V Bristol City (h) match day thread

[Andicis]

20 minutes ago, KCG said:

I would understand the defence of Keogh if it was only the occasional mistake, say once or twice a season, but it isn't is it? It's a frequent lapse in concentration. I would love to be striker up against Keogh because I would know I was always likely to be gifted an opportunity. It doesn't come much better than having the ball passed directly to you! His mistakes have cost us dearly. He needs to concentrate far more and cut the stupid mistakes out.

We like Keogh because of his attitude, but I wish people would stop being irrational by defending the indefensible.

Keogh has made quite a few mistakes, but I wouldn't call it a ''frequent lapse in concentration''. Generally speaking, this season, and the seasons before, Keogh has been excellent. He wasn't good yesterday, but I feel he is nowhere near as bad as you claim here. Don't we have one of the better defensive records in the league?

[Inglorius]

3 hours ago, Topram said:

After Norwich’s start to the season did they think they’d be top at Christmas? Maybe we can get a run of those performances going!

Still feeling confident after the Leeds result today?

[North East Ram]

8 hours ago, Mucker1884 said:

In fairness, the last Saturday before Xmas is historically synonymous with a lower home attendance and quieter home crowd.

It was quieter all around yesterday, but surely nobody was surprised?

 

... That's no excuse for the ripple of boo's at the final whistle though.  Have they all been watching Sunderland 'til I die?   

That Sunderland doc is grim viewing for their fans. What a diabolical disaster. Some nasty toxic behaviour. Physically attacking the camera crew, each other, offering the manager a square go! Vile. Makes our booing look quite friendly.

Still, their season highlight comes at PP on Easter Friday! Probably the day that even the staunchest Gary supporters finally realised he wasn’t the messiah. But a very naughty boy.

[Topram]

2 hours ago, Inglorius said:

Still feeling confident after the Leeds result today?

Never thought we’d catch Leeds... what’s wrong with me being confident? You seem like you want us to fail 

[MuespachRam]

On 22/12/2018 at 11:54, Norman said:

Liverpool 4 points clear trololololol

Ha ha. And they have never been there before have they...!!?? 

[G STAR RAM]

6 hours ago, KCG said:

His mistakes have cost us dearly. He needs to concentrate far more and cut the stupid mistakes out.

Not disagreeing with you here, just wondering if you could give us a list of his mistakes this season that have cost us dearly?

I'm assuming it's quite a lengthy list and will therefore back up your assertion that people are trying to defend the indefensible.

Just to see how balanced your opinion is, can you also give any examples of him defending well and perhaps earning us some points?

[DavesaRam]

IT would seem  from Frank's whinging comments on RD and by what has been said on here that it is a condition of buying a ticket for a Rams match that we are not allowed to moan or criticise. I would agree that we do have to give our backing to the boys, but that should not rule out being less than 100% blind-faithers.

We are in a great position, especially given that we have a brand-new, never-done-this-before manager who completely changed the matchday squad, which we should be grateful for. But that should not rule out expressing our dissatisfaction.

What is causing it to some degree is knowing how the team CAN AND HAS performed already this season. We played Manchester United off the park, were virtually as good against Chelsea. blew West Brom away, and gave Sheffield United and Middlesborough an good going over. There was genuine excitement and expectancy for just what we could achieve this season, but almost immediately we have backed it off and now are fast heading to becoming an insomnia consultant's instant remedy. 

I noticed very early on this season there was a change in how Richard Keogh was playing. Gone were his fearless marauding forwards, instead getting near the half-way line and having to stop and give the ball to someone else. He simply wasn't allowed to carry the ball further forwards, but in having to stop and think about what to do instead of doing what came naturally, he often gave the ball away with a stupid pass.

It would seem that the full-backs, Bogle in particular, have had the same instructions. Bogle caught the eye early on this season because he was willing to take his man on and bomb forwards, looking for the cross or the shot. Now, and for several matches in a row, he too stops just inside their half and passes the ball sideways or backwards. And this has become endemic of the whole team. Now there is no-one who seems prepared to make the speculative run, or make the risky through ball. We have narrowed our play, so when we do try and play through the opposition banks of four, everything is too congested because their defence isn't being pulled wide. 

