Derby County v Notts Forest

[SillyBilly]

I don't think bryson ran around like a headless chicken.

The game went on around him. He couldn't get close enough.

He has lost his engine, and thus become ineffective.

There was a moment in the second half which summed up hendrick and bryson today.

Hendrick passes it five yards square to mascarell.

Mascarell passes it five yards square to bryson.

Bryson misplaces his five yard pass back to mascarell and forest broke on us for the umpteenth time.

We were clueless without hughes.

The management were clueless tactically as well.

They never addressed the problems second half.

And one other thing.....

The amount of free kicks we wasted.

Every free kick from the left was swung in by mascarell right footed.

The delivery was terrible.

We need a left footer to swing it in along the line.

But again.....they persisted with the hopeless tactic all game.

Poor all round.

 

At least I'm not not the only one who thought Mascarell's fluffing of every decent set-piece was criminal. Think he failed to clear the first man on 2-3 occasions if i remember correctly. You saw the game the same as me, just poor all round today, it would have been very disappointing had it been any other team in the league, but being Forest, makes it all the more gutting.

 

I was disappointed that Steve didn't decide to change things early on in the second. It was clear, very quickly that we were struggling, the whole midfield was being bypassed, Martin had no service yet we persisted in the same fashion. Unusual as Steve and co. are normally pro-active. Reminded me of Nigel's days, just waiting for the inevitable to happen and it did.

[duncanjwitham]

Really confused about what McClaren was thinking tactically at 1-1. He put best on and we seemed to play 2 up to, yet Russell was still playing on the left and we had no right winger? 

 

The way I saw it, we had no senior wingers on the bench, and Ward was clearly not going to last 90 minutes. So McClaren has 4 options:  He leaves on a tiring, injury-prone Ward.  He throws an inexperienced winger (Bennett or Calero) into a high pressure local derby. He takes off a holding midfielder, when we were already losing out in midfield. Or he puts Bent into the same role Bamford played for us, a sort of wide striker drifting in.  I'm not saying it was necessarily the right choice, but it was quite possibly the least-worst option.

[TopRam]

They deserve it, let's get over it and move on, more be the only person under 20 on twitter that doesn't think that fan who got on the pitch is great, awful look on the club, anyway it happens still positive and looking forward already !

[RLACML]

I'm going to criticise McClaren as well. Why didn't he make a change at 1-0 when it was so clear what was coming? I realise Bent was going to come on before Assombalonga scored but that was after 15/20 minutes of dominance.

[Alph]

There's a lot of really negative stuff on here, based purely on the second half perfomance. (Which I agree was dire)

But the first half we were good. Sure, we've been better, but no one would've thought at half time that we wouldve played as badly for the next 45 mins.

Hughes offers so much defensively that it's gonna have an effect on how we play if he goes off.

Not defending Bryson and Hendrick in the 2nd half as I do believe they couldve been better (based upon previous performances)

But we lost one half of a game.

I thought Russell was brilliant in the first half.

I don't mean to be negative. I'm just furious!

A pass can go wrong

A header misplaced

You can even be caught out a position

But I got so angry watching Bryson and Hendrick go pressing together and both beat by one pass. Furious. It was so stupid and it kept happening!! Over and over.

Just angry fella. I hate seeing, in my opinion, the same stupid decision over again.

You get players that constantly pick the wrong DIFFERENT options and you get players that couldn't pass wind or cross a road.

But the same decision, the same situation for 45mins? Angry!!

[duncanjwitham]

I'm going to criticise McClaren as well. Why didn't he make a change at 1-0 when it was so clear what was coming? I realise Bent was going to come on before Assombalonga scored but that was after 15/20 minutes of dominance.

 

What change would you have made though? We had no senior wingers and no senior central midfielders on the bench.  There was no obvious change to make.

[Ramarena]

Fully deserved to lose. They had a plan, stuck to it and it paid off. 

 

Credit to Russell, Forsyth and Hughes.

 

Ward, Martin, Christie were o.k and the rest were as useful as a puddle of p1ss.

[Rampage]

Florist had 53% of the first half. Unfortunately, Bournemouth, Ipswich and Middlesbrough play again before we do, so we could be 6 and 5 points adrift of the top two. Ipswich already winning 2 nil. Possible hidden factors? New signings may have knocked stuffing out of some of our players. Also it may have taken more out of the players last week than we thought. Roll on the return of George Thorne. It is obvious that we need another Eustace. if we do bot get one we are in trouble. 

[Gritstone Ram]

Bottom line is our midfielders allowed their midfielders run the second half. Disgusting!!!

[Rampage]

Re - What change would you have made though? We had no senior wingers and no senior central midfielders on the bench. There was no obvious change to make.

Shotton to stiffen the midfield, take ward off and play to keep the lead before we let a goal in. I saw it coming, did you?

