As much as I'd have loved to have taken a deserved result away from the filthy bin dipping ****s and I'm gutted we lost to a scrappy, crappy goal in the end, this performance has made me very happy. We were the better side by far and performed very well despite having some of our best players out. If we had have been full strength today we've have easily walked away with 3 points. It's give me confidence that we can do great things even without a full strength team. Ratings - Pope - 8 - Solid. He seems so strong in the air and great handling of the ball. Apart from one error where he headed it rather than kicking it. Tripps - 7 - Mostly good play, apart from a few slip ups. Doesn't look fully fit. Lascelles - 8 - Thought he had a good game. His distribution has improved a lot and he won a lot in the air Burn - 8 - Solid. Won everything in the air. Targett - 7 - Good game Willock - 7 - Apart from a couple of poor clearances I thought he did a good job. He has played so many of our games til 90 minutes his fitness is exceptional. Longstaff - 7 - Almost cost us a goal, but cannot argue with a cracking assist and mostly decent game. Joelinton - 9 - MOTM - Was an absolute beast in midfield tonight. So much good defensive work. Almiron - 8 - Worked his absolute tits off. Isak - 8 - Great goal, unlucky not to have 2. Fraser - 8 - So much better than murphy Murphy - 5 - Awful attacking, decent defending. Get rid soon but sometimes he does put in a few good defensive tackles. Wood - 4 - Won a few headers I guess.
Mostly agree Tash. Not sure Joelinton was a 9, 8 maybe. But it's marginal. Murphy, 3 for me. I didn't see the defending you mention, but he lost the ball 3 times in 'attack' and fell over when he could have helped kill the game. But yes, agree with the overall sentimrnt, lots of real positives despite the injuries to Bruno, ASM & Wilson. We pressed them really well and put a huge shift in. Isak looks like a fantastic purchase based on that debut. Can't waIt to see him playing alongside Bruno & ASM. Result feels crappy right now, but all in all no complaints about the overall performance. We have some very poor quality reserves in the likes of Wood & Murphy, but hopefully we can shift them out by January. This was better than I expected and I enjoyed for 90+ minutes.
Murphy 1 Wood 1 Anderson 0 (cost the game with a ****ing dreadful effort with the game drawn) The problems are clear. Will we address them in time to change this season? Doubt it.
From last season after 5 games to this season after 5 games Im ecstatic, imagine next season and the season after and the season after. Many amazing seasons to come for this club.
This might seem 'controverdial' to some but I think we have one dilemma following that match. I thought Eddie had firmly placed Lascelles as 4th choice CB behind Botman, Schar & Burn. But I thought he had a moshly solid game tonight, after his surprise selection. So what will Eddie do now? I know with midweek games there needs to be some degree of using the squad, but usually teams try to develop and keep a centre back pairing for consistency, with others only covering for injuries/suspensions. I know it's easy to jump on Lascelles' back and say he'll be back behind the other 3 again. But personally I think he stood up to the test of fighting for his place. Eddie has some interesting choices to make.
Lascelles looked decent towards the end of last season, and has had two solid games. He deserves time to prove himself like everyone else. At least we can say we have good squad depth in one area lol
I agree mate. Lascelles had a good game. All of them did until the subs. Murphy did absolutely nothing. He is not a PL player. Wood. Wtf is he. Every time he plays he doesn’t do anything. Literally nothing!
We got done the PL simple as that. We had a goal disallowed for an offside which was borderline. Then the referee adds 12 minutes of extra time from nowhere. Until they score.
I think the problem with wood is that we simply don't play to his strengths. He's good in the right team but we don't play target man football. Next summer we should definitely sell and bring in a better 3rd option.
I don’t see his strengths though mate. If you watch it back when he came on. We played the ball up to him 2/3 times and the ball came back off his head towards our own goal. He’s turd. He offers nothing and i can’t defend him anymore because he “isn’t” a player that fits. He isn’t even trying to adapt.
Isak actually worked better as a target man and that's not his main game. He won most of his aerial duels. He's also quicker, has more intelligent movement and has shown more skill and composure in front of goal in part of 1 game than Wood has shown in all of his put together. They look leagues apart.
Rubbish. He’s utter ****ing gash. I don’t want to see another post on this forum offering a defence of this joke of a player. He should be sold, he’s ****ing disgraceful.
We're the only team to make City drop points and Liverpool are delighted about a win against us at home with the last kick of the game. The comparison to these 2 games last season is massive, we are going places.
He’s got a pretty good scoring record. We don’t play to his strengths. Not his fault that we made an overpriced signing, though given some of the fees this summer…
What would playing to his strengths look like though? I keep seeing the phrase, but no explanation. What style of football would actually make Wood look good? I can't think of any. Certainly not in the way I'd like to see the team play.
I didn’t say it’s the way I’d like us to play, but he was obviously pretty effective in the Burnley team. It’s not his fault a club came along, gave him more money and then had no real use for his style of football. We should sell him, but to say he’s useless or can’t do a specific job isn’t true.
The way Burnley used to play. Hoof long diagonal balls up to him whenever we are in the opposition half. Get two good wingers who like to get to the byeline and cross the ball in and are corner takers who put all balls deep to the back post while other players block the goalkeeper. And no I don't want to see us play like that.
Disagree on Lascelles. He’s a big lump and his lack of positional awareness caused us to drop a point. He was sent a PL player and he needs pedalling along with Murphy and Longstaff. Longstaff seemed to struggle to pass the ball in a straight line last night. Again, I’d say he’s a championship player.
