No midfield control again…

[valakari]

WE NEED A DEFENSIVE MIDFIELDER TO SIT IN FRONT OF THE BACK 4...that might sort all the issues!

Why can't Warne see this and go and loan one?..if he hasn't got enough dosh, maybe get Bradley Johnson to sit there for a few months!??

[Jourdan]

4 minutes ago, Gee SCREAMER !! said:

We aren't playing people to their strengths. 

This is a fair point, but how much of that is down to tactics and fluidity of position and how much of that is down to injuries, readiness, and availability?

For me, it’s the latter. I think when the squad is stretched, this is when we start to lose sense tactically and take too many risks.

Nyambe and Forsyth would improve the defence if they were available. Wildsmith too if he was reinstated. There’s no-one viable to come in and displace Bird and Hourihane, so we take the rough and the smooth. Then of course you have Collins who is shouldering the burden of the attack because Waghorn, Washington and John Jules are long term injured.

[Sparkle]

We don’t set up to use midfield constructively so it’s not the fault of of those selected 

[IlsonDerby]

What midfield? They’re too busy watching the team play it around and over them. 

[G STAR RAM]

8 hours ago, i-Ram said:

The team are not coached to have any control. Another midfielder will not help if Warne continues to employ the tactics he wants us to play football.

I say football. It’s pinball. Players must be being encouraged to move it as forward as quickly as possible, taking no more than 3 touches. Chaotic, gas out type football.

I thought we might go up with our squad automatically, even with him in charge. I am beginning to think not.

Why is it chaotic taking no more than 3 touches? These are professional footballer for goodness sake.

The quality of the passing was absolutely woeful last night, that's not down to the manager. 

And if Warne is encouraging the players to move it forward quickly, why do 90% of Bird and Hourihanes passes go backwards, often to the same player it has just come from?

This isn't really a defence of Warne because the shape of the team that was working during our good run is no longer working and needs mixing up.

[Anag Ram]

We’re trying to fit too many attacking players into our starting line up. This only really leaves two traditional midfielders and they neither demand the ball or tackle aggressively. We are always going to lose the midfield battle whilst we persist with this tactic. We have to start with three midfielders who play together, i.e. they form a partnership close together where they are better placed to contest the ball and to play the ball to each other. Bird and Hourihane are often miles apart.

If we can’t bring in another midfielder I fear for our position in the top six.

 

[G STAR RAM]

4 hours ago, Sparkle said:

We don’t set up to use midfield constructively so it’s not the fault of of those selected 

However the midfield is set up does not excuse walking around the pitch for 60 minutes like last night.

The fastest I saw Hourihane run was when we got a free kick that he wanted to take.

Edited January 24 by G STAR RAM

[TomTom92]

The midfield has been an issue since last season. But then we go on a run and all is forgiven. But once the run stops it looks painful again. 
 
If we do end up in league 1 next season I’m actually looking forward to no Hourihane or Bird.

[i-Ram]

14 minutes ago, G STAR RAM said:

Why is it chaotic taking no more than 3 touches? These are professional footballer for goodness sake.

The quality of the passing was absolutely woeful last night, that's not down to the manager. 

And if Warne is encouraging the players to move it forward quickly, why do 90% of Bird and Hourihanes passes go backwards, often to the same player it has just come from?

This isn't really a defence of Warne because the shape of the team that was working during our good run is no longer working and needs mixing up.

Please supply your evidence that 90% of Bird and Hourihane’s passes goes backwards. I think you have made that statistic up.

Passing quality will diminish if you urge players to move the ball forward quickly with an economy of touches. That is a Warne tactic/requirement of his players. He is happy to risk losing the ball for the possible advantages gained from fast forward play. That is not playing to the strength of a number of our players imo.

[G STAR RAM]

13 minutes ago, i-Ram said:

Please supply your evidence that 90% of Bird and Hourihane’s passes goes backwards. I think you have made that statistic up.

