Gus, sort it out. That was another very very poor performance.

[Jim in the West]

19 corners from which we had maybe one goal-scoring opportunity. That is truly pathetic.

Little urgency in our game for most of the 90 minutes.

This is a wind up, right? I'd love to know how a team that plays with "little urgency" wins NINETEEN corners!! I assume you'd rather we played hoofball - at least that might qualify as "urgency" in your world. Personally I'd rather the team played intelligent possesion stuff and waited for the right openings.

 

[00snook]

Please tell me this is a joke?

Read my posts above

 

[Hamilton]

Poor first half. Good second half. Should have played 3 at the back from the start and got them by the throat.

 

[Hyperion]

So you are saying that as long as a cross comes in then it's automatically a good cross, and small strikers are to blame rather than the delivery?

Plus you play to the strengths of your team. Floating balls in when you dont have players who can win headers is not a winning tactic.

Except you and Orlandi seem to think it is.

Are you judging his performance on corners alone then?

Btw. We have been completely unimaginative on set pieces LONG before Orlandi. That is a coaching issue. Our set up for corners is obvious and clumpy at best. NO late runners and NO split positioning what so ever. Just a bunch of players within 5 yards trying to head the ball. Orlandi needs to be able to work with better than that at corners. It's not just a height thing.

 

[CP 0 3 BHA]

It was incredibly frustrating to watch but it certainly wasn't a bad performance. If CMS had taken either of his chances in the first half - or Crofts when he skyed Buckley's pull-back, we would have been happy to have controlled the game and scored one or two by half time. Second half was one-way traffic.

 

[Blackadder]

I promised not to moan again on here until after the Peterborough game.

Well, here we are. What an awful performance against a team in the relegation zone. If it hadn't been for that last minute goal it would have been our 8th game without a win!

19 corners from which we had maybe one goal-scoring opportunity. That is truly pathetic.

Little urgency in our game for most of the 90 minutes.

Passing the ball around at the back not looking for the forward pass opportunity. Biggest culprit Mr Hammond.

Lack of awareness from too many of the players.

And Bruno man-of -the -match?? The sponsors were either drunk, stupid, or had absolutely no knowledge of the game of football. He was one of our worst players out there this evening. Poor defending for the most part, poor pass selection, poor pretty much everything.

On a positive note it was great to see Dobbie scoring. He looked good when he came on. And an excellent performance from Orlandi again. And good to see Hoskins back. Of, and I thought Dunk had a pretty good game.

I replied to Pretty Boy Shaw's thread earlier. Same response to you.

Why did you feel the need to start another thread on the same subject just out of interest?

 

[fleet]

Love Bruno, but he wasn't mom last night. Orlando was poor, but I thought Barnes was outstanding in midfield and laid the ball off so well so many times.

 

[Tony Meolas Loan Spell]

I agree our corners were very very poor but thats about it.

 

[Surf's Up]

Sounds a bit like the pot calling the kettle black

Otherwise you would realize that a lot of teams, especially the struggling ones, will come into these sorts of matches and try to stifle the attacking teams play by putting most of their players behind the ball, leaving very little room for the forwards to work in and limiting space and ultimately clear cut opportunities.

Sadly because we are such a good passing side and a lot of teams are unable to compete with that, most will shut up shop and look to steal 3 points with a breakaway goal or at least hang on for a draw at the Amex. Better sides who travel to the Amex will attack more (like Leeds) giving us more opportunities for goals but also more risk of conceding. We are going forward, we are creating some small chances but unless we get an early goal and the other team comes out and tries to attack to restore parity, then its always going to be a struggle.

Who do you think we are, Barcelona or Man U, have we spent untold millions on world class players who are capable of breaking down defenses with ease or have we started to evolve the squad and not gone overboard, splashing the cash and buying every Tom, Dick or Harry (Like Leicester under Sven)

Some people need to manage their expectations better, they seem to think that we must be promoted this season rather than allow us to continue to build but if the instant success is what Tony Bloom wants, why didn't he break the bank and buy anyone and everyone we could find? It doesn't seem to me that Gus and Tony think that its this season or bust for promotion.

Incredibly sensible post amid the emotional expectation driven mayhem!

 

[goldstone]

You're right. We made absolutely NO EFFORT to attack Peterborough in the 2nd half.




*sigh*

Sure we attacked them in the second half, most of it pretty slow and ponderous. But it's no good fecking attacking if we can't score goals and that my friend is something Gus MUST address urgently.

If we think we're good enough for the playoffs we need to be beating teams like Posh by a lot more than one last minute goal.

 

[Green Cross Code Man]

This thread has to be a wind up. Along with about 4 or 5 others on the forum. Why can't the mods either merge the weird moaning threads or create a separate forum for those of us who see life in such a negative manner?

