Greetings from the far east corner of the world where I sat and watched SAFC get demolished till 2 in the morning, you can rest assured a long restless slumber soon followed. Now that I have had enough time to reflect I thought I'd put my thoughts in, not that it really matters but for my own sanity. What concerned me more than the win or the loss is that we, again didn't have a real chance on goal from open play. I wrote an article a few weeks back at my concern of Sunderland being 'boring'. And to tie into what I said in that article, I feel the reason for the lack of goals is not due to Bent's departure like most pundits would claim, I simply think we are now gaining the respect of other teams. Due to the nature of my job, I have had the pleasure of watching numerous premiership sides prepare for a game (especially against the 'big 4') and you would be surprised at the depth/attention to every detail and the time they spend. Reserve players come in and are named 'rooney', 'drogba' etc etc and they thoroughly prepare with numerous simulation plays. After watching the Liverpool match I was convinced that teams are now preparing for us, but after listening to Mancini's post match remarks about how good a team we are, and how surprised he was at the outcome I now KNOW they prepare for us. Now we have to learn to unlock teams that are prepared to be organised and focused. I honestly think it starts from the back, why we don't start El Mohamady is just beyond me, and please can we get over the 'phil bardo is the best leftback we have' theory. I would much rather have Rico back at leftback so at least we have a bit of initiative when we attack. We need players that want to attack defenders, otherwise no space will ever open up for the likes of Gyan and Danny. I really look forward to having Campbell back, I reckon a 3 man attack with sess (or steed), Muntari, and Cattermole sitting behind will at least bring back a bit of creativity. Right now the only player that gives me the tingles when he has the ball is sess, and I hope to god that we start playing with a bit more confidence and directness. I'm sure I'm not the only sick of seeing us playing either across our own midfield or thumping it forward. We need players to sit wide (like the Adam Johnson) and for god's sake let's start playing some DIAGONAL balls. The only thing I really wanted from the City game was a goal, luckily a loss is a loss whether it be 1-0 or 10-0 so I hope that we dust ourselves off and play with more ambition next time out. We need atleast one man to step up and say I will make the difference, hopefully all 11 will do that. Next weekend is vital, we can blame our terrible run of fixtures up until now. It's time the boys step up and secure top ten, anything less than that and I reckon players will start leaving just as fast as they came. Thoughts??
surely the players that you are refering to are the ones who need to step up. just because results are not going their way they shouldn't think about leaving, these are the so called superstars, about time they start to show it
very true, but unfortunately in the modern game loyalty doesn't come with the hefty price tag. That's why i can respect the likes of even Gary Neville and even Shearer. Granted the former was at a great club but through thick and thin, the thought of leaving doesn't even cross their mind. Am I the only one that liked what he saw from colback? good pace to keep up with wright-phillips if you ask me, and nice feet.
Thanks for the post jesustheconman I woke up at 4 am in Auckland, switched on at 2 nil down, a few minutes later it was 5, as we all know. Where on earth has the caoching manual gone for some of these Boys.......Shocked and perplexed. Agree on El Mohamady, but we don't pick the team. Good post mate
i get what your saying mate, but like you said, if players start leaving because of a failure of a top ten finish, they must look at themselves first as its down to them as to where we finish. dont think many will jump ship, but a few may be pushed. think snq and mr short will be taking a long look at the situation, and any discontent amongst the players will be adressed quickly and harshly. hope some are getting a roasting today, or maybe not as we lost some players before because of that. ps colback, nice feet, dont mention that or syd will be on the blower to see where he gets them done.
what I forgot to mention, and concerned me deeply throughout the match (and I know others have written about it) was the lack of togetherness. It seems like a lot of our regular board writers have gone to the 'a night with niall quinn' and everyone comes back raving and ranting about how together the team is. How many misplaced passes, not due to a technical mistake but a lack of understanding, did I count yesterday? I know the match of the day went over this but the gaps between the central defenders and central midfielders was atrocious. Surly everyone was taught growing up to defend compact and attack with width. There's only one team I know in football that manages results by simply playing route 1 every time-Stoke. I understand with new players coming back it's like having a new squad and it seems our squad has been ever changing till now but we are meant to be at the point where wholesale changes are over and we start adding true "additions" to the team. For me true "additions" would be a centre back with good feet, attacking full backs, one creative midfielder and a forward. Is that too much to ask?
JTC I agree with nearly everything you said apart from Richardson left back. And like commachio says the players on the pitch are responsible for the outcome, jumping ship because of their errors wouldn't be good for them. I have said for a very long time now that I don't think we are getting it right tactically, our players look **** scared to move when an opportunity arises to attack. (No I'm not talking about Henderson starting out on the right and spending most of the match midfield, leaving us with no outball to the right.) Our set plays are atrocious Zenden has been the only one to at least get the ball into an area where we could attack it.
it does confuse me that muntari seemed to be able to hit peach after peach for ghana yet for us it was either straight into hart's hands or on the head of the first defender. I'd really like to see the likes of colback starting, I know this sounds a little bit rash but I really do think that sometimes players need to be given a little scare in order to get them rolling again, whilst at the same time giving the young lad a bit of precious playing time on the big stage.
Some good questions and answers lads, for me we need to put in hungry players who will take advantage of the first teams inabilities and show them and us what a bit of effort can do. The lack of any set piece plan is alarming every corner and free kick goes to an opposition player, we can't tackle and worst of all we have no fight in the team anywhere even Catts is muted now. I'm not sure what the answer is but then again I'm not on 1000s a week to suss this out however, we are getting the basics totally wrong maybe we should start there.
