SWLondon Saint

Had another look at the highlights after watching the last 10 minutes of the 1st and all of the 2nd half yesterday and a few thoughts: Good - Pretty much all of the signings we've seen so far are significantly better than what we had already. I actually think we have enough quality to stay up. Even BBD and Archer are clearly a level above AA. - Some of our play in the 2nd half going forward was good, but with the caveat they clearly were on cruise control and didn't want to make too much effort at 3-0 up. - RM made the right subs and shows signs of dispensing with his favourites. Bad - Several of our players still appear shell-shocked at the new level. AA and Smallboner look done. THB doesn't look comfortable defensively in the back 3. Stevens cannot step into midfield. Downes actually wasn't great either, too many wall passes straight back to the defenders which he could get away with at Championship level but not anymore. I think he's more of an 8 at this level, similar to Rice - he can't play as a single pivot under heavy pressure in this system. Ugly - Defensive transition was a complete mess. Leaving aside giving away the ball in our defensive third which should never happen, even when we lost the ball in their half, we seemed to have no plan at all about how to either counter press and win the ball back high, or to stop the ball while we transition back to our defensive shape. - Playing out from the back - Complete mess. The formation is hindering the players not helping them. If RM wants to stick with a back 3, he should copy Alonso at Leverkusen and play with a double pivot (and also with 1 CB capable of either playing in midfield or as a full-back, but that's another story...). It needs a truly world-class player to play as a single pivot in the modern game as the pressure is so high. Our 3 CBs are too close to one another, there's no forward pressure on their defense so their back line can push onto our midfield, compressing the play, no long pass threat to stretch the defense backwards...the list goes on and on. TLDR: RM looks dangerously out of his depth. I'm a football optimist, I like to think any team can play PB but the manager is failing at too many of the tactical things necessary to make it work. He has some credit but the same failings we saw last season are still in place.

3 at the back, 4 at the back - it makes no difference if you don't have a plan to beat the press you'll see at this level. What's most worrying is that RM seems to have spent zero time on this. I mean, come on, you've broadcast you're gonna try to play it out, surely you have to know everyone will try to nick it at the back?!! And we are a complete mess in transition after losing it. Where's the planning???

Haven't seen the build up to the goal yet but it seems like the team just doesn't know what to do in transition after losing the ball. 3 at the back can work fine, it does for Alonso at Leverkusen but they put massive pressure on the ball as soon as they lose it in midfield and that just isn't happening here.

Account approved just in time to join in the pile on! 😝 Watched all of the Forest game and the Cardiff game, honestly have no idea what Smallbone has on the manager. He was dreadful against Forest, no ability (or confidence, which is nearly the same thing at this level) to take the ball on the turn under pressure. Les or Fernandes obviously a class above. We'll see what happens early doors, but the problem so far has been that PL managers know how to stop this setup dead, just like Spain did in the Euros against England. It's not rocket science. You just put heavy pressure on 6, 8, 10 and if they're not good enough technically, which Smallbone and Aribo aren't (not sure about Downes), you simply can't progress the ball unless one of your CBs is good enough to advance into the space and use the ball productively.