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Defensive drop off

rentaghost said:
Fans

Desperate for us to play a bit more front foot. Lost our DNA last 2 games. Get back to what we are good at.
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Yep, we need to be more consevative and defence minded. Lower block. Attack on transition.

Thats who we are. We need more up front, but we basically need more dynamic attackers, especially out wide. Tweaking the system to be more attacking just exposes us.
Provider said:
It's pure speculation by one poster repeated across multiple threads.

We weren't 4-0 down at half time last night because we were trying to play more expensive football, it's because the defending was woeful. The first three were absolutely shocking from a defensive point of view.
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They were, but it is a bit systemic.

We are asking our full backs to attack more. This means teams are getting in behind us and putting really dangerous balls into the box. Players like Ballard and Alderete havent become bad at defending crosses overnight. Its more that dangerous crosses are being allowed at a higher frequency than earlier in the season. Full backs are our weak spot.
 
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Think we should go back to Alderete and Mukiele at centre back, Reinildo left back and personally I’d like to try Gerty at right back but happy to play Hume

Could go 5 at the back with the weird Hume hybrid role thing

After Wolves of course
 
Mowgli said:
Whats happened?

Start of the season and even not that long ago we were solid, compact and always able to nick game. Wasn't long ago only 2 or 3 teams had conceded less.

We could head balls out of the box all day. Now we have conceded 9 in 2 goals and nearly all from crosses. Gaps all over the field. Has RLB been told to be more attacking and transition the team or summit?

Definitely something changed. Can't just be the early adrenaline
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Regression to the mean
 
BaconButty said:
Love Ballard but Mukiele was class at centre half with Alderete
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I'd be starting all three.

Hume and Reinildo at wing back. When Mukiele goes forward, Hume drops central.

Diarra drops to the bench and go with Isidor and Brobbey up top. Could easily transition to a 541 if needed too.

Roefs
Hume Mukiele Ballard Alderete Reinildo
Le Fee Xhaka Sadiki
Brobbey Isidor

​
 
Sometimes Alder and Ballard can be 2 tins of milk like,gobs open catching flies.
Discipline required along with 2 more CBs in summer
 
You can’t keep chopping and changing back 4 and GK as often as we have in past 2 or so months
The familiarity especially that of GK and CB is crucial.
RB at LB. Ballard out and o9 in
Mukiele out for several weeks
Roefs out for several weeks
Alderete is one of the few constants and he mustn’t know if he is Arthur or Martha with all the changes, but no, the usual dunces want to blame him for our defensive woes
Again the coaching set up get a free pass out of jail for the shit show that has gone on recently.
Fergie said
Attack wins you games, defence wins you trophies.
It is another thing we need to work on and critically so for next season
We need more leaders and organizers on the pitch and not keep solely relying on Xhaka to paper over the cracks when key players are out. RLB doesnt seem to have a plan B when key players are out. It is something he must work on
 
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rentaghost said:
Alderete had more shots at goal than any player on either team. Ballard burst past players to get the byline to set up our best chance.
It’s all well and good but we were just too open imo
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No discipline at all. Raiding forward and neglecting to secure the fort. Mukiele does it far too often. These moments have to be carefully judged otherwise it looks like schools footy. Play for a clean sheet against Wolves and let our forwards do the attacking work.
 
A lot of our fans seem to think we have top class defenders but what we actually have is decent individuals (relative to the level) in a top class defensive structure.

Once that structure changes, the weaknesses become much more pronounced.

I think we need to walk before we try to run. It's been seen many times by teams like Palace and West Ham who have moved on from coaches/systems to try and be more expensive only to have to revert back to their previous approach when they found themselves in trouble.

A couple of years like this, solidifying our place in this league and aiming for evolution rather than revolution is the right way forward.

It's not going to please those who require instant gratification, but we need to do it right.
 
FlashGordon said:
A lot of our fans seem to think we have top class defenders but what we actually have is decent individuals (relative to the level) in a top class defensive structure.

