Firstly Brucey left his big bang start on the bus, yet again! Very slow start. Very even game, a draw would have been a fair result, but as we all know football doesn't work like that Hayden did ok, but should have been replaced by Meyler in the second half After two weeks without a game, how a professional footballer cannot play for 90 minutes is absolutely beyond me!!!! Brucey said he 'thought' Abel was bit leggy? When he subbed Diame who could have come off earlier for me, why didn't he check with Abel before he took him off. Abel didn't look a happy chappie at being subbed and rightly so. When you take your leading goal scorer off it also hands the incentive to the opposition to push on. Personally I would have reverted from 4-4-1-1 to 4-4-2 and played Abel and Akpom up top for the last 15 minutes. Greegsy has cost us 5 points this season so far, that said he's saved more than 5 this far so remains in credit for me. I hope Dusan provides serious competition, Greegsy needs it! Robbo, outstanding yesterday, closely followed by Jake who worked tirelessly. Yesterdays conditions would have suited Harry, shame he didn't make it with his knock picked up in training Blackburn away; Harry in for Curtis, Akpom in for Diame, and Meyler in for Hayden, go 4-4-2. Maloney and Harry missing yesterday, so Brucey in 3.5 years is still yet to have a full squad to choose from! Away form is down to Bruceys tactics, we always seem to play to hang on to the point we have, rather than go for the other two on offer! Also Brucey give the front players some freedom to express themselves, it seems that everyone has to rigidly stick to a formation with zero flexibility. Any scout checking us out three seasons ago does not need to scout us again, its a little too predictable. So far so good; three points next Saturday please!
Robbo was very good yesterday! But the view we had it was obvious that he & clucas just hung onto the ball a touch too long on occasions! This gave burnley chance to get bodies back! When we did whip a quick cross it caused them problems & someone should have got on the end of at least one! Also a big mention to snoddy's work rate!!
Our away form is frustrating but nobody in this league seems to be taking teams apart away from home. Victories seem to be of narrow margins so I don't think it is just City who can do more away from home. It seems to be the nature of this league that away victories seemed to be hard fought. We just need to find that right balance between going for it and keeping things tight.
In fairness Sydney, we're not that good away from home. More like abysmal due to the attitude of a negative manager.
When you go away from home you must defend very well, certain games this season we have not gone at teams and dictated play and have been very disappointing how ever yesterday against a team one point from us I thought we defended well apart from the goal and had some decent chances to finish them it could have gone either way and if we had have nicked it the majority on here would have said it was the perfect away performance. Lets get this game in perspective it was a difficult away game and we have a few more to come yes we are all disappointed because its let Burnley get within a point of us but there is still a long way to go but one thing is certain with our run in we will have to beat some of these top sides away to gain promotion.
Burnley are currently the form team in this division. They were at home and neither the team Bruce put out nor the substitutions he made could be described as negative. In fact I was surprised when he brought Akpom and Aluko on (even though they played well together and looked dangerous last week) because it seemed an unBruce-like decision. The team yesterday was probably the one most people on here would have picked and no-one is saying they played badly so why do we need a scapegoat? The truth is Burnley are a good team who deserve the credit for winning a tough game.
An un-Bruce like decision would have actually been to start with 2 proper strikers, and that was an option. Even though Hernandez is our top scorer we know from both this season and last that you can't depend on him to score if he gets just one big chance even when you could categorise it as a sitter.
Bruce played the team that 99% of posters wanted. We lost a game of tight margins. Stop panicking and move on!
If you're talking about changing the system/ players to 3-5-2 on the eve of such an important match you're talking about a big gamble.
These ^^^^^ points just about sum up the game and why we lost it. Small margins for sure but hardly time for the panic heads to hissy fit again. Afterall, Hull City ARE STILL TOP of the championship.
