September International Break

When did she manage the team - between Ramsay and Revie?

 

Can't remember exactly. But I think her boys took a hell of a beating....

 

Nice goal by Lamela. The confidence rebuilding exercise for him continues to roll onwards.

 

Hopefully Lamela will be able to do (what Eriksen can't) and perform against the top teams.

 

BOSS don't you think it's the team that does not perform rather than individual players. There is no doubt Eriksen disappeared against Liverpool but then so did our entire mid field. They closed us down in the blink of an eye. Which is why I find it surprising, as many of us do, that Sandro was sold.
That performance reminded me of our pre Palacious days and post Davids days when we we looked lightweight against all the top teams and some of the lower ones.

 

Agreed, overall it's the team but there is no getting away from the fact we need players like Adebayor and Eriksen to step up and perform in the big game. Adebayor and Chadli had two one on ones, one was from a world class pass from Bentaleb who gets stick for not performing, yet he at least shows up. Eriksen is talented but so far he can only perform agaisnt weakened opposition.

 

Agreed, overall it's the team but there is no getting away from the fact we need players like Adebayor and Eriksen to step up and perform in the big game. Adebayor and Chadli had two one on ones, one was from a world class pass from Bentaleb who gets stick for not performing, yet he at least shows up. Eriksen is talented but so far he can only perform agaisnt weakened oppositionṭ

 

The alternative option is we rest players against the top teams, or tell them to take it easy and go hell for leather to beat the bottom 12 teams home and away. That would give us 72 points, so a few draws and maybe the odd win against the other top 7 teams would give us a CL points tally.
The benefit of this is we could continue our favourite pastime - getting thumped by the big boys.

 

We could have two team sheets. One for the big boys and one for the little teams. Although even if that got us top four, the Fa would probably deduct points after rivals report us for fielding a weakened team but our defence could be that the players you view as first choice are hopeless agaisnt the top four so we have to play the kids.

 

Management is easy. This is pretty much the tactic we employed last year, whether it was by choice or not i don't know. It nearly worked and a bit of tinkering would have gotten us the holy grail of top 4 with a negative goal difference.
Arsenal have been doing it, somewhat, for a while too, although they tend to smash teams rather than eek out wins by 1 goal meaning their goal difference looks distinctly positive


International break is so dull we've deviated off topic. Sorry!

 

That's a fair point. We also need to be a bit more savvy to beat the top teams. That means pressuring refs and throwing ourselves to the floor over under any contact. Mostly though, we need to stop gifting the opposition the opening goal.

 

Why do you lot insist on copying our performances against the big boys anyway?

 

We do it better as we lose to you lot too

 

England failed to qualify for the two World Cups in the 70s when virtually all of the players in England and Scotland were from the home nations.
The problem isn't that the rules allow for too many foreigners, it's that a lot of them are much better than what's being brought through here, as there are virtually no coaches.
England has 1,161 coaches at Uefa ‘A’ level compared with 12,720 in Spain and 5,500 in Germany.
At pro licence level, England has 203 coaches, Spain 2,140 and Germany more than 1,000.

The talent that's available in the UK is largely wasted, as there aren't enough people with the training to bring it through.
A lot of the bigger clubs have also ignored their youth sides or filled them with the cream of the overseas kids, leaving local lads without any coaches or facilities at all.
The problem isn't down to the likes of Falcao, Aguero or Costa, but the lack of the equivalent from England, Scotland and Wales, for the most part.

 

"The problem isn't down to the likes of Falcao, Aguero or Costa, but the lack of the equivalent from England, Scotland and Wales, for the most part."

And if/when they do come, more likelihood they will be poached overseas (Bale etc) .
This season will be interesting to see whether Ramsey repeats 2013-14, and if the usual suspects
come calling for him in the summer should the Goons have their usual season.

 

We certainly haul players down and dive on occasion but against Liverpool there was a noticeable lack of cheating on our side, along with what looked like a well-executed plan to cheat on theirs. But simply hauling Lamela down when he looks dangerous is the defense of choice against him this year. He's the PL's most fouled player after three games. Allen complained that Liverpool were being too honest, and he certainly took matters into his own hands.

Not to say Liverpool weren't the better team. But they been no more dishonest than we were, the scoreline would have been at least a goal closer.

I'd rather we lose playing honestly, too tell you the truth. What I really wish is that rules and their enforcement would be revised so that teams trying to play football the right way were rewarded.

 

The problem is that Chelsea and Liverpool have the edge on everyone else when it comes to pressuring the ref, so if we tried it (or, you know, pointed out the ref made an idiotic call that makes him look moronic, biased or corrupt) we'd get booked for our troubles.

Also, we need to be a bit more savvy with our squad. It's not a new thing, after all Harry played Zokora and Palacios at Old Trafford once and we barely strung two passes together in midfield as a result, but against Liverpool we should've played Lennon instead of Chadli because Lennon would have tracked back to cover Rose at full back, something I don't recall Chadli doing at any point in the game. I've seen suggestions Sandro should've played for Bentaleb on Cartilage Free Captain, but while that may have helped break up Liverpool's attacking play there wouldn't have been any creativity in central midfield so we'd have likely lost possession as a result.

 

We can all see the problems and we all keep saying the same things year after year. From a young age physical prowess trumps skill. Players do not learn basic techique. Few English players can control a 40 yard pass in one touch. A 40 yard pass is a reason to jump high and get a head on the ball - failing that a shin or backside to divert it towards goal. Nothing changes.

 

Three factors come to mind for our miserable performances versus top four sides. The first is that it's a hoodoo at this point, and nothing fails like failure. The second is quite aside from the question of whether our players are as good (they're not, at this point), we're playing teams that have at least a year advantage in terms of learning a system. Finally, as a general rule, we don't do what teams usually do when facing stronger opposition, which is play negatively. A fourth factor is that the rich keep getting richer, and the gap between the top teams and everyone else keeps widening. Short of resorting to tactics to try to bridge the gap (little danger of that, as big a fan as I am of Pochettino), I don't see anything changing for the near future. We could see if we have better big game players, I guess. The only one who comes to mind is Dembele, though I guess a case can be made for Lennon and Walker, who won't be available for a while, of course. You can make a case that a player who scores for the World Cup runner up against the world champions is a big game player, or say, it was only a friendly.

Hopefully Lamela and Eriksen will improve in every way in the next year or two and this will lead to ending our top four hoodoo. Most 22 year olds do. Criticiizing Ade in this case is a little unfair, I think. He had one very dicey and unexpected chip which he just missed. He should have been awarded a penalty kick, and looked much more effective than our other attacking players. I'm not inclined to blame Lamela when Liverpool clearly adopted the rotating fouling strategy against him. Eriksen really was anonymous, and that is troubling. I want to see him take one shot and make one pass from the edge of the box to a runner this year, because I don't think it's happened yet. Either he, Pochettino or more likely both need to make that happen.

But the biggest thing that went missing were runners in the box. Chadli on his miss is the only who comes to mind. That has to, and I think will, change. Get the ball downfield quickly, get a runner or three going towards the goal, and try to get it to them before the box gets crowded with defenders.

 

Hodgson surely has to resign soon or be pushed after his reaction to the press who challenged him about England only having two shots on goal. I hope Swiss defeat England as it seems (sadly) the only way to get rid of Roy is push him to the verge of having a breakdown.