GoalWatch - our defending vs Cardiff

[Bergen Blade]

0-1: From a free kick Cardiff chips into the box, where Chopra gets it down and crosses low. Morgan is there, but his clearence hits Walker's back, falls to Bothroy, who scores.

Obviously Morgan must take the blame for this one. We look very unprepared for the free kick though, Chopra is almost alone when he receives the ball, but is then closed down by three players, while Cardiff have two men completely unmarked just in front of goal.

1-2: Penalty. Cardiff throw it long into the box. Henderson is judged to have pulled Bothroyd down. Looked harsh to me, and Bothroyd looks to throw himself down.

2-3: Another long throw from Cardiff. Hudson beats Morgan in the air, and flicks it on to Whittingham, who smashes it in. It seems to be Little who loses Whittingham.

2-4: A superb counter attack by Cardiff. From another poster's comment it was Walker who lost the ball in their half and they bomb forward.

I think Morgan is wrong to break out of the backline and close down the runner (see photo). If he had dropped back, he, Killa and Stewart could have formed a three man strong backline and Walker could have caught up with the man on the ball. It may not have helped, but it would have given us a better chance.

Killa and Stewart are outnumbered and can only chase shadows, as Cardiff take advantage of the space and Whittingham finishes.

 

[Micalijo]

What I don't understand is the space behind the first challenge for their third. They had a very long throw and I just don't get why we didn't have a player in space behind Morgan if he lost he first header. We had loads of players on edge of area for the knock-down that way. We set up same for the long throw leading to the penalty. I haven't seen any goal similar to this where a long throw is flicked on yet bounces and runs to far post. Very poor for me and if there is meant to be a hole the keeper should be out a bit for me.

I know what you mean re penalty but for me it's one of Henderson's overly aggressive challenges - so easy for Bothroyd to go down and he took full advantage but Henderson has to be aware he is in the penalty area.

PS - Quinn was half a yard off-side I think. Can see it on BBC website match highlights - freeze it when Walker strikes. Very close and lino was guessing. Could have gone our way easily.

 

[Wapping Blade]

There's not much of an appeal from Cardiff for the penalty.

Bergen - it was Walker who lost he ball for their 4th -he got nutmegged by the Cardiff player and that created all the space behind him.

Quinn deffo off, especially if the lino was using the stripes on the pitch, Quinny is clearly in the lighter stripe when the ball is played while all the other players are in the dark one.

 

[Ollessendro]

Thanks Bergen.

I'll add to your comments with Ollessendro's alternative goal watch.

0-1. Oh dear.

I'm sick and tired of giving away stupid, stupid goals. Week after week we make stupid individual errors. This time it's the captain. This is very worrying as Morgan, usually a rock, was completely at fault for this goal. This is the second game in a row where his poor defending has contributed to the opposition scoring (he let Eull get away from him last week).

Quite frankly it's ridiculous. The defening is awful as 3 players crowd round the ball and 2 players are unmarked in the area. Morgan gets lucky and makes the interception. He has time and is under little pressure when he blindly kicks the ball into Walker. It rebounds off Walker and Bothroyd reacts and finishes well. Bennet has no chance. Morgan will be kicking himself for this uncharachteristic mistake, but what the bloody hell was he thinking? With our lack of confidence and general defensive frailties we simply cannot afford to be giving stupid goals like this away.

1-2.

This is harsh. It appears to be 6 of 1 and half a dozen of the other. Bothroyd makes a real meal of things and ends up conning the referee. Whittingham cooly dispatches the penalty. Again there is little Bennet can do.

2-3

I'm a little disappointed that we don't win the first header. There are 2 Cardiff players and the marking is a little slack (Kilgallon stands in frontof them and doesn't really look interested). Morgan gets out jumped and Whittingham is first to react. Whittigham looks sharp where as Little looks apathetic. He anticipates the flick on and easily beats his man to cooly finish. The blame has to lie with Little as he didn't anticiapate the flick and was slow to react.