Could it be that to cut out the numerous sloppy goals we have conceded, the full-backs have been reigned in, which then makes the midfield pull back and play in a line right across the pitch so that there is no longer the fluid movement and therefore there are no forward passes on, so we go sideways or backwards. In addition, the lack of movement means Huddlestone no longer has the targets to play long and through too, so he has started going sideways as well. So our play has become slow and predictable, and actually quite easy to defend against. It isn't so much that other teams have found us out, more that we have become far too cautious and safety first.

So the groans are because the fans know what we are capable of, and want us to play that way because it can rip the opposition teams to pieces, but we have chosen to sheath the sword and go safe. And it isn't new - we have been here before. Do you remember when Steve MaClaren went to Manure? From being on the edge of something fantastic, we plummeted down the league as Jim Smith went into safety first, try-not-to-lose mode. And in Macman 2, instead of the neo-Dutch total-football, we were playing slow-from-the-back stuff which was pretty boring. Not as boring as Rowett-ball, but not at all good, maybe even suggesting that the "have a go" attitude of Mac 1 was actually because of Paul Simpson. Against Villa, we could all see that their defence was suspect, indeed it was a commonly held observation, and on  a number of occasions we made them look very wobbly, but instead of exploiting that, we settled back into our steady-eddy approach.

On about 70 minutes yesterday we suddenly upped the pace and had a 10 minute spell where we suddenly started to create chances. It is blatantly obvious that high-paced football creates chances, and therefore leads to goal and wins, yet we appear to prefer slow, boring and predictable. And that is frustrating, knowing that we are capable of beating anybody in this league - hence the moans. It isn't against incompetence, it is against a choice of tactic, knowing what we could, and should be doing.

[rynny]

1 hour ago, G STAR RAM said:

Not disagreeing with you here, just wondering if you could give us a list of his mistakes this season that have cost us dearly?

I'm assuming it's quite a lengthy list and will therefore back up your assertion that people are trying to defend the indefensible.

Just to see how balanced your opinion is, can you also give any examples of him defending well and perhaps earning us some points?

You joker, you ?

[KCG]

16 hours ago, G STAR RAM said:

Not disagreeing with you here, just wondering if you could give us a list of his mistakes this season that have cost us dearly?

I'm assuming it's quite a lengthy list and will therefore back up your assertion that people are trying to defend the indefensible.

Just to see how balanced your opinion is, can you also give any examples of him defending well and perhaps earning us some points?

How many did he make in the first game of the season for starters? You can go through most matches and see his mistakes. He really is not as good as most on here believe. The crowds groans are a much better indicator!

[G STAR RAM]

19 hours ago, KCG said:

How many did he make in the first game of the season for starters? You can go through most matches and see his mistakes. He really is not as good as most on here believe. The crowds groans are a much better indicator!

He made 2 or 3 mistakes in the first match of the season, they were so costly that we only took 3 points from that game.

Any more? 

Could you not remember him having any good games?

The crowd groans to me are more an indicator of people sitting there waiting for him to make a mistake so they can get on his back. In my experience these very same grimness remain completely silent when he does anything good.

 

[G STAR RAM]

On 24/12/2018 at 12:39, KCG said:

How many did he make in the first game of the season for starters? You can go through most matches and see his mistakes. He really is not as good as most on here believe. The crowds groans are a much better indicator!

The list of all the mistakes that have cost us dearly is taking a while to compile, guessing it must be an extremely long list...

[KCG]

On 26/12/2018 at 08:06, G STAR RAM said:

The list of all the mistakes that have cost us dearly is taking a while to compile, guessing it must be an extremely long list...

I have no intentions of doing so because it's just counter-productive, but he does make frequent mistakes. As I said he made a few against Leeds, and WE lost heavily!!