[CapeTownRams]

Consistency. Or lack thereof. It's gonna kill the season.

 

Have to wonder if there are and have been too many team changes too often. Sometimes due to SM tinkering too much, sometimes injuries.

 

Bryson's 5 year deal is beginning to look like bad business. Fair to him, he hasn't been playing regularly and will be rusty. And SM clearly loves Hendrick more.

[duncanjwitham]

Re - What change would you have made though? We had no senior wingers and no senior central midfielders on the bench. There was no obvious change to make.

Shotton to stiffen the midfield, take ward off and play to keep the lead before we let a goal in. I saw it coming, did you?

 

Yeah, it was coming.  Shtton on for Ward though? Who's playing where then?  And the problem was not retaining possession in midfield, and Shotton is dire on the ball.

[Chris Mills]

The way I saw it, we had no senior wingers on the bench, and Ward was clearly not going to last 90 minutes. So McClaren has 4 options:  He leaves on a tiring, injury-prone Ward.  He throws an inexperienced winger (Bennett or Calero) into a high pressure local derby. He takes off a holding midfielder, when we were already losing out in midfield. Or he puts Bent into the same role Bamford played for us, a sort of wide striker drifting in.  I'm not saying it was necessarily the right choice, but it was quite possibly the least-worst option.

I don't remember Bamford ever playing basically as a striker though. Bent wasn't acting as a wide striker, he was just up top. Balance is an important aspect to a teams formation. I think it was a mistake and it's better to have a player such as Calero playing a position he is confident in and can at least partially defend that right hand side. The only player down that right side was Christie as it stood. 

[Alph]

He was, but this is where we missed Eustace who would have got hold of Bryson and Hendrick and pulled them in to shut up shop so to speak. We need a player with presence and the experience/ability to read the game, see what needs to change and relay the instructions in that position.

Can't argue with that. I'd expect Bryson and Hendrick to figure it out themselves but their heads had gone. They were caught up in the occasion.

I guess Eustace, whatever the debate over his ability, would have organised a line of defence.

Gutted to have seen us crumble. Lose our heads. Play a game we aren't comfortable with. And lose quite convincingly to our rubbish rivals after we worked hard to catch back up to top spot.

[Bris Vegas]

Eustace's experience is invaluable in situations like that.

 

Masc may be too inexperienced to be able to organise a midfield, and even if he did his intructions and lack of English probably wouldn't have gotten through to the other midfield two.

 

Hughes, despite his young age, is so much more intelligent and wise than the other midfielders out there.

 

I hope McClaren teaches them tactical discipline on the training ground. They need it.

[Posh Ram]

Changes need to be made, still. Not necessarily content with just signing Albentosa, Bent and Warnock. We have a real issue in midfield that needs to be addressed. Bryson and Hendrick can't play well together, it's like Gerrard and Lampard, so we either need another CM or to play Mascarell there. Mascarell is not and never has been a defensive midfielder and if Eustace is having surgery, he may well be done for a significant amount of time. We need to be proactive and bring in another defensive midfielder on loan until the end of the season for when Thorne comes back.

I was really annoyed Mac put Bent at right-wing. He'll be as ineffective as Best was playing in that position. If he was gonna bring Bent on he should have gone 4-2-4 but that's not an option when this midfield looks so vulnerable.

[peakram]

Definitely think we could do with a very experienced old head in midfield who can tackle for at least a month until Thorne is fit, otherwise can see us having a bit of a rocky time of it, especially if Hughes has to miss any games too.

 

Christie is another one who seems to panic and get dragged out of position when the other team are pressing, often lunging into a tackle high up the pitch and players running into the gap he has left behind him, or else over committing himself when all he needs to do is jockey the attacker into a less dangerous position.

[top 6 finish]

Yesterday I had a rant on here directed at Liverpool for taking Ibe back.This morning

I texted my bro-in law saying that he was worth 2 goals for us.

 

Nobody has mentioned him,I think we missed him,badly.He would have skinned that

useless RB,and could have scored,as well as create.We need to replace him.

[Bris Vegas]

Yesterday I had a rant on here directed at Liverpool for taking Ibe back.This morning

I texted my bro-in law saying that he was worth 2 goals for us.

 

Nobody has mentioned him,I think we missed him,badly.He would have skinned that

useless RB,and could have scored,as well as create.We need to replace him.

 

Yes because the lack of a frustrating fast winger is the root of our problems.

[Chris_D]

I don't remember Bamford ever playing basically as a striker though. Bent wasn't acting as a wide striker, he was just up top. Balance is an important aspect to a teams formation. I think it was a mistake and it's better to have a player such as Calero playing a position he is confident in and can at least partially defend that right hand side. The only player down that right side was Christie as it stood.

As seen in second goal when christie was way up the pitch covering the space leaving Osborn acres to run and run in