Coventry 1-1 Saints - Match Thread

[Challenger]

9 minutes ago, OnceaSaintalwaysaSaint said:

What doesn't RM get? Like someone said, we had 12% less than our usual 70% possession against Cardiff and looked thoroughly dominant. Yet we quickly revert to this bore fest. I know Egg and a few others warned us to be prepared for this shit, but what's right about it? As Convict shows, at best we scrape wins. Against Coventry, it's the usual fuck about passing to nowhere and then when they score we make changes and chase the game. And when it's the other way around and score first, we sit back and try to hold on.

Just one of our players costs more than the entire squad of Sheff Wed, Plymouth, Rotherham, Ipswich and Huddersfield. We have have the most expensively assembled squad in the championship by a country mile and while I appreciate that doesn't entitle us to be the best team, I still expect us to trounce some teams.

C'mon RM. Speed up our game.

 

I'm afraid, playing this " style " of football will make it highly unlikely to be capable of trouncing even the Dog & Duck second eleven.

[Andy Hill]

We have needed a decent striker for over 2+ years now and the situation remains. If a Premiership Club comes in for Adams in Jan then I would doubt their sanity…….and Armstrong is  League One standard at best.

[The Kraken]

11 hours ago, Andy Hill said:

We have needed a decent striker for over 2+ years now and the situation remains. If a Premiership Club comes in for Adams in Jan then I would doubt their sanity…….and Armstrong is  League One standard at best.

Adam Armstrong?  The Championship’s second highest scorer; that one? He’s League 1 at best is he?

Blimey.

[VectisSaint]

Watching the extended highlights you get a very different view of the game than what is being posted on here (I know, its extended highlights so most of the dross is not shown), I counted 14 quick, incisive, sharp attacks, 7 in each half. The problem wasn't the lack of good attacking chances, the problem was the lack of composure and poor finishing in the box. Our goal was arguably the least incisive attack of the game, very ponderous build up until Stuey and then Fraser got hold of the ball. Really don't think that is much to moan about for an away performance (result excepted). If only we had someone who could replace Adams up front.

[Jack]

2 hours ago, VectisSaint said:

Watching the extended highlights you get a very different view of the game than what is being posted on here (I know, its extended highlights so most of the dross is not shown), I counted 14 quick, incisive, sharp attacks, 7 in each half. The problem wasn't the lack of good attacking chances, the problem was the lack of composure and poor finishing in the box. Our goal was arguably the least incisive attack of the game, very ponderous build up until Stuey and then Fraser got hold of the ball. Really don't think that is much to moan about for an away performance (result excepted). If only we had someone who could replace Adams up front.

The extended highlights also won’t show you the multiple times we refused an easy pass forward and a quick break in favour of recycling it to the back 4. The goal we conceded came from exactly that. 
 

We know we’re fairly goal shy so therefore need to create more, and better chances. It would’ve been very easy to create more and Coventry offered very little, but by sticking to Russball we limited the number of decent chances created, that’s cost us more points as much as Arma’s finishing IMO

[Chez]

We play like every opponent is a Prem side. We don't ever want to give the ball away, so we don't play much speculative stuff.

I don't have a massive problem with our style of football to be honest, but would like to see us play it direct to the striker and some long diagonals every now and then. I also think our midfielders need to look to play on the turn far more. More often than not there is actually quite a lot of room/time compared to Prem football and they could simply play/drive straight through the middle.

Last, but not least, we should get to the byeline and cross the ball a bit more often. Again, it's more speculative than recycling and playing short passes to feet around the box, but I think we almost give teams too much respect and in the end don't make opposing defenders actually do any defending. We are just a little too neat and tidy.  

[Totton Saint]

34 minutes ago, Chez said:

We play like every opponent is a Prem side. We don't ever want to give the ball away, so we don't play much speculative stuff.

I don't have a massive problem with our style of football to be honest, but would like to see us play it direct to the striker and some long diagonals every now and then. I also think our midfielders need to look to play on the turn far more. More often than not there is actually quite a lot of room/time compared to Prem football and they could simply play/drive straight through the middle.

Last, but not least, we should get to the byeline and cross the ball a bit more often. Again, it's more speculative than recycling and playing short passes to feet around the box, but I think we almost give teams too much respect and in the end don't make opposing defenders actually do any defending. We are just a little too neat and tidy.  

There was some diaganal balls.  Lots of passes to  KWP who instead of taking on  his man and passes backwards instead.

[Galway saint]

Watched this in the Coventry end as went with a Coventry fan. Despite being in the ‘executive seats’ there was some bloke shouting fuk and cnt every other word during the match. This followed the Huddersfield game where someone was shouting ‘soft cnt’ the entire game. Who says football isn’t a family sport.

Thought the game was ok. Our passing at the back is now a lot more proficient but still ineffective and dull. It’s difficult to know what it’s supposed to achieve. Perhaps grind the opposition down but that doesn’t seem to work as they just let us have the ball whilst we pass it around boring the pants off everyone. It’s so dreary to watch. 

We were again very reluctant to play the channels. The forward play has to be so intricate to create a chance that it’s no surprise we don’t score more. I can only imagine we don’t play the channels more because we might lose the ball. We are happy to take risks in defence but not in attack. 

Teams clearly have figured out just to sit back and invite us to play through them and we still remain vulnerable to the counter attack. A better side than Coventry would have punished us.

I’m not a fan of this football but we are now a solid side that will likely make the play offs.  RM is having to contend with not having a recognised number 9 who can lead the line and that’s down to SR. It beggars belief we still don’t have a recognised centre forward after all this time. 

 

[VectisSaint]

5 hours ago, Jack said:

The extended highlights also won’t show you the multiple times we refused an easy pass forward and a quick break in favour of recycling it to the back 4. The goal we conceded came from exactly that. 
 

We know we’re fairly goal shy so therefore need to create more, and better chances. It would’ve been very easy to create more and Coventry offered very little, but by sticking to Russball we limited the number of decent chances created, that’s cost us more points as much as Arma’s finishing IMO

Not sure how many more chances you expect us to create. At least 14 good chances were created, we messed up 13 of them and scored from one of the least good ones. Creating chances was not the problem.on Wednesday. The goal we conceded was the result of a complete brain fade by Manning, not for the first time. Whatever system you play mistakes like this will cost goals. Well aware of the limitations of the XH, but it is not the issue.

[suewhistle]

1 hour ago, Galway saint said:

We are happy to take risks in defence but not in attack. 

That's actually quite a good summary of our game. Some of the coolness in defence and lack of panic looks like risk, but they manage it very, very well. There are long diagonal balls occasionally, Harwood Bellis and Bazunu have both contributed well but we still allow too much time for defences to reset. Speculative crosses someone called them, and although we've no CF at the moment we have enough quality players to benefit from them if we mixed it up a bit occasionally. We do create chances but either our finishing is woeful or we do one too many passes.

On a separate point I thought Stuart A lost rather too many tackles and Che just a bit slow too: are they fully fit or just slowing with age?