I heard a couple of radio call-ins claiming that Cairney was poor and lazy once again - was I at the right match? I thought he was by far the best player on the pitch tonight, so how anyone could say that is beyond me... I thought his passing was brilliant and his performance deserved a goal - namely in the form of that 25-yard hit. Does anyone on here share the opinion of the call-in, and care to elaborate on it?
I do, he passes the ball very neatly but slows everything down too much, his positional sense is terrible and he strolls around leaving a massive hole in the middle of the park for the opposition to exploit, Evans is a far better all round player.
He was bloody rubbish tonight. He gave the ball away for the second goal and his passes were useless.The only decent thing he did all game was hit that volley in the 2nd half. Evans back in the starting line up please Nick.
I liked him tonight. Did everything he could have been asked to really - passed it around the middle well. I think the problem is that perhaps him and McKenna are too similar, they both can sit back there spreading the ball across the middle. We don't seem to have anybody making that cutting ball through the middle (maybe that is due to a lack of runs from strikers), and we always resort to the wing.
I don't see how you can say he 'slows it down'. I mean, he does, but so does the rest of the team, so it's harsh to target him personally for it. I'd be frustrated as hell if I was Cairney, the amount of times he played a pinpoint ball to either wing and they either mis-controlled the ball for a throw-in or simply slowed it right down until they had to pass it back to Hobbs/Mannone... it'd drive me mad.
I think I need my eyes testing... what the actual **** I mean, a difference in opinion is expected, but when they oppose so massively over an individual's performance.. I'm lost for words.
About the 'slowing it down': 1) We are too slow on the break, we tend to take 2/3 touches rather than quickly moving up the field. 2) That being said, the crowd need to stop moaning about keeping possession, but then moaning when we try the long ball too. If you want us to stop keeping possession, and boot the ball up, then don't expect every ball to hit a striker clean-through on goal.
I would normally say the same but I thought he was sensational tonight, a totally different player. Although, based on other's opinions, it appears I dreamt it.
Mis controlled on the wing? King was sensational and barely remember him miscontrolling it, Brady was average but didn't miss control it. As for Cairney 'pinging' it out wide yes you was at another game. He was not oustanding as you, however he was neither poor like other say. He did well, he did more going forward than evans did but yet again, he didnt open up the oppositions defence, but he is neat and tidy.
Everyone I sit near were also saying what absolute gash he was. I really wanted him to do well but like somebody mentioned above, all he does is play sideways passes and slow the game down, which is exactly the opposite of what we needed tonight.
I didn't mean that the wingers were poor, I thought King had his best game for us yet but he still did unnecessarily let it go out for a throw once or twice. And I was referring to Rosenior more than Brady. I thought Rosie probably had his worst game in City colours tonight, very uncharacteristic display.
I'm not too keen on replacing him with evans at the moment either, at least Evans will throw himself about a bit and get involved though. Seyi would be far better in that position I reckon, he seems to be everywhere when we play him. But again, he has one bad(ish) game and we don't see him again! Same thing happened before he went out on loan...
I completely agree J-D, i thought he was our best player on the pitch tonight by a country mile, he is the only one that can pass the ball to someone other than the defence and he is the only one that really looks assured on the ball.
I really wanted us to move Brady or King to 'the Koren role' at Half Time, Fryatt was useless there. I know that Koren scores you the occasional goal, but he seems to be doing little else at the moment. Meaning we don't have much chance down the middle, and have to push it to the wing after passing it across the middle, and putting a cross in to players that don't seem to be finishers. This isn't to seem too negative. I thought we played really well tonight against a very good team, and we was very unlucky once again, nothing ever seems to fall for us.
I'm still struggling for words as I said above, I think the entire team pass it backwards/sideways far too much, so I don't quite understand why Cairney is the only one who is picked up on it. The amount of times we break forward promisingly only to go to Brady, to Dawson, to McKenna, to Evans, to Hobbs, to Chester, to Rosenior, to Chester, to Mannone...
Agree with this, we are too slow at times as a team, particularly in the final third, that said the moaners in the crowd don't make it easy, keep possession, they want it getting forward, get it forward from the back and it's wasting possession, for what it's worth, I like what Bar by is trying to do, I just wish we'd move the ball quicker in the final third.
Is the 'patient' build up really the issue though? If we took more of the chances we did have it would have been a completely different story.. Brady's disaster is a prime example of our whole situation I think, great build up and no finish. If we had a confident striker who could score consistently nobody would be complaining about slowing the play down all the time. Do we have the quality to play one touch passing all the time?! Or would you rather just hoof it up every attack?
As for josh king, he runs around a lot, seems to put a lot of effort in but he has no end product, cant cross and doesnt really do a lot when he has the ball. He just seems to me like a bit of a faster aaron mclean. The number of times he got the ball in a threatening position he either played a poor pass or didnt get past his man. I just dont think he is good enough in all honesty. Rosenior was dreadful tonight with dawson not much better. Im not sure why they keep insisting on crossing the ball in from about 10 yards outside the penalty area on the touchline. They did it so many times tonight, most of the time without looking up beforehand, and they are just so easy to defend against. The defenders dont have to move or turn to face their own goal, they can just ready themselves then head the ball away. Its so frustrating yet they keep trying it over and over again. Someone got it spot on the other day when they quoted john cleese in clockwork 'its not the despair, i can handle the despair. Its the hope.' Every game i go to hoping that we will start to take our chances, we will try something different, that we might score a goal, yet everytime its exactly the same old story. The only difference tonight was that the opposition had the quality to punish us. If we were against a poorer team it would have been another 0-0.
