Dire, turgid performance. Another crappy display from Bayo. Sarr instantly back to diving all over the shop and offering the square root of fucck all else, other than killing counter attacks by being offside more times than Pippo Inzaghi. Rotherham had to do very little to grind out an away point, and we look as guileless and boring as ever. Credit to Gaspar for being creditable in midfield, although his misses were increasingly criminal. Credit also to Ferreira for his moment of collar-grabbing fun and debut goal. Shame about all the passes straight to the opposition. You can play about with points still available and 'poor runs of form' and whatever you like, but I don't see how anyone can watch that performance lon top of what we've seen up to now this season and imagine there's any possibility whatsoever of a change in the top 2 involving us in any way. I'm far more worried about the difficult fixture run we are now staring down the barrel of. We'll presumably make the playoffs because we are in third at this point, and if the rest of the division had enough to stop us we wouldn't be this inexplicably high. But we're a total paper tiger, and unless all injuries return, play better than they ever have to date, and we continue to recruit (successfully) until the end of the window, we'll get banged by the first team we play in them.
That puts to rest any faint remaining thoughts of automatics. Our inexperience showed today - too many weak players throwing themselves to the ground in 50-50 challenges looking for a foul, often when even already in a good position to make a pass or take a shot. Too many sloppy passes. Too little killer instinct. Kone was much more sloppy than last week, including giving the ball away cheaply which led to their goal. Ferreira constantly veered from the sublime to the ridiculous. Martins seemed good but went to ground too easily and there was no chemistry between him and Ferreira. Morris offered little. Kamara coming on actually helped change the game for us and gave us some much needed extra energy and attacking impetus. Adeyemo was also good again when he came on and showed some proper fight and grit at least. Adu-Poku didn't seem quite as ready yet as Adeyemo though, and his sub for Martins was an odd one and smacked a bit of Bilic hoping lightning would strike twice with our academy players coming off the bench. We probably had enough chances to win it and hit the woodwork a few times, but a draw also wasn't too unfair a result sadly. Gaspar came close and also could have done better on a number of occasions. Asprilla yet again fluffed a good scoring opportunity - why the heck did he take a touch when the ball fell to his left foot with the goal gaping?! He just mis-controlled it on to his right and also gave their gk and defenders time to make a block. I know he's not going to suddenly learn how to shoot overnight, but until he does he's letting us down there a bit for all the good work he does elsewhere. Sierralta also wasn't great today - looked a bit lethargic and gave away some stupid challenges. MotM Cathcart yet again. Choudhury was also solid (though he could try and pass the ball forwards quicker every now and then!).
When Pedro plays it allows Sarr more space as the opposition has another player to worry about. More difficult when the opposition know he's the only player who carries a real threat, they can organise accordingly. And he set up Asprilla who should've done better. Having said, not one of Sarr's better games overall today as he didn't succeed in dribbling past players too offen.
Very bad result. No excuses to not be beating teams like Rotherham. Can see why Bilic wants another winger and CM. It’s all about getting our players back and keeping them fit for the run in now to make the play-offs. Bayo needs to be sold or at least loaned out. He’s truly atrocious. We’ve got Araujo in which is great, but I would ship Bayo out somehow and try to bring in another striker. I would rather someone like Shane Long/Charlie Austin than have to suffer watching Bayo attempt to play football. Giaretta should be fired for the absolute mess he made of a summer transfer window. Hopefully those signings Bilic and AF have been talking about are done no later than Tuesday. Need them for the Boro game.
Well that game summed us up perfectly. Create some good chances throughout without actually managing to work the goal keeper, give Rotherham the ball for 20mins who deservedly take the lead with a deflected looping shot that gave an off-balanced Bachmann no chance, whose defense was AWOL. Then we get an equaliser but fail to really push for a winner. Rotherham get a deserved point on the road as Sarr does nothing again of note for 90mins apart from diving in the box for a penalty. Bayo was alright at first, some nice touches of the ball but soon reverted to type and was anon for most of the game. Kone couldn't really get into the game, Martins again looked good, but we have nobody decent to finish chances. Thank god we've got this new guy coming in. Excellent block from Choudhury to prevent them scoring and then Bachmann twice pulled off some good saves to keep the scores level. I think it was a fair result, we didn't do enough to win it and Rotherham were setup well to stifle any press we did make. Obviously they will be delighted with the point, probably execpted to get smashed today, but it's easy to see why Blackburn found them a tough prospect, they work hard on and off the ball, I expect them to be well clear of relegation this season. As for us, well the only positive things you can say is we didn't lose, we are three unbeaten and that is hopefully one of the last times we see Bayo start. Bilic made a good sub bringing Kamara on for Morris who had a poor game today, he seemed over-stretched a lot and never really got going. A game we could (and on another day would) of lost, but we take the point and move on to our toughest run of fixtures. Boro' will pull no punches, we will have to much better than we were today. A draw there could be a decent result consifering their form at the moment. Sheff Utd go a further 2pts ahead, but we know it's the playoffs at best this season. Let's just keep picking up points as best we can and get the decent players back sooner than later. Not a terrible performance overall, and we did look good in parts, but our lack of a goal scorer is really concerning. Oh, and Bilic? PRACTICE CORNERS before our next game.