 

[Couldn't Be Hyypia]

Bridge was my mom but Bruno wasn't bad. This must be driving Gus mad too. We simply can't convert our chances at the moment. We look nervous (understandably) but we have the ability to play teams off the park. Cant recall us scoring from a corner for ages - we have simply got to work that out. We don't have a big target man so lets be smarter than simply slinging it into the box.

Frustrating to watch the last few weeks - moreso because we're an early goal away from slaughtering someone.

 

[Sussex Nomad]

I have nothing against criticism of the club, manager, players, et al. But for fucks sake this constant mindless moaning and whining is getting thoroughly tiresome. If we hadn't scored we'd have gone 8 without a win? No shit Sherlock! State the obvious why don't you?

Bored shitless with crap like this.

 

[drew]

i'm not going to bother with most of yur post.....but little urgency for 45 mins i would have agreed with ...but not 90...try again

Agree. Thought the first 45 were the worst of the season so far at the Amex. Why against Leeds did we come out of the starting blocks at the first whistle yet last night we insisted on playing sleepy football along the back four. I would suggest the main culprits for this are Greer and Hammond. Greer rolls the ball to the next player whereas if you watched Dunk, he put a bit ofzip on the balls out to Bridge. Greer's passes allow the covering opposition strikers to stroll over to press the player with the ball. Every time Hammond received the ball from the back four he instinctively looks for a pass backwards and his decision making is commically slow. There was one incident in the second half when he received the ball and two Peterborough players anticipating the back pass ran past him. It seemed an age before he realised he could turn and face the Peterborough half and move in that direction!!!!

Had we started the match the same as we started the second half then I'm sure we would have scored a lot earlier. With one goal, Peterborough would have had to open up and there may well have been more. CMS had a woeful miss in front of goal and should have got a couple of difficult headers on target. Buckley and Bruno did work well on the right but too often their passing to each other was short. I thought Orlandi had a good game, as did Barnes. Of the back four, I would suggest that Greer has more to fear from El Abd's return from injury but as Captain, I suspect Poyet won't drop him.

It was of course great to win and pity the poor souls who left early. At least they were on the bus before us!!!

 

[Seasider78]

Agree. Thought the first 45 were the worst of the season so far at the Amex. Why against Leeds did we come out of the starting blocks at the first whistle yet last night we insisted on playing sleepy football along the back four. I would suggest the main culprits for this are Greer and Hammond. Greer rolls the ball to the next player whereas if you watched Dunk, he put a bit ofzip on the balls out to Bridge. Greer's passes allow the covering opposition strikers to stroll over to press the player with the ball. Every time Hammond received the ball from the back four he instinctively looks for a pass backwards and his decision making is commically slow. There was one incident in the second half when he received the ball and two Peterborough players anticipating the back pass ran past him. It seemed an age before he realised he could turn and face the Peterborough half and move in that direction!!!!

Had we started the match the same as we started the second half then I'm sure we would have scored a lot earlier. With one goal, Peterborough would have had to open up and there may well have been more. CMS had a woeful miss in front of goal and should have got a couple of difficult headers on target. Buckley and Bruno did work well on the right but too often their passing to each other was short. I thought Orlandi had a good game, as did Barnes. Of the back four, I would suggest that Greer has more to fear from El Abd's return from injury but as Captain, I suspect Poyet won't drop him.

It was of course great to win and pity the poor souls who left early. At least they were on the bus before us!!!

I agree 100% about the start and they appeared to be playing 3 across the back for the first 30 minutes which was an ideal opportunity to push on and get an early goal. The longer the game went on the more they retreated behind the ball which made it harder to create clear cut chances.

Overall we fully deserved the points but if we had started with the pace of the Leeds game we would have been out of sight in the first half against a very poor pboro side.

 

[toff79]

Bruno's worst game iv seen although needs a few more bad ones for me to start slagging him, orlandi was non existent in the first half but so was much of the team, another slow performance, the second half they did all they could to score but couldn't, Peterborough where not in our half in the second half and only one team was ever going to score so so why take CMS off is gus allergic to playing to proper strikers

bridge MOM premiership class and Buckley ran himself into the ground

 

[Bold Seagull]

Agree. Thought the first 45 were the worst of the season so far at the Amex. Why against Leeds did we come out of the starting blocks at the first whistle yet last night we insisted on playing sleepy football along the back four. I would suggest the main culprits for this are Greer and Hammond. Greer rolls the ball to the next player whereas if you watched Dunk, he put a bit ofzip on the balls out to Bridge. Greer's passes allow the covering opposition strikers to stroll over to press the player with the ball. Every time Hammond received the ball from the back four he instinctively looks for a pass backwards and his decision making is commically slow. There was one incident in the second half when he received the ball and two Peterborough players anticipating the back pass ran past him. It seemed an age before he realised he could turn and face the Peterborough half and move in that direction!!!!

