Amos 6. Regulation one on one saves. Punching was weak. Kicking a ****ing disgrace. Into touch twice in the second half when we were trying to get something going. Elmo 5. Poor, really poor. Didnt look up for it at all. I thought he would kill Konchesky, never went by him once. Faye Bruce Chezz. 6. Right form the off it was like the Alamo. Great last ditch tackles from all 3, no one to pass to hardly when they had the ball. Dudgeon 5. Looked nervous, some good tackles but didnt want to get down the line at all. Evans 4. Completely invisible, didnt show for the ball, hid when he should have been willing to take the responsibility, knocked off the ball. Truly awful display. Koren 5. Me and my mate both thought he was injured as he was blowing from the word go. I would have taken him off at half time he was that bad. Pathetic non attempt at defending for their second goal. Quinn 7. The only one who kept battling up and down non stop, well done Quinny. Aluko 5. Always wanted it but kept getting it took off him by their No 4, just looked Drinkwater, he was my MOTM. Ran the show. They just waited for Aluko to do a turn and then took it off him. Did their homework well. Simpson 5. Too many first time lay offs that didnt come off. Good goal but poor otherwise. You have to be worried when you have 3 full backs on your bench, Dawson,Rosy and Mcshane!! Prossy won 3 headers and nearly scored when he came on, well done. Steve Bruce 5. Thought he needed to change something at half time. We werent even second best. Hope he was trying to fire up his team when he got sent to the stand. It didnt work. First 5 mins after half time we didnt get out of our own half. Its not all doom and gloom, this may give Brucey a helping hand to persuade the Allams to dip into the loan market. The reason we lost?? A well drilled physical team bullied us and we bottled it.
Agree with most of that, thought Aluko was better than you've given him, and Bruce worse. He never kept the ball in the first half and he kept getting burnt for pace. Also didn't understand the Rosie change, and Evans should have been off long before he was.
Physical?! I cannot believe you're describing Drinkwater, James, Knockaert, Marshall, Vardy and Nugent as physical! We outplayed, outpassed, outmoved and outthought you.
Dudgeon was injured. Went off 5/10 minutes before that after a crunching tackle. Also, I disagree with you about Alex Bruce. He made 2 or 3 brilliant tackles including one right infront of us! We were outplayed; but in my opinion still have a much better team than Leicester. Just an off day, every team has them
You did exactly that today, we are not saying its a bad thing, but you out ran us and bullied us at times, a perfect peformance from you guys...... Not sure how you can deny it, when Pearson used the word bully in his interview i heard, unless i mis heard him? On the ratings, I would of Given Bruce less, Chester far more he was superb, and i agree with you on Aluko but i was just glad he looked for it, Koren really looked off it today and Simpson had a shocker bar his goal. But to be fair i generally agree!
You've obviously watched Fryatt so much that you now expect all strikers to miss their one-on-ones. The striker is the favourite in that position and Amos' today were great saves. Agree about his kicking though, he summed up the team's display with his impatient need to get rid of the ball. Bruce makes good last minute tackles but he's so uncomposed on the ball. He just boots it all the time. Straight after their 1st goal today we had the ball, knocking it about nicely, goes to Bruce who just boots it hopefully to no ****er, they come back and Vardy almost scores. Amos spared his blushes there. Faye and Chester's patience and ability to pass make up for it most of the time but like with Evans, it isn't ideal having someone who gives it away so much. I hope Simpson realises he can't have many games like that and stay in the team. I'd hate to see him dropped because it'll probably be another 6 months before he gets another chance.
Glad you agree with me on Bruce, Gooch said to me today you never see Chester having to make recovery tackles. You don't as its all well and good making some good tackles but when its your fault for giving them away in the first place its not really a positive. He is poor on the ball, don't get me wrong he is decent but he can't use his left foot at all and we play on him on the left. When Hobbs is back he will back on the bench, i don't mind the kid just not promotion material really.
I thought I was the only one who noticed that left foot thing, I've been saying it for ages. I don't get why we don't just swap him and Chester because Chezz is pretty much two-footed. Bruce has done better than expected and he's a decent defender but he isn't really a footballer.
Agree with these two posts completely. Simpson still needs to work like he has a point to prove. Super Matty is returning; interesting times are ahead
It was more the faffing around with moving Elmo to the left when Rosie can play there and we had Daws on the bench. As 1904 just said, when have you ever seen Chester make a last ditch slide tackle? I can't remember it ever happening, because he's always in the position to intercept the pass or make a block standing tackle. That one you mentioned in front of us was because Bruce ignored an easy ball to Dudge to play a harder one to Evans, lost the ball and had to chase back and make the tackle. If he kept the ball he wouldn't have made the tackle.
My thinking behind that is that Elmo isn't really a defender, he's a winger playing wing back, so it makes sense to have Chester, who is the better defender, on the right of the three covering Elmo's attacking than Bruce who is more likely to get exposed.
I thought for playing 3 at the back, they were quite spread out, it almost looked as though the wingbacks wernt coming back at times, as we were getting balls in the wide positions that seemed to pull a CB out of position, NP said first thing after the match when asked how do you setup against a 3-5-2 is that you exploit the wings. One thing that does work in the 3-5-2 though is that no attacks are successful down the middle, i think you blocked all our shots from outside the box.
You cant play the 532 formation against teams with quick wingers. If the wingers are any good they will find room and exploit it. Bruce needs to be more versatile but he didnt change it until it was miles too late
It will be a case of you gradually finding out that the manager has very little tactical knowledge at all. Sunderland won 3-0 away at Chelsea and he changed the team the weak after.
I agree, the best managers and teams should have a back up plan for when things go wrong. I think urgency in our play was lacking also. Your boys looked more up for it, particularly in midfield. Nugent showed why he should be a lower premier league player, rather than in the championship. In contrast, Vardy should have scored one of his guilt edged chances. Despite, all the problems you caused us, I thought we'd nicked a draw right at the end when Proschwitz's header was cleared off the line- but you then went down the other end and finished us off, deservedly.
Im guessing he was being saved. He's getting on, didnt have a proper pre season and we are on a run of 4 games in 2 weeks. Sensible move in my eyes.
I disgree and surely that's the best time to play 5-3-2, you just curtail the wing-backs attacking momentum and ask them to first and foremost get an upper hand defending their winger. If you'd said you cant play the attacking 5-3-2 / 3-5-2 then I'd have agreed with you.
When will your ****e fans start to call for O'Neill's head? Another winning position you blew again, eh? All that money and you still can't win. Wonder if Bruce's top half finish will be bettered this year.