2-4

It appears that this week we were actually facing Barcelona at BDTBL and not Cardiff. There is a pattern emerging here as last week we made Blackpool look like Real Madrid with Xavi Alonso almost scoring from the half way line. They slice through us like a hot knife through butter. It's a great goal. No doubt slick passing, one touch football and a good finish. However once again we allow teams to walk right through us. The midfield is just not existant. They break forward and they simply want it more than us. It really is as simple as that. Look at the highlights and you'll see their players bombing forward, whereas Harper and Quinn merely jog back. They look good, but our pedestrian midefield allows them the time and space to execute an excellent move. Iniesta breaks forward and as Bergen says Morgs steps out and probably shouldn't. There is then a gaping hole and Iniesta gives the ball to Xavi. Xavi lays off a lovely first time pass out to Henry who in turn sends a first time pass across the other side of the box to Messi. Messi cooly slots home. As I say this is a very good goal, but we allow Cardiff to look good by giving them acres of time and space.

Overall our defending was pretty poor. Conceding 4 at home is completely and utterly unnaceptable. I don't know what to suggest as even our best players are making mistakes. I was hoping that Harper might take over the defensive midfield role that Monty usually does, but he simply hasn't. We look very expposed with Harper and Quinn in the middle of the park. Maybe France should be put in to play in front of the back 4. We generally just look very nervous and lacking in confidence. On top of this we don't seem to have the desire. Today, arguably, 2 of their goals might have been stopped should we have reacted a little quicker and if we had been busting a gut for the cause.

I can't work out how to include visual aids like Bergen does so well. I have a couple freeze frames that I'd like to put on to emphasise my points but can't wotk out to do it. Maybe this is somethign you can jhelp me with Bergen.

 

[Micalijo]

Good post Ollie

Like the comment about us not seeming to bust a gut at the moment. I know what you are getting at. I'm 100% sure the players are trying but there are things that make it appear they are not putting that extra in. A lack of quality has to come into it as well though, and of course a lack of managerial organisation.

Must admit the third goal really annoys me. I thought we started the second half well and it was first time ball had been in our area form what I recall. It's just so sloppy and unprofessional. Maybe there was an element of we won't give another pen away but they have to be tighter. Relying on Little to track back in that situation is ridiculous if all we are looking at is Morgan losing a header to bring that into play.

I assume this is man to man marking but someone had to be in space ready to help out behind Morgan. It's laziness for me, a lack of real will to win and an assumption that Morgan will win it. I'd like to see Walker breaking from his man as well to help Little.

 

[Ollessendro]

Looking at the 3rd goal again Micaljo I think you have a good point. It was really important not to concede at that point and we might have gone on to win the game if we hadn't let a sloppy goal in.

A few more observations. Usually you'd want Henderson and Morgan either side of the striker who wins the header. However after the penalty this option seemed a bit risky.
Secondly, where are the defenders? Where are the Red and White shirts? You are right to say that it is ridiculous that Little (a right winger) is left to pick up their striker. Alos there should be another player inbetween Walker and Little. Little was slow to react and Walker could have helped him out, but there were 3 Blades players on the right hand side of the area all unoccupied. Three Red and White shirts just ball watching. You are right to emphasise my point about players not busting a gut. The players are not working for each other. Succesful teams put their bodies on the line for each other. They look out for their team mates and really work hard for each other. At the moment we are not doing this. A player makes an individual error and his team mates just stand and watch. We are just way, way too pedestrian at the moment. And yes, it's very frustrating. The first goal is a joke and is pull your hair out material. Your thinking, let's try and keep a clean sheet and then that happens. We get back into the game and are playing quite well and then give away another sloppy goal. You are right, it is very frustrating. Better organisation, higher work rate and quicker reactions ended up costing us dearly.

 

[Micalijo]

It's hard to explain because we have a decent record of coming back from going a goal down at home this season so it's not all bad news but we are always going behind and with the quality we have against some of the poor defences you see we should always get chances.

But in terms of our defending, I just see a collection of individuals trying their best not to make a mistake that they could be blamed for rather than as you say a team working for eachother. Problem is they are making mistakes and it is clear to me that all confidence has gone in eachother - they also look to the side and see a manager who is berating them and bullying them as far as I can see. Whenever there is potential upheaval and a bad run is happening in any workplace I think people go into their self defence mode and that is fair enough but it aint conducive to clean sheets or that extra 1% that wins a game between 2 evenly matched sides

Morgan was so determined to produce a 'have it' type of clearance that he faield to look up at all. Quite amusing really - CooperBlade I know says Walker should have shifted and there is a bit of that also. Hard to have a go at Blackwell for that but it just shatters confidence.

