The Perfect Goal

[Slim Man]

When United's players score this, someone wake me up. They've been trying to do it for the past 3 home games now, and it's all got very Adkinsy. We only have Fleck who will dare have a shot from outside the box, we have so many chances to do so and we just fanny about with it and either lose it on the edge of the box or (predictably) work it into a wide position and (predictably) cross it to the goalkeeper, behind the goal, or more often than not straight to the head of one of their centre halves.

Coutts was absolutely steaming onto one yesterday and could have whacked it hard and low and forced the keeper at the very least into a save, and he decides to take a touch - it was a bad one - and we lost the ball from a good shooting opportunity.

We aren't Barcelona, we aren't Bayern Munich, we're becoming the Arsenal of League One. Tippy tappy football, dominating games, creating and missing a few gilt-edged chances - then conceding a sloppy one. It's cost us 5 points in the last 2 games at the very least.

They seem unconfident to me. Billy especially, that penalty was the pen of a man who had no confidence. If you feel that way... isn't it a good idea to give it to Clarke, Coutts, Fleck, Duffy? Anyone but yourself? It was the worst penalty I have ever seen in the flesh.

And for me it's been great this 5 at the back, but it works better away than it does at home. If we are going to play it at home we need to be playing a winger as a wing back rather than two full backs because they aren't good enough going forward - Lafferty especially. Very basic footballer, and that's being kind. I'd go with a simple 4-4-2 at home, give Duffy a bit of a free role drifting in off the right.

This might be the shake up we needed but I kind of hoped that after Charlton... So here's hoping. It's not the end of the world, but we can't afford many more like that, that's for sure.

 

[Jim Chimmerney]

As mentioned elsewhere, we are predictable at the moment, good, tight, skillful in places, but predictable. Miles better than we have been in recent seasons but Tufty was spot on after Charlton, we are a good team but still need to kick on to be a better team.

Right with you on the shooting front, very frustrating at times but I can see why they are instructed to maybe keep the ball rather than needlessly losing it against teams set to counter - attack. But, if you don't shoot......

The good thing is that we have the better teams to come to the Lane so they won't all sit back and our style does seem more suited to away games where, in theory we have the lesser teams to play after Xmas.

 

[Flakey]

I agree, If you don't have players willing to have a pop from a distance, it means the opposing defence can retreat into the box, making it impossible to score from close range.

Just how many shots have we had blocked recently.

Lets draw the defence out of the penalty area, and then we may have a chance at getting one or two close range goals as well.

 

[dave the drummer]

As mentioned elsewhere, we are predictable at the moment, good, tight, skillful in places, but predictable. Miles better than we have been in recent seasons but Tufty was spot on after Charlton, we are a good team but still need to kick on to be a better team.

Right with you on the shooting front, very frustrating at times but I can see why they are instructed to maybe keep the ball rather than needlessly losing it against teams set to counter - attack. But, if you don't shoot......

The good thing is that we have the better teams to come to the Lane so they won't all sit back and our style does seem more suited to away games where, in theory we have the lesser teams to play after Xmas.

Looking at the match stats it seems the problem is the quality of the shots - 20 shots and only 3 on target - I think I know what they need to concentrate on in training!

 

[FlamingLip]

Looking at the match stats it seems the problem is the quality of the shots - 20 shots and only 3 on target - I think I know what they need to concentrate on in training!

the crosses against Bury were also largely dog log.

 

[South Bucks]

When United's players score this, someone wake me up. They've been trying to do it for the past 3 home games now, and it's all got very Adkinsy. We only have Fleck who will dare have a shot from outside the box, we have so many chances to do so and we just fanny about with it and either lose it on the edge of the box or (predictably) work it into a wide position and (predictably) cross it to the goalkeeper, behind the goal, or more often than not straight to the head of one of their centre halves.

Coutts was absolutely steaming onto one yesterday and could have whacked it hard and low and forced the keeper at the very least into a save, and he decides to take a touch - it was a bad one - and we lost the ball from a good shooting opportunity.

We aren't Barcelona, we aren't Bayern Munich, we're becoming the Arsenal of League One. Tippy tappy football, dominating games, creating and missing a few gilt-edged chances - then conceding a sloppy one. It's cost us 5 points in the last 2 games at the very least.

They seem unconfident to me. Billy especially, that penalty was the pen of a man who had no confidence. If you feel that way... isn't it a good idea to give it to Clarke, Coutts, Fleck, Duffy? Anyone but yourself? It was the worst penalty I have ever seen in the flesh.

And for me it's been great this 5 at the back, but it works better away than it does at home. If we are going to play it at home we need to be playing a winger as a wing back rather than two full backs because they aren't good enough going forward - Lafferty especially. Very basic footballer, and that's being kind. I'd go with a simple 4-4-2 at home, give Duffy a bit of a free role drifting in off the right.

This might be the shake up we needed but I kind of hoped that after Charlton... So here's hoping. It's not the end of the world, but we can't afford many more like that, that's for sure.

Good post Danny and I couldn't agree more. Thing that concerns me the most is in order to fix something a person needs to accept there is a problem in the first place, diagnose it correctly and then have a plan to fix it. Wilder and many fans seem to think we are still mostly doing the right things and it will all come right in the end. Unfounded optimism from the couple of games I've seen recently with too much slow tippy tappy in areas that dont hurt opponents and not enough quick incisive percentage play with a final shot. Hope I'm wrong but we'll never be Barcelona and shouldn't try to be. Other teams will just watch us huff and puff then pick us off with a quick break like last night.