Three points

[blade too long]

bolton , dropping like a stone
3 points off an automatic , in form looking much brighter

 

[JohnDenver]

Funny how fans see marches differently. I thought Lafferty played very well to tonight and was pushing O'Connell and Moore for our best player

Lafferty was good. Defensively solid despite a tiring Duffy in front of him. And a great cross for the goal. What more do we want?

 

[Ricky]

Positionally Lafferty's not bad, and it was a good cross for the goal, but on the ball he's generally shocking and has no composure under pressure. He should get better though, at least playing left back. There must be a reason he's still contracted to Burnley.

 

[bartman]

Positionally Lafferty's not bad, and it was a good cross for the goal, but on the ball he's generally shocking and has no composure under pressure.

He was the complete opposite of this today and his covering behind the two centre backs in the second half was excellent

 

[Harry's Game]

Never thought I would say it but we need to switch back to 3.5.2

Got over run so many times by their big fast midfielders and only our strong Centre Backs and keeper kept us in it.

Showed we missed Basham, who is never going to be a favourite player, but the lack of any strength there was telling and he is the only player of that type we have at the moment,

Coutts showed some real moments of quality but needs a ball winner along side him and that is not Flecks game.

But as the OP says three points is by far the main thing.

 

[PokerBlade]

The main thing at the moment is I always feel we're capable of finding a goal. And if we were picking a game for Basham to miss this wouldn't be it. The lack of height and some brute force in the middle made things much tougher for us than it might've been. Had to reshuffle the system a little again which is always a blow when you're trying to gel a side and get some consistency going. In spite of that, we've fought for a win.

Could've gone against us again after riding our luck a little but you know what? Fuck it. At least if we'd lost today we would've lost while trying to win the bloody game. The last two seasons I've watched tactics and players that looked content to see the game out as 0-0 or be a goal behind and not really venture forward, somehow hoping that a goal would come from nothing. Wilder's got us pressing high up the pitch, moving the ball at roughly 10x the speed of any pass all last year, and even going in at half-time goalless it was an entertaining game.

Ignore the result, I'd take that kind of performance for now. We can build on this, and I still believe we have a few players like Duffy, Fleck, Lafferty, who haven't been great yet but show promise that there's more to come. We're seeing Done back to his best, Billy can have brighter games than today. There's still Lavery, Chapman, Clarke, possibly Hussey to force their way into the side. Even Coutts is showing some passion (and, as a side note, actually playing well) and who would've dreamt the fans would've shouted his name without the prefix "Fuck off"?

I'm dangerously optimistic again.

 

[Nasik Blade]

Lafferty's been knocked on here a lot recently but you have to give him credit when due because that cross was an absolute peach. Was sat right behind it. Thought in general that was a decent result as they were alot more handy than expected. Also that was a good following from them today decent turn out and made a good amount of noise.....untill we scored!

 

[Newbury Blade]

[QUOTE="Ricky, post: 1118129, member:

As for the left back position.... third time lucky in January?

Funny how fans see martches differently. I thought Lafferty played very well to tonight and was pushing O'Connell and Moore for our best player[/QUOTE]
Agreed, Lafferty was very good going forward especially after Chapman came on. He was also pretty solid at the back.

 

[5tannington Blade]

Thought there were too many times when our full backs weren't prepared to take a man on and put a cross in. So frustrating, too many of them turn their back away from goal rather than running direct at their defence. Let's be honest, we are bang average all over the pitch but we need to get behind them to get the most out of them. The team won't be challenging for the top 2 unless we recruit more quality in january, we are far off the quality of the team that had MacDonald and Evans sadly. Still, well done lads for getting that result, got the goal at a time when it looked like we didn't hve a chance of scoring!

 

[Bladesman]

The win is all that matters obviously.

Although I am getting sick of seeing us sit back against 10 men even though the game is there for the taking. Against better opposition that would have ended up a draw tonight.

We really need to start putting teams under pressure more when they go down to 10 men, we show teams far too much respect.

 

[Sheffsteel]

The team won't be challenging for the top 2 unless we recruit more quality in january, we are far off the quality of the team that had MacDonald and Evans sadly. Still, well done lads for getting that result, got the goal at a time when it looked like we didn't hve a chance of scoring!

It's not as simple as fill a team with quality players means promotion.

When we had Mcadonald and Evans we were the "Arsenal" of league 1.
We were so superior to most teams but we had a soft centre.
Mcadonald was a bit of a flat track bully.
He was brilliant against weak teams but went missing against the best teams.

Wilder doesn't seem so impressed with talent.
He's more focussed on the whole ( THE TEAM), instead of individual parts.
He wants leaders, players with good characters who show commitment and have a will to win.

This season we might be the Leicester City of league 1.
Rarely that impressive but seem to have the knack of picking up 1-0 as 2-1 most of the season.

 

[Silent Blade]

[QUOTE="Ricky, post: 1118129, member:

Funny how fans see martches differently. I thought Lafferty played very well to tonight and was pushing O'Connell and Moore for our best playerQUOTE]

You weren't at the match for the first half then!

 

[bartman]

You weren't at the match for the first half then!

As I said. Fans see things differently but defensively he did well last night. Freeman was the weak link of the back 4

 

[Silent Blade]

As I said. Fans see things differently but defensively he did well last night. Freeman was the weak link of the back 4

Agree that Freeman didn't play as well as he usually does

 

[1danewhitehouse]

Three points, but barely deserved. We were wholehearted but they deserved to score at least once. Moore got us through it with good handling, and EEL and O'Connell made a number of important clearances. Although EEL still hasn't convinced me. Our possession game took a lot of pressure off us as well, Coutts was very tidy.

Looks like we need Basham in a midfield four for it to work, in the meantime we need to go back to 3-5-2. I think it was particularly difficult for us today with that formation, their shape trumped ours, especially in the first half.

We're still lacking quality and pace. A lot of the midfield approach play is good but we still struggle to penetrate, and end up chucking in deep crosses for two small strikers.

As for the left back position.... third time lucky in January?

Isn’t it weird when you look at the left backs we’ve had over the years compared to the right backs. In my time some of the best in each position have been:


RB- Walker, Naughton, Lowton, Jagielka, Borbokis (better at wing back mind), Brayford, Bradders, Geary, Gage. OK, there’s been some crap too like Westlake etc.


LB- Nilsen, Unsworth and erm……… Wayne Quinn for a brief period as a wing back before injury turned him shit. Stretch was alright but better in midfield. Geary/Koz/Naughton all decent but preferred RB. Meanwhile we’ve had toss like Andy Taylor, Jordan Stewart, Matt Hill, Marcus Williams, Sean McGinty, Nicolas Weber, McEveley, Lappin and the early signs now for Hussey and Lafferty don’t look good either although I thought Lafferty improved second half.

 

[1danewhitehouse]

[QUOTE="Ricky, post: 1118129, member:

As for the left back position.... third time lucky in January?

Funny how fans see martches differently. I thought Lafferty played very well to tonight and was pushing O'Connell and Moore for our best player[/QUOTE]


I thought he was a mixed bag. A couple of times he gave the ball away incredibly cheaply. He also cannot take a man on. He got done by his runner a couple of times too. But at other times he showed a great first touch, put a good cross in for the goal and made a couple of good clearances late on. Does some things well but I’m not totally sold on him and would rather have someone with more pace and power and maybe a trick or two to beat a man for the LWB role (assuming we revert to 352 when injuries subside).