saintant

Not hopeful.

What the fuck do they work on all week at Staplewood because whatever it is it's a complete waste of time and effort.

One shot on target against fucking Hull - let that sink in.

I think it's safe to say that we are nowhere near as good as we think we are. Better off looking at this season as another fight against relegation.

Game in hand and Boro at home soon so chance to cut it to a mere 4 points - possible but we'll need a big improvement so let's hope Will has been working some magic and drilling them hard on the training ground.

Boro tonight looked good value for their position at the top of the table. Strong all over the pitch and their second goal was an example of the pass and move football we should be well capable of. We need a run of wins to get back into contention. The next 5-6 games will tell us a lot about our direction of travel but maybe this is going to be a transitional season where we don't mount a challenge for the top six. Hard to guess which way it'll go for us.

Well if we're paying his wages he should be available for selection although it's up to Will Still to decide whether he merits a place in the squad. I'd say he does because from what we've seen so far it's a low bar.

Yeah, seems hard to believe and indicates that some of our players are not performing with the freedom required. How can you be afraid to play a forward pass! Maybe some of them need therapy rather than coaching.

Seems likely that Casper Jander is going to start this game in place of Downes. Will Still talked him up in the press conference so it will be interesting to see how he performs and what influence he has on our play. I'm hoping he's going to make a real difference although it may take him a few games to really show his worth. Often one key player can transform a side and maybe he will do so for us because we need a spark to get us going particularly after Sunday's dismal spectacle.

He was sacked by Leicester after a dismal record then by St Etienne who were bottom of their division after 2 wins from 17 games. He has been twiddling his thumbs since Dec 2021 so, by your reckoning, there should be a long queue of clubs desperate to employ him. Whilst he did achieve things with us he's not some kind of genius manager and I'm not sure we'd still be an established PL side had we retained his services.

Agree entirely.

You miss the point 🙂

Watched Barcelona beat Newcastle last night. Their midfield was superb and did everything our players fail to do - they were constantly on the move getting between the lines and making sure they were always available for a pass. Their pass and movement was very good and everything was fizzed around at pace. We seem to spend a lot of time on rondos during training and presumably this is designed to improve pass and move but it doesn't appear to improve us during matches. Perhaps pass and move and get between the lines is better coached during training games set up on a full size pitch with it being continually drummed into the players until they get it right. Maybe the coaches do this as well but it's certainly not working because we are always so static with players failing to utilise all the space on the field.

It makes you wonder why he didn't get a very early message to the players from the technical area after about 5 minutes of hump ball. He has to be proactive.

Well if we are intent on getting our wingers to do nothing more than get crosses into the box we need someone over five foot nothing in the middle and he is better than nothing. Personally I'd change the tactics and get our wingers cutting into the box or getting to the byline for cutbacks which makes more sense if you don't have a big, strong centre forward - maybe that's too simplistic an idea.

Yeah, the extra subs gives you more chance I guess.

Agree. It still appears that certain clubs can break the laws with impunity. All this so called fair play nonsense is anything but.

I guess it's why the formation pretty much went out of fashion.

A reasonably high finishing position brought about by playing attractive attacking football and signs that we are headed in the right direction. I'm not desperate for promotion this season but it does need to be achieved within a short time frame or we risk becoming a mid to lower level underachiever in the Championship.

Yeah, if you read up on 442 the weakness continually highlighted is being outnumbered in midfield. You'd think it could be adapted so that the two wide players in the four are told to work back and forward but I'm assuming it's too big a workload unless you have the right athletes who can cope - we don't.

Agree, I like the new players we signed but once again we have failed to introduce a couple of big, fast, strong, powerful types and we continue to look too lightweight for my liking.

I agree that Archer will score enough goals given the right service. I'm unconvinced we have the players to score headed goals and thus fail to see the point of continually putting in crosses - I don't think either Stewart or Downs are going to weigh in with lots of headed goals because neither of them seem to have the spring or the body strength needed - they are a long way off Ron Davies! We should have signed or loaned a big unit who can head the ball and doesn't get outmuscled but once again we didn't address the centre forward position.

We seem to be high in the list of teams putting in crosses and from what I gather this is a Will Still trait. However, we'll not score many goals from crosses unless we introduce a big centre forward and therein lies our problem. We should be mixing it up by getting our wide men and Archer supported by Azaz to drive forward and get shots off plus threading passes through the inside channels for runners. Still has to come up with a formation that gives us more threat going forward and creates more chances because we look toothless particularly on Sunday..

Not expecting this to be easy as Hull are nowhere near as bad as some might think. Apparently they were decent at Swansea and unfortunate not to get all 3 points. McBurnie will bully us. Time for Will to start showing us why he was appointed.

I think he realised but this was just another of his endless excuses.