Not much mention of Capoue on here, but I thought he was much much better today and was one of the reasons our play was actually entertaining today.
The exact same could be said of Ngakia in terms of work rate and pace, and at 20 he's already a far, far better defender. Was arguably our best player before being replaced for no obvious reason. Much like the situation with Cathcart/Wilmot, I'd far rather see us play a young player, who's already of at least a very similar standard and with a potentially far higher ceiling, than stifle their progression by persisting with ageing players ahead of them who still aren't good enough and most certainly never will be should be achieve our goal of getting back to the Premier League.
Yes my Coventry comrade, but Gray and Foster hardly covered themselves in glory for your freaky first and then our double-barrelled bloke Troost-Ekong tamely watched your French non-league fella (I think) head it down to your double-barrelled bloke who caught it just right. Not what you'd expect from a Serie A/Nigerian international player really. Did you see how Kabasele tore him off a strip afterwards? His later headed goal was redemption. There was feeling in that. For our first, you have to acknowledge the tremendous diagonal ball from Capoue then the amazing control and run from our Scandinavian stallion Sema, followed by a pinpoint killer cross. From there, we got a bit lucky, yes, but that play would have undone many a Prem team last year. As for our third, yes your defence was a bit more culpable. It was innocence more than anything I reckon. Lack of experience of higher level football really. I was VERY nervous for the pen, but Sarr didn't give the keeper a chance. The penalty was insouciant. Hope you enjoyed the game - it was a roller coaster!
Just watched the goals, Hamers' header to make it 2-1 was so far out he might as well have been in a different post code. Embarrassing for Foster to concede that. Walker's goal was good, will have to see from more angles to gauge how saveable it was. I thought their keeper Marosi really should have saved WTE's header..maybe it was harder to save than it looked.
Sorry, I did edit my post to give credit to Ngakia, and I agree with you that we should give more minutes to younger players who have the potential to make the step up, should we get promoted. I can see it from Vlad's point of view too though, trusting a more experienced player who is perhaps a little more careful in possession. I'd be happy with either starting though.
Kiko vs Ngakia One good going forwards, not that good defensively. The other one not that good going forwards, good defensively. 3-2 or 1-0? Pick your poison.
I’m in total agreement with the young man a few posts up about Ngakia. In my opinion, did nothing to warrant not starting the last four matches. Poor.
This season we're swimming in a lake of luck. Seriously.....how can we be this bad yet find ourselves in 2nd place? The Championship is crap, we are crap.....but slightly better level of crap than the league.....apparently. Coventry.....like Wycombe....created so many chances and could have scored 4 or 5. Can our luck be maintained......probably not, but we can improve.....and we have to improve massively. Do not be fooled with our league position. We are pretty poor and there has to be a huge upgrade in how we control games and create chances. Today was a complete mess. The sooner we ditch 3-5-2 the better.
I 've been watching a long time, but I'm struggling to remember one. I'm sure he just meant to knock it back into the mixer, not go for goal. Foster might get criticised somewhat, but, with that defence in front of him how can he be blamed for trying to come out and take charge of the situation?
I'm sure there were others who made it as well (last season), my post wasn't in a vacuum. Him looking like JT while not being anywhere near as good of a player is still a valid reason for not taking a shine to someone anyway.
Agreed I thought he had a good game, he dictated the play and looked miles better when he tried to play forward. Garner was brilliant also in the middle. I can't say I noticed too much of Cleverley but I watched the game with Coventry City fans and they were impressed with him. To be honest it wasn't a good performance really we fell asleep after taking the lead and we were in 2nd gear most of the game. Coventry are a poor side if it was not for Sheffield Wednesdays points deduction they would be comfortably in the drop zone. Don't get me wrong I am happy that we won and are up to 2nd and I can enjoy a few beers tonight with bragging rights as I live in Coventry but I do feel that we need to start playing better to stay in the top two. The positive though is that it seems that we don't even have to play well to win in this league so I can't wait until in clicks.
Another Very positive thing to emphasise is the clear spirit in this side . Whatever the issues with tactics /quality etc they are playing for Ivic and his insistence on including players that want to play has worked in that sense. Coming from behind in 2 successive matches with no crowd to spur them on demonstrates this. It is down to Ivic to get the best out of this squad now.
He's a fantastic one on one defender, has great energy and is surprisingly skilful but... he doesn't look after the ball. He tries to pass through the eye of the needle too often leading to us turning over possession and his final ball when he overlaps isn't very good either. I reckon he'd be great in a back four but given that all of our attacking is based on switching the ball to the opposite flank and trying to get crosses in, can see why Ivic prefers Kiko (albeit he had a stinker today).
