I would like to see Sierralta partner Kabasele at some point. They have yet to play together for any length of time.
I personally think this would be our best option, Kabasele has looked very comfortable at this level. No idea how long he is out for though.
Tbf I think all 3 of the non-injured possibles next to Sierralta have an error in them. I've seen Wilmot lose a player and distribute poorly from the back when he has played. So you's pays your money and takes your choice. Or at least Xisco does .
He was in an offside position for sure. But did he interfere with play? I’m honestly not sure what makes the grade these days.
None of that virtual line-drawing in the Championship, and that's the way I like it tbf, benefit of the doubt should go to the attacker in my view even if there are marginal calls like that one tonight that go unnoticed
Definitely 'interfering with play', without him being in that position, WTE possibly won't feel the need to touch the ball, but as I say, it was so marginal that I don't think we can complain that it was allowed
That’s been a decent six days! I’ve not seen a better group of corners than those today. In fact their right back was excellent. Take away the corners though and they did nothing of any note. We weren’t as good as last Saturday but we still created chances and really should have scored one or two more. 2-1 looks like it was close but it really wasn’t. Three games in six days looked like it took its toll towards the end but we managed the game well. Bachman. First time he was under a bit of pressure today and didn’t deal with it very well. Hopefully he can learn from this but crosses do appear a weakness which is a concern. Femenia. My MoM. Very good defensively and his partnership with Sarr is superb Masina. Still don’t think he gets close enough to attackers to stop crosses. Didn’t get forward enough as possibly worrying about their full back who was excellent. Cathcart. I thought he was fine. Ok on the ball and defended ok. The issue was that the two centre backs are a partnership and his partner was poor. Ekong. Ok defensively but on the ball is on a par with Doyley. Should be last choice currently Chalobah. Really good and unfortunate to come off. I think being one booking from a suspension is the reason. Probably his best performance of the season Hughes. I could wax lyrical about him all day but him in the middle has been the big difference to our season. Shame he got the early booking as suspect that’s why he went off and he will play a massive part if we do go up. Cleverly. Didn’t affect the game as much as recently but the great thing about him is his constant running and pressurising makes him an asset even when quiet. Sarr. I think it’s fair to say 4-3-3 has brought out the best in him. He must give opposition full backs nightmares. The burst of pace to set up the first goal is frightening Sema. Played against one of the better full backs I’ve seen this year and struggled to get in the game. Quite poor but has been decent for most of the season. Pedro. Superb. Got some luck with the goal but held the ball up, ran the channels, battled to win the ball at every opportunity. Can’t win every game 6-0 and sometimes you have to battle to get what you need. Tonight was a mixture of battle and good forward play. On another day that could easily have been 4-0
They were so unlucky with the disallowed goal, they actually worked it brilliantly to get Kazim-Richards free. A whole bunch of movement at the back post to create space for him to run through a crowd, T-E completely lost him and got blocked off. Was a fantastic routine and delivery.
Definitely, I said that in a group chat with my friends - they had a crazy amount of inswing on their corners which caused us a lot of problems, if you could get a flick on just before it hits that front post area then it's so hard to defend against if you've got delivery like that Like this example but closer to the post and with a speedier delivery:
Unfortunately we conceded one minute after our last two subs, the subs were risky, asking Wilmot to play a position he hasn’t really played before and Zigger Zazager although got stuck in a bit is a bit of a loose cannon, There’s no way he is making those subs at 2-1 down, the fact we found ourselves at that score line led to an uncomfortable final 20 mins
We were also lucky not to concede a penalty when Bachmann saved the inswinging corner it came down and hit Zinc on the arm. Definitely a penalty in the Premier. Re Wilmot, there was doubt over his best position being CH or DM so no issue with him playing there. So far this season he has played everywhere but his favoured CH position (maybe he did early on, I can't remember), LB, RB, LCB of a 3 and now midfield. He is one of the best ball players of the defence and I truly believe that if he gets the right exposure he could some day get an England cap but he won't be achieving that if he continues to sit on the bench and I don't think he will tolerate that, it's not in his character.
Great win. Needless CB rotation. Braindead subs. Cannot fathom the thought process behind taking Chalobah off. He was our best player on the night and was obviously the one giving us control, and in turn allowed Hughes to do his more creative stuff. Yes Chalobah may be on the verge of suspension but Hughes and Clevs were on yellows on the night. What was the point of saving Chalobah from suspension just to risk a red and suspension for the other two, whilst simultaneously ceding control of the last 35 mins to Derby on the night? Xisco has done well to come back from what I thought was a certain sacking. Long may that continue and I’m sure he’s doing some good things that are contributing to our current form. But he got away with one tonight. His subs and tinkering with line-ups are madness.
Was surprised we only made one change for the 2nd match in a row. I'd imagine the changes and substitutions were based on player's physical conditions more than anything. Great to get through those games with 9 points and no injuries. If we wanna go up we can't really celebrate, just get back to work and keep trying to grind out victories. Hopefully Deeney won't come back and sabotage the momentum we're building up here.
