Lincoln City (H), 7.45pm Tuesday 14th February.

[kevinhectoring]

26 minutes ago, sage said:

Knight hasn't got the touch to play DCM. He is an 8

Hourihane is also an 8 and plays better in a 3 with Bird or White behind him.

 

The conversation began when someone asked whether you drop Collins, Didzy or Knight. I think the answer to that is pretty clear.

I’d actually be fine if he dropped Hourihane, but I don’t think he will. And dropping Knight makes no sense. So you need to compromise to get the best out of the two of them. 
 

Knight’s all round game has improved a lot in the last year, as he showed by making a reasonable fist of playing at RWB. 

[PistoldPete]

26 minutes ago, HorsforthRam said:

We were awfully predictable; Smith always looking for NML on one side, Roberts for Dobbin on the other and then an attempted cross. No out ball into midfield to create a triangle and move Lincoln about. As another poster said “rinse and repeat”.

After their man got sent off, we still persisted in similar tactics which was frustrating despite having one or two men free in the middle a lot of the time. Trying to quickly to find a “killer” ball which goes out of play ir straight to their keeper, queue break up of play. 
 

Warne constantly talks post match about players making an extra pass, not getting a cross in quick enough, not pulling the trigger, not moving the ball quickly etc. Sometimes it feels to me the way some players try to remedy that is by being frantic in their attempts to pass/cross the ball to each other leading to so many misplaced passes and poor ball control. Composure was missing last night, especially when they were down to 10. For large parts we did exactly what they wanted us to do. 

I agree with this except things changed when Sibley came on. he can cut inside and shoot which he did a couple of times and nearly scored. Or cross. Or move it down the line to Barks. He just gives us more options and should have been a starter if not the first sub when they scored not an afterthought 5 mins after half time. 

[jimtastic56]

I am getting a little concerned about NML. Him and McGoldrick have been our best players this season. But NML has now played more games this season than he has played in the last 2 combined. He has never played 45 games in a season and looks to be running out of steam or he has lost the confidence to go round people .

[ossieram]

Someone sent me this.

Brilliant work by the linesman. 

[sage]

9 minutes ago, PistoldPete said:

I agree with this except things changed when Sibley came on. he can cut inside and shoot which he did a couple of times and nearly scored. Or cross. Or move it down the line to Barks. He just gives us more options and should have been a starter if not the first sub when they scored not an afterthought 5 mins after half time. 

He only made an impact when Cashin started overlapping Barkhuizen, which Sibley should have been doing for the previous 15 minutes.  

We should have been using the width to draw defenders out then exploiting the space down the side of the box. Instead we just kept throwing poor crosses into the box.

Smith did it to an extent so Knight could get in the inside right position, Cashin eventually enabled it on the left. 

[G STAR RAM]

1 hour ago, duncanjwitham said:

I certainly think the Port Vale performance was complete garbage,

We had 17 shots, 8 of which were on target that night.

[duncanjwitham]

6 minutes ago, G STAR RAM said:

We had 17 shots, 8 of which were on target that night.

I watched the game. We were dreadful.  

[Tamworthram]

1 hour ago, bcnram said:

I didn’t think the ref was that bad last night. He was let down by one of his linesman, but if a player goes down feigning injury, there is not a lot he can do. In fact I suspect this referee will be working his way up the leagues. 
Our play was so predictable last night it became boring to watch. Work the ball out to the wing because that is what Lincoln wanted us to do. Then put over a cross that their defence easily coped with… and repeat… and repeat. Lincoln created the better chances their manager did a great job on us. Sadly our manager was fell short again, I hope it isn’t a trend. 

I agree. I don't think the ref can be blamed for the second goal or Didzy's being ruled out if he was indeed onside. Even the Lincoln goal was down to the assistant ref. That's what they are there for.

One thing I applauded the ref for was, on at least two occasions, a Lincoln player went down faking a foul but the ref didn't fall for it (no pun intended) and just waved the Lincoln players appeals away.

[taggy180]

Frustrating game. Should never had played 442, we had no control in the middle because hourihane dropped back alot which left knight having alot of ground to cover. Cashin must have had about 60% of derbys possession first half and it felt like the pressure was on him to create something. The crossing was poor which meant Collins hardly got a sniff and maybe he would have been better coming on has a sub because with only 2 striker's at the club this is where the efl restrictions have hit us. Refreshing to hear warne honest about the match as always and ref should have got tough with lincolns time wasting second half. Another tough game Saturday Charlton are on the up under dean Holden 

[Tamworthram]

1 hour ago, Crewton said:

He could have booked the goalkeeper for starters for persistent timewasting, and penalised him for holding onto the ball persistently for twice as long as the laws of the game allow. 

Good point about booking the keeper but you could argue they were penalised for the persistent time wasting by the 4th official adding on 9 minutes. 

[sage]

1 hour ago, kevinhectoring said:

The conversation began when someone asked whether you drop Collins, Didzy or Knight. I think the answer to that is pretty clear.

I’d actually be fine if he dropped Hourihane, but I don’t think he will. And dropping Knight makes no sense. So you need to compromise to get the best out of the two of them. 
 

Knight’s all round game has improved a lot in the last year, as he showed by making a reasonable fist of playing at RWB. 

