neck when you go one down. And lastly we need a real bad bastard forward who can take down inexperienced centre half’s and put them in his back pocket. All of those things are required not a young kid starting out. All teams need a spine. We don’t have one. The manager also is spineless. His after match comments again reflect last seasons. His systems and substitutions are awful and never changed properly if losing. Teams know how to play him and the better battling teams will do so.
A lot of us who have watched football and some played it to varying degrees, have 100% more knowledge than Ehab who hasn't a clue whether a coach is doing a good job or not. He knows only by results, and even in that case, when he lost all those games last season, McCann seems to have convinced him he is the best man for the job. In short, we can see McCann's shortcomings Ehab cannot.
Watched the game in full again early this morning. Might be stating the obvious here but Jesus H Christ we were poor second half. They smelt blood the moment we gifted them that second goal and more worryingly we didn't seem to have the ability to play ourselves out of a hole. Ok, a couple of players were missing and normal service might well be resumed next game but if ever there was a wake up call it was last night. Forget Cup finals...this league is brutal and full of hardworking sides that will eat us up if we don’t compete physically keep the ball and pass it around. In a nutshell the little fishing villagers spanked us good and proper with couple of old timers in midfield,organization and hard work...and we couldn’t deal with it. Over to you McCann...
Well it's typical City, making an early season struggler look like play-off certainties. No surprise. Rochdale away will tell us if theyve got bounce back ability.
It wasn’t the loss that bothered me or even playing semi-badly. What worried me was that stunk to high heaven of the end of last season. Give away a sloppy goal and the heads dropped and McCann didn’t change much. We were outmuscled in midfield so he makes us lighter there by dropping in an attacking midfielder. The lack of plan B is a worry and a failure to stop Fleetwood playing how they wanted. I saw it so often last season and I hope it’s the last time I see it this.
We desperately need more experience in this side. They have till Friday to do this. What we don't need is another 20 year youth player from a Premier club.
JDW was part of the reason for their second goal. Questions need to be asked where he was - Honeyman (wrongly) played a blind pass, but he played it to where JDW should have been - where was he?! Huge gap between Elder and Burke!
Just rewatched the goal back - I thought it was Burke where JDW is. Problem was with our right-back taking the throw-in in their half, it pushed Burke across to the right-back position, JDW in no-man's land and Elder was halfway up the pitch on the left. Yes Honeyman shouldn't have played a blind pass and was the main fault for the goal, but for once we weren't cautious enough. With Burke pushed across to the right and JDW left to cover too much ground, Elder should have move further across to cover the space. Too gung-ho. Totally underestimated them.
No. I don’t hate McCann. I just think he’s a poor manager and simply not good enough. Sandy Row is a reference McCann used in an interview regarding how ‘tough’ he is.
McCann is not a leader of men. Sending your team out with the message that you have never had any success at Fleetwood as a player or manager does not inspire confidence. Then swapping Batty for Mayer when we needed that strength in the midfield takes us back to the old days. The next game will be telling.
It's easy to see why Smallwood is in the team over Batty. Smallwood wouldn't have allowed their midfield to just walk through, he would have been on them. We have the quality to do well in this league, but tactically we still look all over the place. I never really rated Adelekun, but he has pleasantly surprised me in the last few games. I like Mayer, I think he is a very direct winger who runs at people and we've lacked that in previous seasons. Both are pushing for the same spot and offer different things; last night I think Mayer would have been better starting with the energy of Adelekun coming off the bench. But CM is still a concern. McCann raved about Regan Slater; to be honest, I didn't even know he'd come on last night he was that anonymous. You need a workhorse in the side that'll protect the defence, especially one that seems to lack confidence when being pressed. I know Smallwood is injured, but in that case, you need another more combative CM to step in and Batty isn't that player. I think it's still worth pursuing Ollie Rathbone at Rochdale, if not you'll see what I mean next weekend. I think Fleming should be in for Elder next game. The latter is first choice, but after a performance like that does he deserve to keep the shirt? I'm over the result, but I want to see a big improvement next week to prove this was indeed just a blip.
Don't make joke's like that, it scare's the **** out of me, just the thought turn's me white with fear.
I agree with a lot of this. I think it’s easy to point the blame at the defence, and lord knows they have had their fair share of problems, but I think it’s our midfield that is key. it’s no coincidence that our clean sheets up to now have been when we’ve had a strong midfield, stopping the opposition playing. Last night we didn’t have that and we paid the price. Think back to the end of last season, who in midfield ever disrupted play? The defence look even shakier when they have to deal with so many attacks. It was the same last night. For my money, McCann has never really got a handle on what our midfield is supposed to be doing and it shows in our dodgy performances.