If the players are scared to make mistakes then they need to look at their wage slips and get over it.

 

[ghandi]

Must admit the third goal really annoys me. I thought we started the second half well and it was first time ball had been in our area form what I recall. It's just so sloppy and unprofessional. Maybe there was an element of we won't give another pen away but they have to be tighter. Relying on Little to track back in that situation is ridiculous if all we are looking at is Morgan losing a header to bring that into play.

I assume this is man to man marking but someone had to be in space ready to help out behind Morgan. It's laziness for me, a lack of real will to win and an assumption that Morgan will win it. I'd like to see Walker breaking from his man as well to help Little.

This goal was almost a carbon copy of Scunthopre's 2nd last week.

 

[Bergen Blade]

What I don't understand is the space behind the first challenge for their third. They had a very long throw and I just don't get why we didn't have a player in space behind Morgan if he lost he first header. We had loads of players on edge of area for the knock-down that way. We set up same for the long throw leading to the penalty. I haven't seen any goal similar to this where a long throw is flicked on yet bounces and runs to far post. Very poor for me and if there is meant to be a hole the keeper should be out a bit for me.

Ghandi said it was similar to Scunthorpe's second, and I'd like to also mention Blackpool's first, which came from a corner kick. As all our players had marking resonsibilities we had nobody to attack the ball, and Seip scored with a low, diving header. A lot of teams have one zone man, who doesn't mark anybody in particular, but takes up a position behind the first challenge, ready to attack the ball, or deal with a flick on.

 

[LoughboroBlade]

The blame has to lie with Little as he didn't anticiapate the flick and was slow to react.

In fairness, he was probably moving and reacting as quick as he physically can. The reality is he's slow, and if our defending at set-pieces is having to rely on the quick reactions and pace of Glen Little then we're in a helluva lot of trouble...

 

[Bergen Blade]

I can't work out how to include visual aids like Bergen does so well. I have a couple freeze frames that I'd like to put on to emphasise my points but can't wotk out to do it. Maybe this is somethign you can jhelp me with Bergen.

1 Stop the video when it shows the situation of interest
2 Press "Prnt Scrn" on your keyboard
3 Open up Paint
4 Press Ctr and C
5 Frame the area showing your photo
6 In the Edit menu, chose "Copy to..."
7 Save your image
8 In here click Manage Attachements below your message
9 Upload your photo
10 Click Preview Post to see if it works.



Then you can point out that a simple chip into the box shouldn't take our defence by surprise like on the first photo below. And that it looks like schoolboy defending to see the situation two seconds later:

 

[Bubbleburp]

The 3rd goal for Cardiff was pure blackboard (or should that be whiteboard nowadays ?) tactics ......straight out of the classroom.... schoolboy stuff really.

One word that jumps off the page at me from your post Ollessendro....... ANTICIPATE ....
the one thing that the team sorely lack is any sort of anticipation ....we see it week in week out where an opposition player is the quickest to react and nips in to nick the ball and make use of it .

 

[Micalijo]

Ghandi said it was similar to Scunthorpe's second, and I'd like to also mention Blackpool's first, which came from a corner kick. As all our players had marking resonsibilities we had nobody to attack the ball, and Seip scored with a low, diving header. A lot of teams have one zone man, who doesn't mark anybody in particular, but takes up a position behind the first challenge, ready to attack the ball, or deal with a flick on.

I know what Ghandi means but the Scunthorpe goal was more a quick break type of goal wasn't it? Yes it was from a throw and yes the defending was horendous but I am talking about set-up from a set-piece. I aint sure how quick the Cradiff throw came in after the ball went out but I recall the Scunthorpe goal resulted really from quick thinking and our doziness - Stuart especially, rather than a hopeful flick falling into an area where we should have dealt with it.

 

[Ollessendro]

Thanks Bergen. I'm still having problems though. My file size is way too large and it will not upload.

If you look at Bergens second photo you can see my point about the marking being hurrendous on the first goal. 3 Blades players around the ball and 2 strikers completely unmarked in the area. We got lucky (or so we thought) and Morgan just happened to be in the right place at the right time. Then we have an own goals and gaffs moment which you are all very familiar with!?