Had we started the match the same as we started the second half then I'm sure we would have scored a lot earlier. With one goal, Peterborough would have had to open up and there may well have been more. CMS had a woeful miss in front of goal and should have got a couple of difficult headers on target. Buckley and Bruno did work well on the right but too often their passing to each other was short. I thought Orlandi had a good game, as did Barnes. Of the back four, I would suggest that Greer has more to fear from El Abd's return from injury but as Captain, I suspect Poyet won't drop him.

It was of course great to win and pity the poor souls who left early. At least they were on the bus before us!!!

I remember that Hammond moment, and even when he finally turned and left the two of them dead, he still passed it sideways when he could have attacked the space in front. I thought it really highlighted how much we missed Bridcutt, as I thought Crofts didn't really impact on the game, and wasn't surprised when he was subbed.

Boy did Buckley and Bruno get through some work, the two of them never stopped running and were a constant threat. Pleased Dobbie came on and really showed some promise of what he can add to the team. He was busy, demanded the ball, passed it well and of course took the chance really calmly - although a gilt edge chance, it would have been easy to blast it and see it ricochet off the keeper.

Very pleased with the 2nd half, always felt we were worth a goal, even when injury time started, and to be fair, it would have been a second travesty in 4 days had we not got the 3 points.

 

[BensGrandad]

I cannot believe what I am reading on this thread. We were as poor as we have been all season for the first 45 mins but improved tremendously after the break. I thought the pick of the players for the 2nd half were Orlandi who set up most of our attacks, Hammond who controlled the midfield completely with his holding of the ball and short simple passes and Bridge with his surging ruins down the left which was our best form of attack. Bruno looked to be getting back to his best, his best game since his injury ,but not a MOM performance as yet Dobbie showed what a good player he is when he came on Dunk and Greer were both poor and showed how much El Abd covers Greers mistakes. Overall not a good 90 minutes performance but a competent 45 and good result.

 

[Since1982]

Gus made an interesting comment on the radio after the game about the way Peterborough set up - he described it as being unique in the Championship and therefore we needed to time to adjust. Must confess I am not entirely sure what this meant. As to corners - if we cannot get a head on the ball - and we clearly don't have the players to do so, then surely we need to adopt a short corner routine. To keep lobbing balls into their box whether from corners or crosses (and I thought Orlandi did both very well last night) seems pretty pointless. Lots of hard work last night from the entire team. I thought Crofts was good and was surprised when he came off, Barnes was excellent, Bridge quality as always and at times looked our most dangerous player going forward. Delighted for Dobbie - cool finish in a tense moment is indicative of the quality we all want to see form him. CMS the biggest disappointment.

 

[Papa Lazarou]

CMS the biggest disappointment.

That's the main negative conclusion I've taken from the game. He had 5 maybe 6 scoring chances - 2 headers , one unmarked, plus a shooting chance in the first half, and a couple of gilt edged chances in the 2nd.

The thing we just seem lacking is that sharpness on front of goal that leads to spectacular goals, or 'lucky deflections'. 2 examples:

1st example: Last seconds of the 1st half, the ball breaks to Orlandi on the edge of the area, he shifts the ball onto hs left, making space ... so this is where we seem to lack that edge. Other games, other teams, you'd hope for a shot into the top corner, or at least in that region. But, in this case (and there were other similar chances - Crofts, from Buckley's pull back) he doesn't execute the shot properly, and it goes wide.

2nd example: Mid-way through the 2nd half, yet another cross comes in from Buckley, and the ball falls to CMS, in space around the penalty spot. He has some time to control the ball and get a shot away, but quite inexplicable flicks his weaker foot at the ball, which he doesn't connect with and the ball goes wide. Once again, you'd hope for those sort of chances to be put away, after all, we work very hard to make each chance.

Actually - that wasn't going to be my 2nd example - so, 3rd Example:

2nd half - we're attacking down the left, and the ball falls to Dobbie or Bridge, who fires a low shot, destined to just pass the far post. CMS tries to get a touch on it, to divert it goalwards. He doesn't, and it flies out for a goal kick. We've conceded 3 deflected goals at home this season, the most recent a potentially deliberate touch by Bechio for Leeds.


The bottom line? In terms of goals scoring, we're certainly lacking confidence in front of goal. Orlandi, having missed a gilt edged chance to win the game up at Blackpool when he scuffed a shot late on, and then was (IMHO) unlucky to miss a better chance versus Leeds decided to pass rather than shoot a couple of times last night.

We create lots of chances - and a team with their tail up (much like Palace are at the moment) would batter teams with the same chances.

I certainly agree the lack of ariel threat does limit our options, and reduces the effectiveness of dead ball possession - CMS / Barnes / Dobbie / Hoskins are all of a similar height and none are prolific in the air. Were we to have that option I think we'd be far more effective, as the crosses we put in would then be a major threat.

Sorry for the ramble.