Our shape yesterday was awful. When you're playing well and getting results it's a positive thing to have players switching, wingers coming off the wing, strikers dropping off, etc but when you're playing poorly it doesn't help when we have all of our players seemingly drifting in and out of various areas of the pitch. It's something we did better against Swansea and although we were also aided by Swansea playing much more open than QPR it is still worth persisting with. Whether it's Defoe, Ade or Saha we need someone to be consistently in the box not drifting out wide or deep so stay on the slowest centre back's shoulder as all of them can either outpace the defender with a ball over the top or the defensive line is forced back giving our midfield and VDV in particular more space to operate in. Wingers provide an outball on the wing so do it so Ade doesn't feel the need to. If we're playing one winger then make ****ing doubly sure they stay on the wing and don't start pissing around running inside to be marked out of the game. Lennon was every bit as guilty of this yesterday. I like it and think he works well when he overloads a flank with Bale or plays behind the strikers in spells but that's one for next season, not whilst we're struggling so badly. Holding mids and Modric, no interchanging. Don't let Modric go all the way back to the centre backs to pick up the ball and have the holding midfielders hold their position!! If we really need an extra body up there then let Sandro move up the pitch but don't let him drift around to the right wing and just generally get a bit lost, really Walker on the overlap should be the first "extra man" to be thrown forward anyway. VDV should be the only player that has license to drift around but he needs to be much more attack orientated, even if it means ignoring when our midfield are struggling to create, help them with good runs into space in forward positions not running back and giving them an easy two yard pass. Lastly no more passing it around the defence and the keeper. I don't mean we should be hoofing it, I mean when they get it they need to play it forward not backwards or sideways. The same goes for our midfielders, no passing it back to the defence unless you're under pressure. Too many times we were passing with little purpose on the halfway line yesterday because our defence always opted for the safe two yard pass and our midfielders were often too scared to turn to face the goal with the ball and actually look up to pick a pass unless they already had 10 players back and we had 4 or 5 players meandering around the 18 yard box. We should've been chasing the game yesterday yet at one point I saw Gallas and Walker deep in their own half making 5 passes between eachother as Walker was closed down and Gallas wanted **** all to do with the ball, creating an embarrassing game of pass the buck. I know this is all very basic but we really do need to bring it back to basics and keep things simple if we're going to get our confidence back at the moment we've got too many players drifiting around the pitch out of postion and treading on other players toes and if all we're going to create is half chances then we need to create far more of them if we're going to win games.
I don't understand why Redknapp can't see this. When he picks two holding players, plus Bale and van der Vaart provisionally on the wings, but given freedom to roam, where does he think that everyone's going to end up? All of the defenders from the opposition also drift centrally, to deal with our players, so it all gets completely congested and we can't break them down. We're persisting with tactics which clearly don't work. Why is this suddenly going to change?
I'm going to write 'Arry a letter The two holding midfielders, or any other formation, isn't the problem for me, we had the same problem with Lennon on for Sandro in the second half. I'd side with Sandro and Parker playing because our centre backs clearly need some help at the moment and it allows Walker to commit forward without us getting countered(in theory atleast).
I just get the feeling that we don't work hard on the training pitch. Not on fitness (although we do seem a bit short of puff compared to the top sides.) But on formations; what EVERYBODY has to do when we attack and defend. Dead ball situations too, we are truly awful at these, offensively and defensively. We have a ton of coaches yet tactically who is tackling these problems? Just saying "keep your eye on player X, stay tight for the first 20 and go out there and express yourselves," is just not good enough. If the side IS better prepared than that, WTF happens when they cross the white line? My guess is they aren't.
We were already behind at that point, making QPR even more resilient as they didn't have to attack and yet we still didn't use our width. Lennon and Bale both wandered about aimlessly, rather than sticking to their wings and committing defenders.
Chirpy is spot on..i tell you what i was looking for yesterday and that was team spirit in other teams...Wigan,QPR...and some other teams..Newcastle for example...everyone is pulling in the same direction..high 5's...gritted teeth etc..all i see in our camp is deflation..quite upsetting actually..and i blame Harry..he would rather be popular than do his job....i bet half of our squad cant wait for him to go so they can attempt fairly at reviving their careers.
