Bristol_Gull wrote: ↑31 Aug 2019, 18:06
I think some of are problems stem from trying to shoehorn Hall, Little and CLE into the side - I understand why you would want to but it’s simply not working.
I agree with this. I think this is the root of the problem. We have Hall, Lemonheigh-Evans, Little, Andrews and young Frank Vincent - all good midfield players, but only Manny Duku to partner Reid upfront. But from what I've seen of him so far, I don't think he's going to set the world alight. We have a team of young players and it is probably proving to be a bit of a culture shock for some of them this season after playing mainly part-timers last season.
My thoughts on yesterday's game were that 'pool were more street-wise than we are and the ref allowed them to get away with far more than most refs would. He was weak and the linesman on the Pop Side was, frankly, very poor. I wasn't in line for their second goal, but from where I was standing, it looked to be yards offside in the build up to the goal. Having said that, 'pool put us under the cosh in the first half and we were fortunate to be only 1 - 0 down at half time. We will be okay, but I think we need an experienced central defender and striker if we are going to challenge for a play-off place. I think Gary Johnson would have learned a lot from Saturday's game.
tomogull wrote: ↑01 Sep 2019, 21:32
I agree with this. I think this is the root of the problem. We have Hall, Lemonheigh-Evans, Little, Andrews and young Frank Vincent - all good midfield players, but only Manny Duku to partner Reid upfront. But from what I've seen of him so far, I don't think he's going to set the world alight. We have a team of young players and it is probably proving to be a bit of a culture shock for some of them this season after playing mainly part-timers last season.
My thoughts on yesterday's game were that 'pool were more street-wise than we are and the ref allowed them to get away with far more than most refs would. He was weak and the linesman on the Pop Side was, frankly, very poor. I wasn't in line for their second goal, but from where I was standing, it looked to be yards offside in the build up to the goal. Having said that, 'pool put us under the cosh in the first half and we were fortunate to be only 1 - 0 down at half time. We will be okay, but I think we need an experienced central defender and striker if we are going to challenge for a play-off place. I think Gary Johnson would have learned a lot from Saturday's game.
Not so sure about offside now I've seen the high/low lights.
I think you're right. That was one decision the linesman did get right. Actually, in that 10 minute clip we didn't look too bad. Shame about the other 84 minutes, although overall I feel there will be days when we play worse than we did on Saturday and win.
Agree that Hartlepool were more streetwise than us, and that we get bullied too easily. We badly lack a genuine target man, an asset that most other teams have, who can both win in the air and hold the ball to bring others into play. However, we can play good football - just not, apparently, for two halves - and need to get our distribution and decision-making more consistent.
Too often our attempts on goal are high or high and wide - trying too hard, instead of testing the goalkeeper on the ground and picking up any rebounds. We can't expect Jamie to score all the goals for us!
Too often we loft the ball hopefully into the penalty area, often beyond the far post, and it is not as though we are likely to bullet headers into the net very often. So we have to play more on the deck, and, especially, look to exploit crosses into the near post area to create more realistic goalscoring opportunities. We seem reluctant to make runs to the near post even with two up front to look for space in the box.
Yes, playing neat football can make us more predictable, but hitting high balls just plays to the strength of tall or robust opponents. Perhaps we could even keep the ball from a kick-off rather than hoofing into touch; after all, we do give ourselves enough practice with kicks-off!