It’s still not easy watching but there are signs things are slowly getting better. I really believe, with the quality we have, that we will go the way of improving. Also we are rotating quite a lot so our players are likely to be a bit sharper at the business end of the season. Many teams in this division do not have this luxury. It does take a bit of time to settle with some new and returning players and a new manager in a division where teams come at you with a lot more urgency than the Prem. Whether this sort of thing can be kept up by other teams all season will be interesting. I agree that the formation is a bit of an issue. In a 352 teams seem to get in behind us way too easy. Can’t be too upset with being second after 11 games but certainly we have ridden our luck and we do need to improve significantly but I think we are more than capable. William Hill still have Brentford at shorter odds than us though so what do I know? Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
The idea is to win games and we have found ways to do that-apparently by being complete **** as well! We have shown we can defend as a team and win games that way. We have shown we can attack and score goals and win games this way. Of course it'd be great if we could do both of these things in the same game but there are reasons for this(if you care to consider them perhaps you might have a more positive view point instead of one which is depressingly boring.) To help you out: We have a new coach who has zero experience of English football. We just got relegated so confidence was low. We dealt with a transfer window having to lower the wage bill and sell players but also construct a squad that could challenge for promotion. We had many players who wanted out but were unable to secure moves who the club decided should not play until the transfer window closed. We then encounter some injuries in pre season which mean we have to play several games without a striker or left back. Despite all of the above we have won many games and sit one point off the top. Lockdown is tough so to have my team winning games and looking like a good bet for promotion is great particularly when I know there is much more to come.
Have to say really enjoying this season. More games, and each match seems to be really close. I’m not desperate to get back to the Premier League, I think I prefer the blood and thunder of the championship for now anyway.
Nope. We actually want to be proved wrong and be forced to eat humble pie because we love the club.. And again you’ve made a straw man. In the first half people weren’t demanding “free flowing football” and to “roll people over”. We were wanting to see us have more urgency and create a few chances. But anyway the 2nd half was a lot of fun so not really in the mood for arguing with you.
Tbf I can fully understand why we've gone for Femenia in some of the more recent games, he's more likely to come up with something going forward, but he was shocking defensively today, we looked much more solid when Ngakia came on
It is ridiculous really we are second, we have mostly been awful. I guess if it continues like this for the rest of the season then happy days, but we really have to start getting it together soon. You have to feel we are 2nd in spite of Ivic than because of him.
Funnily enough, most of the people who complain about our lack of attacking threat also complain about the fact that Kiko is not great defensively. Perhaps we should just have 13 players on the pitch and hope nobody notices
Funnily enough, yes. It was actually Coventry scoring against us in the League Cup in the early 8os, in the same goal. We drew 2-2 and were thrashed 5-0 in the replay iirc. Eric Steele was the Watford goalie and the match beginning of the end for him.
Femenia's got two assists. It's hardly brilliant. One of which was against Wycombe who are likely to finish comfortably in the bottom three. Had Ngakia played in that game, or for more than 20 minutes today, who's to say he wouldn't have offered just as much going forward? It also seems to me that the wing backs have been told to get forward more in the past few games. Ngakia is very comfortable and calm on the ball and has more than enough to offer just as much as Femenia going forward, is a far better defender and is only going to get better. I don't see the logic in playing someone who is an abysmal, weak defender and is never going to be good enough should we go back up, at the expense of a young player who is full of potential and ability, just because Femenia has finally registered a couple of assists.
Yeah, it's getting better going forward, but still not what we could be, take the win of course, but hope for better when we return from the international break, hopefully with Hughes starting. Capoue can be frustrating at times, can be a bit lax, but he's got the range of passing that nobody in the team can match. Garner I thought was fairly average in open play, but can take a set piece, which is what we've been waiting for for so long! Fairly happy with him so far, and I'm sure he'll get even better as the season progresses. Not sure why the defense has got so shaky all of a sudden, I guess Cathcart and Kabasele were just having a purple patch, but WTE was much shakier than we've seen from him despite him scoring. Would we be better or worse in that regard with a back 4 I wonder? Gray has managed a fantastic career for himself despite barely being able to kick the ball lol, but he gets in the right areas so he'll be among the goals this season I hope! Sarr is frustrating at times, always involved, yes he gets surrounded, but he could definitely be a bit more direct like Sarr, because they are both terrifying at this level. Glad he took the penalty though, would have been nice for Troy to get a goal on his big day, but it's a sign that we're not just bending to his whims now unlike in the past, so credit to Ivic for that
Absolutely stinks of the season after Boothroyd got us relegated, where we muddled along for a few months getting results, until WBA humiliated us at home and the wheels completely fell off. It’s all well and good thinking we’re going to get better, but it could go either way at this point. I don’t think 3-5-2 suits us. Nothing new there. Garner is going to frustrate at times, but when he’s playing well, he’s lovely to watch. Very smooth. Good corners today, too.
Or maybe, a crazy, out-of-left-field, blue-sky pie-in-the-sky fugayzi-fugazi fairy dust level of thinking, I know, so, just hear me out for a second, ok, let me speak, don't shout me down like some kind of alien prophet or messiah and try and cancel me - maybe, they're asking for a player deployed in a specialist role in which they have dual responsibilities to be capable of fulfilling both of those responsibilities? Nah, you're right actually. It's too outlandish to even contemplate, isn't it. Silly me. I'll take my cult teachings elsewhere.
