So we shout and cry about negative football, no passion and showing no willing to win games, then at 2-2 with seconds to go, Liverpool on the ropes and having dealt terribly with balls into the box we should pull back our 6 foot something central defender and stick it into row z??
That's exactly what we should have done! Look what happened when we didn't. Redknapp totally blamed Fer and I do too. Brainless!! We'd come back from behind..........twice. It was the last minute. It would have been a huge point!!
The problem was we did neither, if we wanted to hold out for a point we should have slowed it up and played it to the corner, if we wanted to go for it we should have committed players to cause trouble and push Liverpool back into their own box, instead we sent a few forward then kept others back at halfway, when the rubbish free kick went in there was no one to challenge it and they broke with no one between them and half way, that can't all be blamed on Fer and my point is that Dunne had some blame in that and was skinned when they broke.
Lots of positives today which was exactly what we needed - something to be positive about. Ok, we shot ourselves in the foot, naively, but we have given ourselves a lot of hope. Points and final result aside, we were the winners today. Keep the faith, or in some cases, have some faith.
Thanx Col, been waiting for this to see what you posted. You usually put a note about the manager/Redknapp and crowd. What was your opinion on harrys selection ? Think he may have unsettled a few and got himself a few extra weeks before departing. another performance like that and he'll be with us all season. Is that a good or bad thing? For my opinion, dunne was immense and ikm not so bothered about the score...it was the effort and performance against a top 6 team that mattered. Im happy
Disagree about Phillips.... did a lot of good down the wing.....think of it this way.......I was pleased to see Matty, when Ned didnt come out I thought it would have been Rio. I so agree about Fer and the free kick. When will we learn the basic tradecraft.......You have clawed yourself back into the game TWICE ....take the ball into the corner....I think it was a rush to the head, WE CAN WIN THIS.......we are missing a leader on the field....we are missing JOEY. Joey would have taken it into the corner.....he may not have turned off during the Sterting free kick. Joey for Fer in that team....and we might just do it.
Phillips was terrible Beth. "Did a lot of good down the wing"? I must have missed that!! I'd have rather seen Rio!! I agree that Joey would have organised them on the pitch and we would have had more men back. Isla was our furthest forward player as the ball was headed away. He should have been back on the halfway line! In fact, we should have had no one forward for that free kick!!
That was just the game I had hoped for a long time and the team showed a superb reaction after the lacklustre performance at WH. I am not sure if we had won this game hadn´t Austin and Fer missed the best opportunities but losing it after that stupid freekick was when I wanted to through the telly out of the window. For me it was BZ MoM and I was only utterly disappointed with Fer´s bad performance today. We need to play Yun and Ned and keep Phillips out in my point of view. I am not sure about McCarthy who was solid but did not overimpress me at all. I do prefer keepers who speed up the game but McCarthy held the ball too often much too long. Still a very prominsing game and I honestly hope that we will be able to show that sort of spirit against Villa.
I think he largely got the selection right. I would have started Vargas (I've been saying for a while that he could be our surprise package) and wasn't sure about Zamora starting. Zamora was excellent so I was wrong. Yun played and was excellent too. Hopefully Harry will now choose players who are the best in that position. I've always said he has to change his attitude in selection for us to have any chance. Maybe he's starting to. The crowd were fantastic. Very loud at times and even at the end, most people were clapping the team off after such an improved performance. I couldn't get that stupid free kick out of my head!!
Methinks you do not like...Aylesbury's finest Matty Phillips Col??? Now something I never do....formations... Alot of impetus I think when we went from 3-5-2 to 4-4-2 in the second. I thought (but I am no tactician like you Col) that Arry had deliberately changed the format to disturb Lpools game Rogers certainly did not see the original 3-5-2 coming and were not set up for it, which is why dominated (I like that word so I will say it again), dominated the first half. In the second they pushed Gerrard further back to counteract the strong QPR midfield and came into the game more....which is why Matty came on (but would have perfered to see Junior myself). Arry knew that they would do that....so changed the formation again (especially if there was a twinge in Ned's leg)....it would have been much more logical to play Rio in the back 3 As this is my first attempt at serious tactics Col....what am I not seeing
I think you have described it perfectly Beth. I suspect that had he been fully fit, Harry would have replaced the injured Ned with Rio so as to maintain our shape. Mind you, there is a lot of debate over what exactly our formation was. The club twitter feed had it as 3-5-2 whilst the club website had it as 4-4-2. I wonder if Harry put it out there that we were going to play 4-4-2 but actually played 3 at the back as a surprise? It looked so much like 3 at the back at the ground. It looked like 3-5-2 at the game, but maybe that was just the way the game panned out. I don't think Harry rates Junior which can be the only explanation for his continued faith in Phillips.
I'm I the only one who thought Fer had a good game. I though he was a very lively. I think selling Simpson was a massive mistake. Ned and Caulker would make a great partnership but Ned will have to stay out on the right. which means Dunne or Rio are going to look vulnerable. Up until Jan
Fer probably looked good on the TV mate. He had some lovely touches and there's no doubting his ability. He was, however, very lazy and often didn't track back. He also got that last minute free kick desperately wrong!
I think Fer went down hill fast when Sandro went off, more pressure on him to be the big boss...I was not quite sure what Traores exact role was Sandro and Henry were pretty damn solid.... I think the plan was to bring Vargas on much earlier, but OBZ was playing SO well he couldn't The next bullet Arry (and us ) are going to have to bite is playing OBZ and Vargas as the starting pair...with Charlie coming off the bench If Vargas plays, Isla must play as wing back to provide for him...the two are telepathic
The last freekick from Fer was thoughtless but he was very unfortunate (as were the whole team) what happen after that. Maybe he and the whole team were going for a victory when they clearly saw that pool was on the ropes. IMO Fer was quite good and deserved at least 6 rating.
I had a busy afternoon yesterday, and wasn't able to watch the game. Having now seen the highlights, am I right in thinking that; 1) we were unlucky in the first half not to go ahead having hit the bar, and missed a sitter, but then as will always be the case, we missed our chances and were punished for it. 2) Dunne was out of his depth, not just scoring an own goal, but then also just severely lacking in pace throughout. From the highlights (and I know highlights can be deceiving), and from reading through this thread, it looked like we had some good spells though, and there was a glimmer of hope that things could be okay, or is that being overly optimistic?
Actually Dunne was not quite as out of his depth as we might have expected. He made up for lack of speed with concentration and positioning..I can only remember him really being scalped about twice, and Ned was behindhim the first time .both og were awful.....but Dunne should never of been put in that position and Balotelli was right behind him and would not have missed... But Yun did such a good job on the fastest footballer on two legs... The next match Yun can play more as an attacker...I am hopeful
