Sitting back

[S40BLADE]

Wanted to start a separate thread away from other users arguments as i thought it was worth discussing. In the last two matches after we have scored we have been what seems to be on the back foot. What is this due to? Not enough energy? Negative tactical approach? The opposition stepping up their game? Would be interesting to see peoples thoughts and opinions on this hopefully not leading to arguments about "clappers" and "slashers" etc

 

[Cerberus Blade]

Derby: holding out for a draw.

Stoke: holding out for a win.

Problem seems to be: “ holding out”

 

[Rodders]

Purely mental; after the score goes 1-0 we go from a swashbuckling side passing triangles all round the pitch to a team afraid of our own shadow and like we’re kicking a live grenade. I can only think that it’ll come with time being in this division and the players believing they belong here. (or they are replaced with Championship-regular players)
Dress it up as “well we’re top of the league” as much as you like but the fact is the players might have the ability but do not have the mentality to stay there. Tuesday night was a complete surrender of that lead.

 

[Snowman]

Subs

 

[Bill Johnson]

Stop. In the name of God stop. You can't talk about the s word.
Won't somebody think of the children?

 

[SUFC Handsworth]

Purely mental; after the score goes 1-0 we go from a swashbuckling side passing triangles all round the pitch to a team afraid of our own shadow and like we’re kicking a live grenade. I can only think that it’ll come with time being in this division and the players believing they belong here. (or they are replaced with Championship-regular players)
Dress it up as “well we’re top of the league” as much as you like but the fact is the players might have the ability but do not have the mentality to stay there. Tuesday night was a complete surrender of that lead.

I would say in that case we need a few natural leaders to make sure we do just that, perhaps starting (and finishing) with Coutts might help on that front.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

Mental strength.

 

[Rob86]

No clappers or slashers ! Haha

My opinion is we don’t have any outlet when we get pressed by the opposition. No return jab that could lead to a KO punch. Against Stoke this was largely irrelevant as they were that poor and I dont believe we sat back excessively.

Against Derby, far better opposition, we lacked the means to hit them whilst they were on the offensive.

We don’t have 3 or 4 players that will break out and hit a team on the counter. We have to move forward as a team and as the team gets more tired, at the end of a game, this becomes more difficult. We then see balls being pinged up to the strikers and when they control it basically have to pass it back, there’s no turn an play it into the runners beyond 80
Mins.

It’s a pitfall of the 3-5-2 that without ultra fit full backs, you’ll lose momentum as the game nears the end. For eg, IMO, at Derby we needed an Udlovu or Murphy as the out ball.

Every system has negatives at this level though

 

[Cappy]

Mental strength and belief, for me too.

I went to a doo where the captain of the Western Force (pro rugby union team) was talking to us about leadership. One thing I remember through all the booze was him saying that when you are picked as a leader, you are picked because of who you are now. The temptation to then change to being someone different is huge and must be avoided.

We go ahead because of what we are doing well in that phase of the game. But then we change what we are doing, even though it was evidently working. Like going 2-0 is worse than maintaining 1-0. I don't quite get it as it's not like we are going full bollocks playin high-risk football to go 1-0.

However, I've had quite a lot of wine and know fuck all, so I will go away now.

 

[RealMcCoy]

One of the things that happens is that the opposition change because they are now “behind”. So, they up the tempo, chase harder, challenge and contest harder, generally be more “aggressive” in their approach, take more risks, and indeed often change formation with substitutions to address our strengths/weaknesses.

Post #8 by Rob86 addresses this.

It’s not all about how we suddenly change our own performance, it’s more about how we need to adjust to the changed opposition. We currently don’t seem to be able to do that effectively, whether that means becoming strongly defensive, or maintaining a high pressure attacking momentum ( with the associated inherent risks and with more to lose).

It seems to be the same home or away, we just lose the plot a little bit.

Over to you Messrs Wilder and Knill.

 

[Gannon's perm]

I personally think it's a combination of all those factors. We can't own the game for 90mins and the other team will have good spells in the game. We do however seem to sit back when we've scored and did appear to be knackered at Derby.

The problem is that we can't hold out or stop the other team from scoring when they have a little spell. We don't have the players or pace to counter attack teams. We only have players who can hold the ball up. If we had pace we could put balls in behind their defence and have a proper out ball.
However I think we are doing amazingly well and just need to make sure when we are on top we put our chances away. If we'd put our chances away, Stoke's little spell would have been irrelevant. Which was what happened against Villa.