Once that structure changes, the weaknesses become much more pronounced.

I think we need to walk before we try to run. It's been seen many times by teams like Palace and West Ham who have moved on from coaches/systems to try and be more expensive only to have to revert back to their previous approach when they found themselves in trouble.

A couple of years like this, solidifying our place in this league and aiming for evolution rather than revolution is the right way forward.

It's not going to please those who require instant gratification, but we need to do it right.
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We were doing very well until AFCON. After beating the visitors in December we were 7th in the league on GD level on points with 5th place.

AFCON obviously disrupted our season, not only the six players we missed but the extra strain on a depleted squad at a really fixture intensive point of the season.

We achieved the key objective of premier league safety (not mathematically but to all intents and means) by mid March and it seems to me at that point there’s been a shift in approach to try and appease those looking for a more entertaining, expansive style.

We have now started leaking goals at an alarming rate, something which seemed unthinkable during the first few months of the season.

I think we need to accept that the way this squad has been assembled is with the emphasis on being defensively solid. Let’s go back to the way we started and leave the next stage in our progression to when we’ve added a few players more suited to that style.
 
It's important not to overreact, the drop off is essentially two games where we haven't been at it. Before Villa we'd gone 6 games without conceding more than once in a game.

Villa: I don't like digging out a player but they identified Onien as the weak link and Watkins just outclassed him on the day.
Forest: Hopefully just a massive off night all round, gifted the first two goals, forest were clinical with 5 goals from 6 shots on target and rumours of a bug in the camp all week.

As RLB and the players have said, it's how we now react, we've had losses during the season and normally reacted pretty well.
 
Doesn't help that we're not playing with any wingers at the moment. We've recently been playing with players on both wings whose natural game is to play inside/the middle which makes it far too easy for teams to get past us out wide.
 
Mowgli said:
Whats happened?

Start of the season and even not that long ago we were solid, compact and always able to nick game. Wasn't long ago only 2 or 3 teams had conceded less.

We could head balls out of the box all day. Now we have conceded 9 in 2 goals and nearly all from crosses. Gaps all over the field. Has RLB been told to be more attacking and transition the team or summit?

Definitely something changed. Can't just be the early adrenaline
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Bit like arsenal hardly conceded in the first few months they've conceded a lot more since then.
 
I think we are attacking more and leaving ourselves more disorganised at the back.

Also I think they've completely forgotten about what has got us here , which was intensity and hard work.
 
They have definitely tried something imaginative and progressive in the two games. Attacking-wise, looked great at times, even the first 10 minutes v Forest, until two knock-out punches caused the collapse. But the entire point of football is to match or better the goals of your opponent (vindaloo, we're going to score one more than you). I think we've had a shot at attacking like a top-five team, with these players, and see whether the defence can accommodate the increased load. A resounding 'No' seems to be the answer.
 
The defensive coach left in January.

I keep saying, next season could be a tough one if key strategic roles are not filled correctly. Running a club isn't just what happens on a match day.

I hope they dont mess up a good start to life back in the prem.
 
We got away with gifting the ball away earlier in the season, with Roefs making saves or last ditch blocks by the defenders, Ballard, Mukiele, Alderete etc. We aren't getting away with it anymore. We are also not really scoring as many late goals when we have thrown people forward, barring the mags match. Its a lot of things in combination but we were never going to get away with it to the levels we have been, its simple law of averages.
We lack the intensity we did and some will be down to fitness also season taking its toll.
We are not really that much more on the front foot because we still have no one in the box for attacks bar Brobbey, its not uncommon for us to be half way in the opposition half and still end back at Roefs it happened a few times against Forest. We need to keep the ball and use it better and have players is positions to receive it. Losing control and a leaky defense is a recipe for disaster. Our set pieces have been shit for months and we don't score from outside the box much, which doesn't help when we don't get players in the box.
 
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