I thought Bayo was much better than last week personally. Obviously still nowhere near the standard required, but his layoffs were squandered by players unable to hit the target if their lives depended on it.
Disappointing, probably doesn’t really affect the table as we have no chance of automatic promotion Gasper man of the match , if one of his had gone in we would have won comfortably , really hope he stays in midfield when the injured players come back. disapointment of the match Sarr , even Bayo seemed to be more involved , Sarr looked like he was arsed for 10 mins after half time and then disappeared again can’t see us selling him , am sure Bilic is under pressure to play him , but I would bench him for a few games until he can show he wants to play Gasper / choudry / Cathcart sold, defence not awful , martins stays on his feet and drives forward hopefull will find. a bit more form, asprilla should have scored (really needs a goal) . subs were ok let down by only having 10people on the pitch that we’re playing
Rotherham are s***. Bad, bad result. As ever Watford look like a group of individuals, all waiting for one of the others to do something. Thankfully Ferreira did, but we needed more.
Ferreira, Morris, Choudhury and Adeyemo all completed more successful dribbles than Sarr today. They all had 1 each…
Compared against how many times he broke our counter attacks down by stopping and cutting backwards or being offside, the amount of times he attempted to get past his man is almost incomparable. You are seeing what you want to see and not what is actually happening. As per your strange denials about Andre Gray at the time. There’s a theme.
Adeyemo won the same amount of aerial and ground duels than Bayo in only 17 minutes. He also made 2 key passes compared to Bayo’s 1. Bayo for me is honestly fourth choice behind Araujo, Davis and Adeyemo now.
Have to win those sort of games to get automatic promotion Fortunately, we aren’t getting automatic promotion anyway On to the next one
Little bit harsh there Burnsy, Glenn Murray fell over his own feet running without the ball and was god awful. I don't quite think Bayo is that level, but I would say he ranks below Gray in terms of ability. I would probably put him on par with Perica/Gayle. Bayo can score a poachers goal, but one from a good build up? No. He is certainly not good enough for this level but one thing he has got on his side is time to get better. For us, we just don't have that to give him.
I'm not saying he didn't do the things you said in your first paragraph, but that isn't what you were stating. You said he didn't attempt to go past players. I am saying he tried to go past the 2 or 3 players that were around him a few times but not much joy - he may have won a corner but not much success apart from that. And Gray has nothing to do with it.
A full week of training and we still didn’t look like we knew what we were doing. I like Bilic as a guy and I’m sure he can stick a rocket up them, but I’m pretty underwhelmed still.
We are just crap. Boring and crap. Only just over half way through the season and 13 points behind the team in 2nd that we somehow beat on the opening day. It's a shambles now, not even sure what I'll call it when we end up finishing mid-table.
That is the sort of example as to why we probably won go up. No lack of effort but not enough ability at the key moments although nice strike by Ferreira. Just a bit scrappy and slow . Bachmann had his usual mixed game . Cathcart , Gaspar and HC decent enough. Sarr and Martins hardly in the game . Wasn’t really Asprilla’s game and Tobi did more than Bayo I thought .
I genuinely don’t think it is - Glenn Murray had a decent career right up until the season he joined us. Given the amount of time Bayo has been afforded, he’d have been a better buy. Not to mention he didn’t cost £5m. Glenn Murray had a modicum of ability to control a football. And had more pace at 39 or whatever he was. My original post was a joke - but when I actually think about it, I stand by it as a serious opinion. Also, Bayo is 26. That’s an age where you refine your current ability and the things you are good at. Bayo has almost nothing to refine so I don’t think he is at an age to improve. The player he is now is the best he will ever get.
He didn’t attempt to go past players in any meaningful way so it’s a moot point you made to begin with. He continuously made attempts to actually move the ball away from goal by cutting g back and trying to go against players he was already in front of when he received the ball. It was brain dead all afternoon from him.
Scratching around for a positive but maybe that is the last time Bayo starts for us. Whilst the performance was poor, we would have scrapped a win with a decent forward. But overall performance will need to massively improve with a much harder run of fixtures to come.
harsh From what I remember I thought he had a few decent attempts , hit the cross bar , 2 good saves and one ballooned over the top
