I think we "started again" at the Sheffield game. It needed players to forget almost everything that has happened in the previous games and get back to basic defending and building from there. Sheffield was no easier game than Brighton. A draw got us out of the mindset that we would concede every game and probably lose. Let's hope we can take another step forward on Saturday
The statement is only rubbish because you have a different opinion. If you're going to use that term of phrase, I could say the exact same thing to you, because I don't agree with your point either. After we got destroyed at Man City, why didn't Flores use this new formation at Wolves? It would have been far more logical to have done this. Come to think of it, why didn't he try this ultra-defensive formation at Man City? Man City away is the perfect time to experiment with being compact in defence. We would never have lost 8-0 with the formation he's using now. Why did he wait until our first perceived winnable game at home to Sheff Utd to play this ultra-defensive style? Sheff Utd would not have destroyed us defensively. They do not have that ability to do so. The formation was not needed for that game. I'm surprised you cannot understand that. I think there's enough evidence to question Flores over his tactics and the games in which he started to change things. We played at Newcastle and Everton and didn't let a tonne of goals in, so to imply if we used a more attacking formation against Sheff Utd would have resulted in a defensive disaster is just folly...or to use your word "rubbish". We were handed three glorious chances by the opposition in the SU game. We didn't do anything clever to engineer them. Had we won that match, I'd have felt "we got away with that one". That game in particular was designed purely and simply to keep a clean sheet. Nothing more. We cannot afford to burn these winnable home games from the position we find ourselves in. ….and it's not that I don't want Flores. I think he's a perfectly reasonable coach. But it went wrong last time for a reason. I felt he was only appointed because he was available, rather than being the right man. He may well turn it around and if his methods are proven, then great. But my opinion that he wasted a winnable home match unnecessarily will always stand. We cannot afford to throw away games like that.
It's interesting looking at the xG of our players over their seasons in the top leagues across Europe. Andre Gray has 22 goals from 21.74 xG - bang average Deulofeu has 19 goals from 19.19 xG - bang average Pereyra has 18 goals from 16.33 xG - slightly above average Deeney has 37 goals from 38.68 xG - slightly below average Sarr has 18 goals from 12.41 xG - much higher than average, although has scored a decent amount of low xG shots
The argument around how we should have played against Sheff Utd. still rages I see and has now become hb1 v the rest. It's entirely circuitous. Does anybody who's arguing have any coaching badges at all?
We're looking to keep the score down. This is the philosphy. This is what you said. That statement has nothing to do with my views, it has to do with you saying that all we're looking at doing is keeping the score down which simply isn't true. QSF has his faults which we saw last time but as it stands he has got us far more defensively sound which we desperately needed to do. You mention Everton and the fact we didn't concede a load of goals, that was down to their finishing more than our defending. There will always be the odd match where we didn't concede a 2 or 3 goals but taken over a longer period it was obviously a major issue which we had to sort or we would go down without any question. I have not once implied that if we had gone more attacking vs Sheff Utd then it would have resulted in a defensive disaster, although the way we were defending at that time I'm not sure we would have kept a clean sheet against anybody, it was more the point that we had to change they system to make us harder to score against. In previous games he came in and rather than change things straight away I suspect he wanted to look where the problems were. Was it the full backs, the centre backs, midfield, so having seen City and Wolves away he felt that the current formation was the way forward and despite what you say, we have looked more likely to win the last two games than many of the others before that. The reason we have not won the previous two were because of poor finishing or VAR not because we were too defensive
I do. I have my UEFA B badge and in the past have worked for Watford. I would like to point out that this does not make my view anymore valid than somebody who doesn't have any coaching badges
You can place as many quotes as you like, but you're conveniently glossing over the key questions I posed. Would the ultra-defensive formation been better served at Man City and Wolves? Why wait until Sheff Utd at home? It seems Flores has done this completely the wrong way around. Flood the defence with bodies at City and even Wolves. We would have achieved much better results had we done this, I suspect. We should have taken the game to Sheff Utd a bit more, as we just didn't need to be so defensive against them. Had we attacked them from the start, I think we'd have won the game comfortably, instead of having this timid approach of just being grateful we kept a clean sheet. Had his tactics produced wins, then he's the man. But we have not won any of the games since he took over, so I think it's perfectly fair to ask questions of how he's approached games. Now for clarity, I will repeat, I do not have a problem with five at the back, a couple of DMF's and a keeper, basically 8 defensive players in the team when you go to places like Spurs. That is perfectly acceptable. But you should not be playing this way at home to teams you should consider you can beat. Over a period of games, you will not win a lot of games playing this way. Your defensive record for sure will improve, but that's about it. There will be a lot of 0-0 and 1-1 draws, with a mixture of 0-1 defeats and 1-0 wins. We need wins now, and quite a lot of them. We need a system that will maximise the chance of winning consecutive matches. The way we are playing reduces the chances of being overwhelmed by the opponent. Keep it tight and hope to score on the break. I don't think that's good enough against weaker teams at home.