 

[Isaw Joeshaw]

Some good points made on this thread .

I too find it hard to understand why , particularly in last night's game , we can go from being a group of players controlling the ball and dominating the opposition all over the pitch to one that starts pissing their knickers
just because we've gone in front .

For whatever reason , the same players who 5 minutes before were confidently stroking the ball around and making runs suddenly start to panic at every available opportunity , give the ball away needlessly and concede stupid and unnecessary free kicks .

As others have said , the lack of a strong leader and the timing and nature of the substitutions didn't help but the dramatic level of change in approach is still a bit mystifying and definitely needs to addressed if we are to achieve what we are undoubtedly capable of .

 

[SwissBlade]

Wanted to start a separate thread away from other users arguments as i thought it was worth discussing. In the last two matches after we have scored we have been what seems to be on the back foot. What is this due to? Not enough energy? Negative tactical approach? The opposition stepping up their game? Would be interesting to see peoples thoughts and opinions on this hopefully not leading to arguments about "clappers" and "slashers" etc

Sitting back, as you call it was certainly a bit of a myth against Stoke.

I agree that as a team, we defended deeper after we scored. But what do you expect? Stoke (a solid side in terms of quality players that they have) had to come out. But whenever we could, we were still trying to get forward, the difference was that we'd worked for 70 mins to get the goal, Butland and their defence not letting much through, so we weren't committing as many players forward.

Stoke also changed things around a bit, Crouch coming on meant that the dynamic at the back, so we also had to change things around, Duffy having run his socks off, the opportunity was there for Stearman to slot in .

Lots of teams play of the counter attack in this division, so we're able to play higher up the pitch. Until we score, then those teams have to abandon trying to catch us on the break and press us.

We were still attacking just before they scored and after

 

[Cerberus Blade]

Mental strength.

Agree. Make your breath smell nice too!

 

[Muttley]

The solution;

Go 1-0 up in the 92nd minute.

 

[Rusty view]

One of the things that happens is that the opposition change because they are now “behind”. So, they up the tempo, chase harder, challenge and contest harder, generally be more “aggressive” in their approach, take more risks, and indeed often change formation with substitutions to address our strengths/weaknesses.

Just this.

Teams are coming and sitting back looking for a point and to frustrate us, catch us on the break. That is no longer any good when we score.

Not saying we can't combat this, but this is why it seems like we sit back when we score. We don't but with the opponents becoming more adventurous, it naturally brings a bit a cautiousness to our play.

 

[HodgysBrokenThumb]

The solution;

Go 1-0 up in the 92nd minute.

Bit of a problem if it's only 1 minute added time.

 

[HodgysBrokenThumb]

I'm coming to the conclusion (though what do we as outsiders really know?) that the key is the last 10% of confidence and self-belief. Only Basham and Norwood have considerable experience of playing at this level or higher, and most of the players are playing the best football of their careers. When it all clicks, and it has done frequently, the team looks really good, and the confidence is clearly high. But human nature seems to sometimes kick in when we go ahead, and the concern about making a vital error seems to break the confidence in the quick-passing game. I can't prove this, but it is an explanation that I think many of us can recognise from our own humble experience. On the park pitches of South Yorkshire when the score was 3-0 either way, I would command the penalty area with total confidence (dropping the ball regularly, unfortunately), but if we were 1 goal up, I never dared leave the goal-line for fear of dropping the dreaded clanger that changed the match. I know professional sportsmen are a different breed, but going from 90% to 100% self-belief must be a really difficult step to take, particularly as you move up the leagues.
The only practical conclusion I can draw from this is that we as fans should try not to add to the levels of anxiety when we are defending a lead. I have not yet managed to put this into practice...

 

[blade67]

can I say I don't think this happened in either game and you are imagining it.

At Derby they came out 2nd half and played brilliantly. Pushing us back and forcing us to concede possession. That is why ended up on the back foot and that happens when you play really good teams. The question is, can Derby do that every week?

On Tuesday we really had the chances to win several times over. Crouch is quality and when he came on Stoke got into the game for the first time. We didn't sit back but they certainly got into the game and I thought we coped really well until we gave away a cheap free kick and then defended it really poorly.