Had a look on the Stoke board out of interest to see what they are thinking. Surprised about quite how confident they seem to be. I know they've won both their opening games and scored plenty of goals in the process, but they were against likely relegation candidates. We should be a completely different proposition. Not saying they can't beat us or anything, but thought they'd be a bit more level headed with the mindset of 'we've been great so far, but anything we get here will be a bonus'. Quite funny considering they're hammering us (probably Saintsweb) for being arrogant. No idea if Still is the type of manager that would throw a new signing straight into the team when he's only been here a couple of days or not. Hope so tbh as we need Fraser further forward given our lack of wingers. Good that Stewart and Downs are back available again, gives us a completely different feel to our attacking capabilities. Feels like we might see a few more changes to the line up and formation for this one! This will also be my first game of the season so I hope it's not the classic (for recent times) Stoke at home performance, which have been dire.
Their strike force is very handy (problematic) but their midfield is pretty weak, which is where our strength is... I think they'll score because of the former, but with our actual strikers back, I think we'll win because of the latter.
Hopefully he will tell our defenders that, if they are under pressure get the ball up field. We still hang on to the ball too long at the back for my liking as we did under RM
Some of our better attacks come from this though. It is the modern game. You have to be able to rotate possession through the back line to open up those packed defences.
Yep, just don’t make it the norm to piss around with it and try to give even your fans with strong hearts a heart attack.
Definitely need to know when to get rid - which was Martin’s failure. It can be frustrating for our fans as we don’t play the high press (yet) so opposition teams move up the pitch easily. However, in our half they then meet 9 players and we should be pretty solid. When we pass around at the back the idea is to bring 4-5 players up from the opposition so if we get beyond them we have half a pitch with only 5-6 players to beat.
I think we upped the pressing intensity in the second half at Ipswich but I don’t like it when the CBs get caught up in the excitement of the press and get turned on the half way line, as Stephens did at the start of the second half and Szmodics hit the post. The CBs, in general, aren’t quick enough to recover once turned so I would like to see them remain a little more circumspect about rushing in too quickly.
I think WS is playing it very cautiously at the moment & that includes tactics, starting 11 & formation. Stoke will be a very interesting game for both teams. They’re on a good start albeit against lower div sides(?) but you can only beat what’s out in front of you & they’ve done that well. We’ve had harder games but 2x draws would have probably been a fair performance reflection - got a bit of luck (deserved?) & snuck a win & draw. Really looking forward to the game & seeing, what WS has learnt from us over the last couple months & his application to this game.
Big game this. Cautiously speaking but we look a more robust outfit so far. I think Still was right to say we would have lost the Ipswich game last season. The team look like they have a collective spirit which bodes well. 3 points tomorrow will really get the momentum going!
