Agree especially about that Burgess Davis link up. We missed those darting runs down the left and pinpointed crosses. One aspect no-one has mentioned is that we must have given it all against Notts Forest and consequently looked jaded. Hopefully, after their game against Spurs on Thursday, there will be many tired Bnmth players on Sunday.
We definitely seemed reluctant to play the ball forwards. I felt like we had a different mentality last night, much more cautious and worrying about defeat. As we said, the Palace press didn’t help and disrupted our rhythm, particularly pressure on defenders and the central midfielders. Weirdly, most of our points this season might come against top half clubs rather than lower half clubs, as our style of play lends itself to effective counter attacking football. Agreed we did miss Burgess’ long passes last night. As said before, not sure why he was dropped. Whenever we played direct from the back last night, we often gave possession straight back. I wonder if Burns and Jack Clarke was partly down to that. Out and out wingers who spend a lot of time hugging the touchline and don’t look comfortable in the air. Compare with Szmodics and Hutchinson when they’re out wide, their inclination is to go more central and compete for direct balls. They’re better pouncing on second balls too because of their dribbling ability. Take the point about lack of depth in first half of last season. The system and style of play arguably played a bigger part than individual player quality. Teams can get out of the Championship with a well-drilled playing style and momentum - Burnley, Luton, Sheffield United two years ago - but you need something more than that in the Premier League. You mention Hdlaky a bit, but he was far from perfect last season. Made some great saves and good with a short pass, but I don’t recall his long passes being particularly consistent. He also made many mistakes last season and that was in the Championship! The fact he can’t get into the Burnley team probably underlines he isn’t exactly Premier League standard. Muric’s not a notable upgrade on him (unless he’s a lot more solid at Championship level, we’ll possibly be finding out next year!) Like many of the players we’d bought in, Chaplin was better than League One standard. He was joint top scorer last season, but then pretty much all our main attacking players got into double figures and the goals were shared around a lot because of our system. This season, most of the lads haven’t been taking their chances other than Delap. I just hope McKenna’s got a solution in mind.
Yeah, a good point. We didn’t look as fit as Palace last night. Forest game probably took it out of a few players. Delap and Hutchinson has been doing a lot of heavy lifting lately. Certainly would like to see Szmodics and Broadhead starting on Sunday - I think they’ll get more involved than Clarke and Burns.
To be fair to McKenna, that’s been a historic issue here since arguably the George Burley/Joe Royle years. Even as a newly relegated side to League One under Lambert, we consistently failed to beat teams that finished in the top six.
Difference being, you have a very good young manager with plenty of credit in the bank, West Ham don't, he was woeful at Wolves and he's not changed a thing, his tactics are awful.
Very good point, perhaps the more talented top 10 teams general fluent style of play and swift counter attacks suit our own style, rather than the dour, dogged, compact, cancelling style of teams around us.
Some great posts here. In a nutshell, we'll do much better if Muric stops holding on to the ball. Palace did press our back line, but a decent ball out quickly from the keeper will beat that and create a 3v3 on the counter. We will continue to struggle if Muric allows the other team time to get reset every time he has the ball in his hands. Nuggets, I know you think Muric should be in the team because he's made some good saves but I see it differently. Some of those saves wouldn't have been needed if he'd just claimed the initial cross. His reluctance to crash through a crowd and pick the ball out of the air is strange considering his height and build. I would like to see Walton back in. I think he gives the defenders more confidence with his decision making on when to claim and when to stay and his first thought once he has the ball is who can I get it out to quickly. Muric always looks like he's considering whether or not he should fall on the ball and waste a few more seconds!