Passing quality will diminish if you urge players to move the ball forward quickly with an economy of touches. That is a Warne tactic/requirement of his players. He is happy to risk losing the ball for the possible advantages gained from fast forward play. That is not playing to the strength of a number of our players imo.

I did make it up, its probably closer to 95%.

There were numerous times last night when simple passes were put straight out of play, nothing to do with fast forward play, just a lack of care with the ball, thats not on the manager.

Which of our players are not capable of playing fast football in your opinion?

[angieram]

42 minutes ago, Anag Ram said:

We’re trying to fit too many attacking players into our starting line up. This only really leaves two traditional midfielders and they neither demand the ball or tackle aggressively. We are always going to lose the midfield battle whilst we persist with this tactic. We have to start with three midfielders who play together, i.e. they form a partnership close together where they are better placed to contest the ball and to play the ball to each other. Bird and Hourihane are often miles apart.

If we can’t bring in another midfielder I fear for our position in the top six.

 

If you're going to make this trade-off (and Warne definitely is, that's not going to change) then your extra forward player has to absolutely make that difference. For us it all too often doesn't. 

 

[Anag Ram]

4 minutes ago, angieram said:

If you're going to make this trade-off (and Warne definitely is, that's not going to change) then your extra forward player has to absolutely make that difference. For us it all too often doesn't. 

 

It will help when Nyambe comes back and Wilson can move to RM. 

It hasn’t helped that Collins and NML have lost form at the same time.
 

[trappatoni]

8 hours ago, Jourdan said:

Hourihane was excellent for Barnsley and everything went through him but this was seven years ago, even further back if you are thinking about his standout years in League 1.

He was in his mid-20s when he left. You are a completely different player physically at that age compared when you are approaching your mid-30s.

At Villa, he was part of a really high quality midfield playing in a three with McGinn who  plays with aggression and covers a lot of ground and Grealish who can draw defenders and create space for a player like Hourihane to operate in.

I just don’t think he can do what he did before with the same frequency in this current set up.

He's only 32 - ok nearly 33 but people have been levelling this accusation at him for at least a year.   I don't believe physiologically a 32 year old has lost much - at least not due to age - a few percent most.   He should be able to cope physically - the athleticism of league 1 players is typically less than the higher levels.  

[Papahet]

All Hourihane can do is pick out the odd pass every half a dozen games (his set pieces have gone downhill), said this for over a year that considering the level he's played he's not dictating many games. Legs went at Villa. He needs move further forward IMO.

Bird, like Sibley hasn't pushed on and needs a fresh challenge - don't think he's been the same player since his injury. Although sometimes he does show quality. Sell for a million if offered it.

Thompson,  runs around like a headless chicken and gets praised for doing so, genuinely don't get the love fest for him (?) Was fine when he was out injured, which shown he wasn't a major absence.

Fornah? Wtf happened with him?

We need a box to box midfielder a'la Bryson, someone like Brannagan would've been perfect.

Edited January 24 by Papahet

[angieram]

Just now, Anag Ram said:

It will help when Nyambe comes back and Wilson can move to RM. 

It hasn’t helped that Collins and NML have lost form at the same time.
 

I do worry that, even with our best players available,  we lack the tactical nous to beat teams with this formation, though.

We won throw ins and corners a plenty last night, but their backline was tall and strong and we were never going to beat them with our "out wide, crosses and set-pieces" mentality. 

The swirling wind didn't help but we didn't do enough to try to play into and round those big defenders along the grass. We were all calling out for it at the game, but it was never going to happen. 

Look at the highlights. Apart from one header, all our good moments came when we played along the floor. Yet we wasted countless set pieces because we couldn't match them in the air. (Watching Bradley trying to get his head on some of those high balls at the end was just comical!) 

The way Warne sets us up only works if teams come at us and give us space to play on the break. But we are good enough as a team to dominate possession most games -  despite being told to treat the ball like a hot potato. Opposition then sits in, defends the cross, we are caught disastrously over-committed in attack and we then look vulnerable on the counter-attack.