Did you read my post you're replying to, if you did you will find I answered that. What makes you think that had we attacked them we would have won comfortably? They are very sound defensively so actually attacking them may have played in to their hands because as they showed last night, they defend very well and can counter at pace as well. Because we didn't attack them the way you suggest we should have done, it nullified their threat hence we looked quite comfortable and should have won
I can turn the question back to you. What makes you think we wouldn't have beaten them had we attacked? We did very well against Arsenal when we became assertive. We dominated them and should have turned a 0-2 half time score line around by the end of the match. The way we played in the second half against Arsenal is how we should approach the majority of our home games. Sheff Utd probably played their worst match of the season against us. They were mistake ridden and sloppy defensively against us, which is uncharacteristic of them this season. We hardly had any attacks, yet through their own mistakes, they handed us three glorious chances. They were gifts from the opponent, rather than anything we did. This goes to show, had we gone for it from the off, I suspect we'd have won comfortably, because Sheff Utd had a bit of a defensive nightmare against us. More attacks would have placed more pressure on their defence and they were vulnerable that day.
Excellent. Well I'd suggest it does lend your opinion more weight when discussing organising a back 5/3 CBs and tactics.
I can't say that we wouldn't have beaten them by being attacking, we may well have done but as I've said, sorting out our defence was paramount and having seen us at City and Wolves, QSF decided on this formation and style as being the best approach to get us out of trouble. It's impossible to predict what would have happened had we chosen to play a different way but when you have a defence that was conceding a lot of goals and an attack that wasn't scoring that many then it's obvious that to try and win a game of football we needed to reduce the amount of goals we let in so we didn't need to score quite as many to beat a team. We don't have a natural goalscorer at the club currently. Maybe Pedro or Cucho will be that player but they're not here at the moment. We have for some time been too easy to score against and if you continue to do the same things, you will get the same results. It had to change and for me, although not the greatest to watch, it looks as though it has resolved the defensive problems. Looking at the fixtures that you mention that are coming up in a different thread, Bournemouth will attack, Chelsea will attack, Norwich will attack and Southampton ( as the home side) will attack. Only Burnley of the upcoming games would I think maybe more defensive. I would think that the formation and tactics will remain the same for this run of games
But, unwittingly, you are underlining my point. Why did QSF have to witness Man City and Wolves before making a change? You are so accepting that the flow of events had to occur in the way they have done? I'm challenging this. Flores should have used his defensive formation at City, then carried it on at Wolves. That would have been an intelligent thing to have done. When he came into the job he knew there was an issue with the defence. He knows, or should know, how strong Man City are. Why play the usual way, which was not working, against City....then do nothing different in the following match at Wolves, even though you let in 8 goals in the previous match? To finally change it in the game where we would have the least amount of pressure form our opponent, is extraordinary. I'll give to two options, and you can select which one you would take. Option A. Play an expansive game away to Man City and Wolves, but an ultra-defensive approach against Sheff Utd at home. Option B. Play an ultra-defensive approach away to Man City and Wolves, but a more expansive game at home to Sheff Ud. It's so ludicrous, it's beyond belief anyone would choose option A, but our coach did just that. You are supportive, so I'm assuming from the two choices you'd choose option A also?
I don't believe we did either. we certainly did not attack Man City, they were 5 up before we had a chance to do anything. I think he chose to look at the players, how they were playing, could we change it without too much change of formation. After those games he decided that the current tactics were for the best and that's what he did. I think you and few others said that Arsenal, City and Wolves were almost a free hit where we wouldn't expect to pick up points whatever we did so it gave him an opportunity to look at the squad and see what he could change and if he was thinking about the current tactics, who would best be deployed in it. Maybe he looked at Sheff Utd as the perfect first game to start his new formation as they probably wouldn't go at us all guns blazing and would allow the players to get used this way of playing. Had we tried this at Man City without using it before and still got torn apart I'm not sure what the players would have gained from it. Maybe should have tried it at Wolves but there is the possibility of the players not being quite up to speed with it and he preferred to stay with a more familiar formation. I'm obviously not at the training ground and don't know what was said or planned so much like everybody else I'm guessing but what I do know and have said a number of times, with our shooting boots on, we should have won the last two games without looking like conceding. That is a big step forward and it shows you can win games without being ultra attacking. I'm not sure we will agree on this so maybe time to move on and argue about the Bournemouth game!
If either of you had your profligacy badge instead of your proficiency badge, you could play upfront for us this weekend.
I suppose he couldn't watch recordings of our previous matches as he'd left his video recorder behind when he came back to the UK.
Yes, and it was my job for the first few years I lived out here, until I became a corporate sell out. Not that it really has had any impact on my view here. I just find it hard to understand how we’d have suddenly become defensively solid simply because we’re facing Sheff Utd at home. I think if we look at the entirety of Quique’s second spell in charge so far, I’d argue that the decision to eventually settle on the ultra-defensive tactics for the Sheff Utd was a result of the previous 3 results, where we’d shipped 12 goals, which left Quique feeling as though he had no choice but to start from scratch and build entirely from the back, however defensive solidity was achieved. As disappointing as the result was, and I was also pretty annoyed that we made very little effort to win the game once we’d successfully nullified them, I also do believe that it built the foundations for the good performance this past weekend. Why not try it sooner? Perhaps he looked at our squad, with guys like Geri, Sarr, and Pereyra and thought it wasn’t suited to 3 at the back. I think the first few results and defensive shambles he inherited were much worse than he expected. For me, the only way that the Sheff Utd result becomes acceptable, is if it’s the start of a decent run, where we don’t concede many goals, and we’re able to win a couple of games and start to build some confidence to continue pushing on. It’s only been 2 games, but so far, I’d argue that we’re on track for that.
