Another narrow scoreline against us, to add to the pile of similar scorelines this season. That's the Selles influence and what he was brought in for under Ralph. We don't get hammered. Sadly, the rest of the performance was closer to what it was under NJ than it was under RH.
I can see the logic in the lineup, assuming KWP isn't quite 100% and there's a genuine preference over DCC, rather than club politics. But all the old limitations were shown up, with the added bonus of a couple of new players who clearly haven't gelled yet.
We were set up to contain more than attack. But with no effective plan on what to do with the ball, and some sloppy errors, the first half was nearly all Leeds. That gap between the decision to make the subs and them coming on coincided with Leeds tiring a little, and Sulemana and Onuachu actually getting a little joy as we moved forward a bit. Mara looked more lively when he came on and Walcott once offered a nearly good delivery. But those, and a JWP corner, are the scraps we had today.
We had no effective way of getting past Leeds' midfield until just before all the subs. We had a little moment, then made our own subs. They had all of a minute of promise, before Leeds once again took control.
I'll need to see the goal again. Should Baz have saved it? Should his posisitoning have been better, so as not to be blindsided? Should Janny B have ben where he was? What happened to let the ball come in for the shot? I did think Janny B was clearly fouled in the previous play, and got nothing for it. But that's no comfort if we can;t defend what's in front of us.
Once in front, we offered nothing at all. Leeds fully controlled the game until the final whistle.
A big disapointment every game is that we've seen the majority of these players play beyond their limitations in a high energy, higly drilled set up. Yet, for whatever reason, when that was found out a bit, it was beyond everyone at the club to come up with an effective solution, despite half a dozen other clubs, across Europe, going through a similar transition.
Our squad simply isn;t good enough to soak up pressure and get a goal on the counter. It seems like a massive victory when it comes off, rather than a clear sign that we should be trying something else on the back of all the narrow defeats. If anything, it works better against the bigger teams, who may overcommit at home convinced of their superiority.
Leeds have had loads of weaknesses this season, and we failed to exploit any of them. They worked harder, completed some passes and eventually, with little firepower themselves got the winner from all that space we gave them all game.
It's the same feeling I got after watching Ralph's games early in the season, strikerless and before all those January pennies were spent. Looking to sneak a victory and hope givign away control, space and cohesion doesn't cost us. I can only hope Selles has more exapansive attacking options in his tactics locker, as it was a bit of a shambles in that respect today. We didn't lay a finger on them.
