Defensive Coach

[Millenniumram]

1 hour ago, brady1993 said:

To also add onto this, I'd guess there is a reasonable proportion of the goals we concede are down to individual mistakes*. With so little going forward and so little in the way of control of the game you just are going to be much more susceptible to such a goal and packing the defence doesn't alter it all that much. But then again I'm of the perhaps counter-intuitive opinion that if an opponent doesn't have the ball they can't score and if they are worried about you they are far less likely to commit in numbers going forward.

*There is a reasonable argument  that  most goals have an individual mistake (or 5) in them but what I'm trying to get at is a fair few we've conceded have been very clearly down to a single individual e.g. Byrne against Coventry, Marshall against Forest.

This is the crux of it really - our lack of attacking quality puts too much pressure on the defence. Ironically, if we scored more goals, we’d probably actually concede less as well!

[Van der MoodHoover]

9 minutes ago, brady1993 said:

This isn't entirely accurate. We only ever set up this with a double pivot of Bird and Rooney in 1 and half games (second half at Luton and Blackburn). It's also worthwhile noting there was a fair amount of chopping and changing both in midfield positions and at the back. It's also worth highlighting that Rooney came back really unfit.

You're right that my analysis was a bit loose.... I looked back at the early line ups and it seems we went.... 

Bird/Shinnie in the first 2 games

Bird/Rooney in the Blackburn disaster. 

All in a 4231.

Then we went to a 5-4-1 against Norwich and Watford with Rooney used up front and Bird and Shinnie back as the midfield 2.

Them to a343..... 

 

So I think there are elements of truth in both our analyses. There has certainly been a lot of chopping and changing as you say. But there also seems to be a general drift towards less forward thinking players.