For me it was two other decisions that should have happened. That’s what done my head in. As soon as Derby went 442. He reacted bringing on Gosling for Chalobah. Don’t disagree with it being a strange one, as that’s literally the best game Chalobah has had all season. However, like for like sub and when Gosling came on, he immediately had some good touches. Great, no problem. It was what happened after that, that made us struggle. What was baffling to me was waiting until the 76th minute to sub Sema. He was absolutely done in around the same time we brought Gosling on. Didn’t mind him waiting, as giving Zinckernagel 30mins was probably risky at only 2-0 up. However you could literally see Sema from the 65th minute onwards, just cream crackered. At that point whether Zinckernagel was a risk goes out the window. Sema was gone. Zinckernagel and Masina have to take some blame for the OG scored. Not closing down quick enough and getting done far to easily. However Masina for the last 15mins before Sema went off, was basically doing Sema’s job as well. So I’m not surprised we ended up conceding from that side. Zinckernagel has just come on and Masina was blowing out his butt for the past 15mins. That’s where Xisco got it wrong for me tonight. We were crying out for fresh legs. Sema needed to come off 10mins earlier. Ekong was another mistake. Said it before the game, we’ve all been saying it for weeks now, Ekong is a liability. Passing is woeful, and puts us under the cosh for no reason. However Xisco started him. Wrong move. Sierralta has been our best defender by far. With a team like Derby, who even stated that they were going to try and win the game from set pieces, you play Sierralta. Anyway. Ekong was fading. Before the OG, he needed to come off. You could see it. However, Xisco didn’t sub him. Then after the OG, his head was gone and Cathcart crumbled next to him. It was crying out for some composure at the back. Especially as the balls into the box were coming thick and fast. We got away with it, but Xisco needed to sub Ekong. It was a great win. 3 games in 6 days and maximum points, can’t be upset with that. However, tonight didn’t have to be as stressful.
Bachmann, zinc and troost will cost us promotion. Proper 2/10 performances. Just not good enough. Calamity Ken is also a dreadful footballer. When we go up we have an immense rebuilding job on our hands.
I don’t actually agree that the disallowed goal was a foul. The attacker was being man marked by a defender, who had a grip on him. For me Bachmann stepped into the Derby player who just stood his ground. Not complaining or anything.
'IMPEDING THE PROGRESS OF AN OPPONENT WITHOUT CONTACT Impeding the progress of an opponent means moving into the opponent’s path to obstruct, block, slow down or force a change of direction when the ball is not within playing distance of either player. All players have a right to their position on the field of play; being in the way of an opponent is not the same as moving into the way of an opponent. A player may shield the ball by taking a position between an opponent and the ball if the ball is within playing distance and the opponent is not held off with the arms or body. If the ball is within playing distance, the player may be fairly charged by an opponent.' I can understand why the ref gave the foul, especially when he doesn't have the benefit of VAR. Hard one to call either way. Personally I think Derby's tactics were on the limit all night, one corner I recall they surrounded Bachmann with 4 or 5 players which is as clear statement of intent to block as could possibly be made. It was the only thing they had in their locker, Derby are a poor side this season compared with how entertaining they've been in the past.
If Chalobah gets one more yellow card then he'll receive a two match ban, but if Hughes or Clevs got sent off from two yellows they'd only get a one match ban. He did also take off Hughes, who looked more at risk than Clevs of getting another yellow - he gave away a foul which could have been a booking just before being subbed. Getting on Wilmot for additional help with set-pieces also made sense.
But we’d have been down to 10 men in a game where we ended up ceding control with even 11 players - play the game you’re in, not the one in the future? The game wasn’t won when he made the call. As I say, in my opinion, while praising Xisco for the upturn in form, he got away with poor decisions last night.
Would we? He subbed Hughes only a few minutes after Chalobah, and Clevs was being more careful while playing higher up the pitch. The only poor decision I think he made yesterday was dropping Sierralta, but without knowing if he was fully fit or not it's difficult to know how critical to be of it. If he comes back in next match then maybe it's not too bad.
Only the second time this season we have won three on the trot, previous time was Huddersfield + Barnsley H, Stoke away. Can we make it 4 in a row for the first time next weds?
I notice in reports that Chalobah was ill before the game and that impacted on the decision to withdraw him early.
Would we what? Have been down to 10 men? If one of them had been sent off then yes! And the started to overrun us with 11 - taking Chalobah off was a huge risk and I think it was luck more than judgment that it didn’t backfire. We didn’t look nearly as in control in midfield after he went off. I’m not in any doubt as to why he subbed him and the reasons were noble ones - I just think it was a risk that didn’t need taking at that time. Agree about Sierralta. Normally the club say if the player isn’t fit but I guess him being among the subs discounted them saying anything. Troost-Ekong certainly did us no favours though and has been a big disappointment...from believing he would at least be a marginal upgrade on the others, he actually looks the worst of them all in my opinion. His distribution is absolutely dreadful.
At 2-0 up I thought we looked a complete class above Derby, literally all they had was the ability to take a good corner. At that point I think we could’ve gone for the jugular and finished them off, but instead we went a little bit Ivic and seemed happy with what we had, which IMO always ends badly as far as the dynamic of the game is concerned. I guess it’s understandable with so many games that we may feel the need to try and conserve energy where we can, but you have to balance that against the confidence, belief and enjoyment rolling teams over will give players like Sarr and JP, which will benefit us going forward. The chalobah sub seemed very odd at the time, likewise resting Sierralta. My only explanation for it is that although we need wins and we need to beat teams like Derby, losing to Derby is not as bad as losing to Bournemouth or indeed any of our rivals. It’s a balancing act which no manager will always get 100% right, but I guess the ideal scenario is to beat the weaker teams with as little energy and suspensions expended as possible, leaving you as a strong as possible against your direct rivals, against whom dropping points will be disastrous as they’re 6 pointers.