But somehow it's all Bird's and Hourihane's fault. 🤔

[BathRam72]

9 hours ago, JuanFloEvraTheCocu'sNesta said:

You could put Kevin de Bruyne in our midfield, it wouldn't make a difference because Warne actively bypasses the midfield. 

It's a tactical choice that is currently, and will continue to, cost us points.

However, if your midfield is so poor as ours is, why would you play it to them. Bird pretty much gave every ball to the opposition last night.

So until we get some decent players in the midfield, we may as well play 5 at the back and 5 up front.

[ramsbottom]

I don't think it's even worth investing in another midfielder because they'll still be asked to play in the same way, which is to recycle the ball as quickly as possible and get it to the wide players.  There's nothing wrong with that in theory but it's just not working.  I don't know if I'm the only one to have noticed but Bird & Hourihane are never really in the middle of the field, they're always operating miles apart from one another.  When either of them managed to play a 1-2 it's rarely with each other, and more likely to be either a full back or winger

[Jram]

9 hours ago, BaaLocks said:

I will quote @Gee SCREAMER !! from a few weeks back - Hourihane is stealing a living in this team. Absolutely stealing one.... For a player that was supposed to be our linchpin he has been woeful in all but two or three games. Sibley is still living off that Milwall hat-trick (if ever there was an example of lucking out that was it, I'd be surprised if he scores three more goals in the rest of his career) and Bird just seems to get muscled off the ball too easily. Some say Bird gets himself about but that is for naught if you can't control and distribute the ball when you win it back.

To not score against either Lincoln or Reading and to not even have a shot on goal when a win would have taken us top shows just how poor this side actually is. And while we can point blame at Hourihane, Bird and Sibley it is also true that time and again, it's the summer signings that have been the undoing of us, there is simply no quality in nearly all of what was brought in. Nothing to even suggest we can change a game when things aren't going our way. Ward, Bradley, Washington etc. have just been bang average. Nelson, Elder, Nyambe, Wilson have replaced what was there before (Davies, Roberts etc) but besides that this team is not better than the one of loans and favours we cobbled together last season.

As for Warne, I'm not sure you can blame him as much for the footballing ideas and general intent but if you don't have bite in the centre of the park you can shout and wail all you want to get it out wide. Not much point though if you can't keep the ball for more than ten seconds or find a man in space when you do.

What I will say is that tactically Warne doesn't seem to do his homework - mate of mine is a Reading fan, tells me before the game that Azeez is the main threat. So what happens, we let him run free for the first half before we work it out? Surely someone, somewhere watched a video and had a think about what they were going up against?

Depressingly poor performance against a team that we should have cantered to a win against.

This is the sort of dramatic post we were seeing a lot in October. These sorts of reactions blew my mind then and they blow my mind now. Sorry to pick on you, you’re clearly not the only one, but haven’t you learned anything from almost ousting Warne earlier in the season only for him to win ten of the next twelve?

We were always going to have poor performances. We weren’t great last night but let’s have a little perspective. We lost 1-0. They weren’t great. We weren’t great. Could have drawn, could have nicked it, the chips didn’t fall unfortunately. 
 

If I were the players I would be understandably fuming after the season they’ve had so far reading posts like this 

[Srg]

Not going to chance until Hourihane doesn't play. Out of possession, we are a man down in most possessions. 

 

Would say this gif is an accurate representation, but he often doesn't even get that close.

[BathRam72]

28 minutes ago, trappatoni said:

He's only 32 - ok nearly 33 but people have been levelling this accusation at him for at least a year.   I don't believe physiologically a 32 year old has lost much - at least not due to age - a few percent most.   He should be able to cope physically - the athleticism of league 1 players is typically less than the higher levels.  

Not sure I entirely agree with your last line. At levels above, games are usually wide open and players have time. If you are clever you don't have to run as much if you can dictate the play.

At this level, most teams rely on their athleticism ton just run and hope they are faster and harder than the opposition. Currently most teams are more than Derby.