Dig Dig

We need a link between the holding midfielders and the forward players. Having three midfielders holding against Utd nearly worked but the front three have to put a hell of a lot work in just to link up with them effectively. It's just not sustainable IMO. 4 2 3 1 is the way forwards IMO.

I remember how awful and uncreative we were when we played 3 central midfielders last season. Didn't get a point from what I recall.

Well Turkish coined the term which is why I used it in a reply to him. I'm sure if he minded he would have said so. I suggest you do go change your pants, weirdo.

Don't be a ****, it was a joke FFS

Only the self appointed intelligent posters can relate to Adkins tactics. You'll just have to wait and see

Don't be ridiculous...no team scores all their chances. Saying it could have been 8-2 if such and such had scored is idiotic

Another Cortese tactic?

Lets see how we do in the next 6-7 games. If we continue to "get battered" (which I don't think we have been except for Arsenal) then it will probably be a good indication that we'll go down. Plenty of teams in the bottom half of the table would concede that number of goals against City, Arsenal and Everton away. These games won't define our season. If we can get close to 10 wins at home plus the 4 away which Adkins in targeting we'll be fine.

If we win 4 away and get the job done at home what would be the problem with that? Would you rather we went away from home looking for a draw? We'd need 12 of those to get the same points tally.

How much better though? How many more points would we have and how many less goals would we have conceded? It's the same philosophy, just on a different scale. The most encouraging point for me is that we are creating and scoring in every match and controlling large parts of games as well. We're on a learning curve in terms of the quality we're up against every week but I'm confident the defensive side to our game will improve even before we have a chance to bring in more bodies. If were losing games but only marginally whilst not creating much people would be bemoaning the lack of quality attacking players we have instead. We're getting beat by better teams but I've seen enough to think that we will win the games which we'll need to win to at least survive. Harping on about the summer transfers all season doesn't achieve much now.

Almost has mental as saying that had we signed Scott Dann or whoever instead of Ramirez we wouldn't have conceded so many goals.

Yea that's the answer. Bring in Silvestre and we'll stop conceding goals with immediate effect.

I agree that a LB should have been a priority, I wasnt convinced by Fox last season. And of course, anither good CB would be better, I'm not disputing that. Originally, I was just questioning what that has to do with Rodriguez and still don't really see the connection. If later in the season Lambert was out for 5-6 games and we had no one capable of leading the line, people would be saying that we shoud have prioritised competition for Lambert. I really don't see Rodriguez as a weird or wasted signing at all.

So what would our options look like if Lambert got injured, needed a rest or lost form? You call Rodriguez a reserve striker when competition would be a better way of looking at it in my book. Lambert has never had any competion in his time here and something which was always complained about on here whenever we were without him. Also, Adkins said he wanted maybe 2 CB's of which we got 1 in yoshida who looks a very good player and is a leader. I havent seen all these comments from Adkins which you always seem to use to justify your argument here. Where are they because I'm struggling to recall anything Adkins has said which would indicate he's not happy with our summer signings?

How many of the goals we conceded came from Baines and Piennar?

The only potential point to your argument is that signing Rodriguez somehow hindered or prevented us from strengthening in other areas. I don't personally think the link is relevant. If Lambert was to get injured for a period of time, the value of having someone like Jay would become very apparent.

No better than Grant Holt

I hoped that we would have lost every game 1-0, maybe even a 0-0 which shows we are building from the back. Very dissapointed, time for a manager like big eke who knows how to set up a team defensively because that's what fans want

So there would be no or less criticism had we gone to Everton and lost 1-0 after setting up defensively and maybe not creating much by way of chances?

You have to consider the opposition we've played so far though. We've faced a lot of the very best players in the league. We're a young team who don't sit back and look to win games in a positive way. When we don't have to play the top top sides almost every week the teams around us won't often be able to handle us going forwards. Despite shipping three yesterday, we could have got 3 ourselves and not many teams around us would have a chance of doing that at Goodison. We have some brilliant forward players, we will always concede against the top sides, most will. I think we'll be fine.

He's allowed 11 so 5 more to go.

Tdd was the one who was saying all summer that our fans wouldnt be able to handle losing a lot of games this season and would start to panic very early in the season. Now look at him!

Haven't you got anything better to do on a Saturday other than a bit of trolling on a mong board?

Why do you peddle out this absolute crap?

Yea we get it Roger, you're head over heals in love with Lambert.