At one point Vin Jr pointed to the corner flag at the junction of the Kingsland and Northam and it was almost horizontal. I'll refrain from calling you an idiot. Vin
I used to always say that bad weather evened things out, so didn't favour us. In the past that was a joke, but it's not any more. We are a good playing side of delicate (handsome) flowers and rough weather is always bad news for us. At least, we generally come out with at least a draw these days.
I think that in the stands it can sometimes not let you feel how bad the conditions were. They were atrocious at times.
They had three shots and scored three goals. We attacked to the penalty area, then played it out to the wings, and endlessly attempted to cross the ball. Surely someone else must e seeing this regular occurrence.
If the shot is not on, or too many bodies are in the way, what would you suggest they do? My view in this is that we don't get behind them wide and that is where and when we will really cause problems. Shaw did it against Arsenal and caused problems; he did it once today, Clyne didn't and often crossed at the first defender.
That sounds like exactly it to me. Without getting down the flanks we aren't turning their defenders around and they can keep their shape = the shot isn't on for 90 minutes. I don't know how to improve that but we have three young full backs and I'm sure they will get even better at it. Actually I think we might have done it better with Vic doing his covering thing in midfield, but I think we might have done that one to death already.
I felt the same exactly the same way, which is why I said on the other thread it would have been nice if we could have introduced Chambers earlier. TBF, it's not all on Clyne though. He should have been more willing to get to the byline, but if he wants to cut inside then Lallana can help him out by going outside and providing him a target. Even if byline crosses are not Lallana's forte he at least draws out a defender. It was just too easy for Stoke to pack the box because no one was injecting any width.
Some odd reactions on here today for me. I tend to get disappointed if we play crap, or get undone by a sucker punch, completely dominate games and fail to score. I don't feel disappointed when another team plays very well and shuts us down if it's clear that they are working to an impressively executed plan. Particularly if it's not anti-football (which Stoke certainly weren't today). Fair play to them.
About 20 seconds before this, I turned to my Dad and son, saying "why is Lambert thinking of shooting from that angle? He'll never score. He should be in the box waiting for someone to deliver a good GGGOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAALLL!" After the celebrating my lad said "what were you saying Dad?" Love it.
I was very similar. "Oh god, he's going to hit it isn't he, you can just tell.... oh that was alright"
No excuses. Stoke came to play and they were effective. Once again we weren't quite good enough in breaking down the opposition. We had the chances and we didn't take them. My general disappointment this evening is that we dropped 2 points and missed out on a genuine 8th place. One can look at it another way and say we raised the drawbridge on the teams below us, but I tend to look upward. I'm not interested in consolidating the present position. I want better than this.