He still can't play DCM and when he plays in a 2 with Hourihane, Conor has to sit in front of the CBs, negating his qualities.  

Edited February 15, 2023 by sage

[Curtains]

Good point in the end last night after a tough game at Wycombe.

Missing Bird but White did well when he came on .

Lincoln are no pushover .

Excuse the pun 

[i-Ram]

4 hours ago, VulcanRam said:

Time wasting and gamesmanship is part and parcel of the game, always has been. When a player goes down, the ref has no choice but to attend to a player who claims he is injured. He can't pick and choose when he thinks someone is feigning injury; all he can do is add the time on, which he did. Nine minutes added time was right.

That said, he was a weak official who increasingly lost control of proceedings, and if it is the case that the same linesman allowed two fairly obvious offside goals (haven't seen the video back) then he needs some kind of sanction. 

Yet you can't blame the officials for our performance. In the first half Lincoln out ran us, out fought us and were more organised. Second half they did everything they could to secure something out of the game. It's horrible to watch and frustrating, but it is up to us to be able to beat teams like this if we want promotion, and we nearly did.

Disappointing night but we should look no further than our own poor performance, especially in the first half again. I was surprised to see two in midfield again after a poor performance at Wycombe where we were overrun  in that area, and it was clear against Lincoln we had nothing in the middle and were essentially just playing in the two outer thirds of the pitch, left and right, which made it pretty easy for the opposition to defend. 

Much to think about ahead of Saturday.

Thank you for this post. I suspect it is the most balanced I have read. It is pretty clear that Warne got the set-up wrong. There is also a lot of bleating on here about how Lincoln s********* it at the end. Not sure what anyone expects really. They were apparently the better team for the first 55 minutes, and then had to play as 10 men for the last 35 away from home to a promotion chasing side. Who wouldn’t try every trick to hold on to a lead, or then the one point. We are playing League 1 football against Lincoln, not beach football against Man City.

[sage]

1 minute ago, i-Ram said:

Thank you for this post. I suspect it is the most balanced I have read. It is pretty clear that Warne got the set-up wrong. There is also a lot of bleating on here about how Lincoln s********* it at the end. Not sure what anyone expects really. They were apparently the better team for the first 55 minutes, and then had to play as 10 men for the last 35 away from home to a promotion chasing side. Who wouldn’t try every trick to hold on to a lead, or then the one point. We are playing League 1 football against Lincoln, not beach football against Man City.

He did set up wrong for the 2nd game running. At least he admitted it this time.

[Curtains]

I think we such cut the team and Warne some slack .

I am proud of the team last night for the way they got a point out of that game after a poor start. 
 

This team never give up  

 

[Mucker1884]

From skimming through this thread, some... I repeat "SOME"... comments appear to suggest that the respective writer(s) have forgotten:

1/  Just where this club was, 12 months ago.
2/  Just how our squad was looking, just a week or two before the season started.
3/  Just how young some of these now-regular players are, and how much learning they still have to do.
4/  Just how galling terms like "Criminal", "Awful", "Worst game in a Derby shirt", and even the lesser "Not good enough" can be, when referring to those referred to in point 3 above.

 

Yes... I know... It's a forum... Opinions matter.

But still, eh!  ?

[Mucker1884]

12 hours ago, SKRam said:

PW in interview……. NOOOOOO bobble. That says it all about tonight

Fortunately, he was wearing it post whistle, as witnessed by those of us who stayed back to applaud them off.  I assume that infers he was wearing it throughout the game.

The bobble is innocent, I say!  Find another scapegoat!  ??

[Mucker1884]

12 hours ago, jono said:

We are but Mr White step forward. Like the look of this lad. Composed, makes time. Reminded me a bit of David Jones

 

Nah... Can't see it myself...

 

[Tamworthram]

24 minutes ago, Curtains said:

I think we such cut the team and Warne some slack .

I am proud of the team last night for the way they got a point out of that game after a poor start. 
 

This team never give up  

 

Absolutely deserve credit for keep battling away (having said that, surely you’d expect them to when the scores were level, there was only one goal in it and especially when they went down to 10 men).

By and large it was a poor performance and I’m sure how we would have got back into it had they not had a player sent off but, as PW has pretty much said, we shouldn’t get carried away when we win nor too despondent when we don’t.

The same applies to our end of season position. If we reach the play offs then great but keep the champagne on ice until we’ve won the final. On the other hand, if we end up just outside the top 6 then it will be a major disappointment but no need to go into melt down.

Edited February 15, 2023 by Tamworthram

[Mr Tibbs]

1 hour ago, jimtastic56 said:

I am getting a little concerned about NML. Him and McGoldrick have been our best players this season. But NML has now played more games this season than he has played in the last 2 combined. He has never played 45 games in a season and looks to be running out of steam or he has lost the confidence to go round people .

Whilst I don't think NML is quite at it, Lincoln's RB had him in his back pocket most of the night due to good defending IMO. Hardly got tight so wasn't easily done and when NML did get past him, he was brought down both times to stop the attack. Pretty textbook performance but you don't see it every week thankfully. He's one of the better RB's I've seen at this level, most can hardly run never mind defend.