I have just finished watching the first half of the match which I have recorded from S4C. The first thing that struck me was that we were playing at half pace probably because this was a friendly and the players did not want risk injury. This has always been the norm in previous friendlies I have watched. The first goal came about because Shelvey tuned into trouble and lost the ball instead of moving the ball out wide to Montero. This is a weakness in Shelvey's game as he selfishly too often fails to bring other players into the game by using short passes. The ball was subsequenlty moved forward swiftly and our defenders were caught out ball watching instead of picking up fast moving attackers running into space. Our passing was awful with our legendary crisp short passing virtually non existent. At times there was a large space between our defence and their attack with no defensive midfielder visible. Only once was a through ball played for Bony or Gomis and this was supplied by Montero who on this occasion had moved inside. We were more effective on the left because Montero and Taylor tried to link together whereas Rangel was isolated on the right. With Dyer, Emnes, Montero, Routledge and even the youngster Bray available we must never again play Siggy as the wide man. His talents are wasted there as he is an attacking midfielder which was badly needed yesterday. Any way when the season proper starts let's hope our team selection, tactics and performance improve.
Good post Nos, sounds like we watched the same game
You picked up on the lack of DM too which was key to our poor display imo. Neither Shelvey nor Ki locked that position down, both seemingly happy to play in the no man's land between DM and CM. This left space galore all around them and with no solid spine to our midfield the rest of our game inevitably collapsed.
To be fair, neither had any cohesive support from those around them. This may have had something to do with Siggy (playing out of position and new to our midfield), Montero (new to our midfield), Ki (I'd like to say playing out of position but I'm not sure what his position was, and we might as well count him as new to our midfield) and Shelvey (same as Ki regarding position, but everyone around him was new to him and our midfield)
Compounding this we had Gomis (new up front), Bartley (new and learning) and Taylor (still trying to get his game back).
....and the rest? Bony (getting back to fitness and every one around him is new) Rangel (Tried his best but now a step off the pace) and Williams (who isn't going to score us a hat -trick)
Without any use of an abacus this still adds up to, no triangles, no snappy passing, no incisive running, but simply a fitness training session in front of 12k people where some players get 90 for the first time in a long while.
No need for an inquisition, Spanish or otherwise, just plain old common sense.
It'll happen chaps, remember what Corporal Jones used to say?