We need to get a spine

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robbiez666

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We look fancy and lively going forward but we consistently fail to take chances and finish off games. We were great for 55 minutes and then poor. When things aren't going our way we need players who can galvanise us. Drive us forward. We don't really have any.

We have a soft underbelly and there's no leadership on the pitch.

Norwood and Fleck give nothing in terms of leadership in the middle. Egan is little better.

Pointless having Billy as a captain as Billy only cares about scoring.

We need some steel. We need some big personalities. We need people being loud on the pitch. Talking. Supporting.
 

robbiez666 said:
We look fancy and lively going forward but we consistently fail to take chances and finish off games. We were great for 55 minutes and then poor. When things aren't going our way we need players who can galvanise us. Drive us forward. We don't really have any.

We have a soft underbelly and there's no leadership on the pitch.

Norwood and Fleck give nothing in terms of leadership in the middle. Egan is little better.

Pointless having Billy as a captain as Billy only cares about scoring.

We need some steel. We need some big personalities. We need people being loud on the pitch. Talking. Supporting.
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A Chris Morgan type would be ideal. He wouldn’t accept the likes of Egan, Fleck and Stevens just going through the motions.
 
robbiez666 said:
We look fancy and lively going forward but we consistently fail to take chances and finish off games. We were great for 55 minutes and then poor. When things aren't going our way we need players who can galvanise us. Drive us forward. We don't really have any.

We have a soft underbelly and there's no leadership on the pitch.

Norwood and Fleck give nothing in terms of leadership in the middle. Egan is little better.

Pointless having Billy as a captain as Billy only cares about scoring.

We need some steel. We need some big personalities. We need people being loud on the pitch. Talking. Supporting.
Click to expand...
Spot on ,.
 
Tbf Sharp had quite a few unselfish assists this season, or did the donkey work and passed it to someone who laid it off and got the assist... but whatever it is we're lacking, we're lacking it in spades.
 
Let’s be fair, we don’t have a midfield, our defence leaks goals, our keeper is a bomb scare and our strikers are feeding off scraps or being under utilised.

Apart from that we’re fine.
 
robbiez666 said:
We look fancy and lively going forward but we consistently fail to take chances and finish off games. We were great for 55 minutes and then poor. When things aren't going our way we need players who can galvanise us. Drive us forward. We don't really have any.

We have a soft underbelly and there's no leadership on the pitch.

Norwood and Fleck give nothing in terms of leadership in the middle. Egan is little better.

Pointless having Billy as a captain as Billy only cares about scoring.

We need some steel. We need some big personalities. We need people being loud on the pitch. Talking. Supporting.
Click to expand...
Good post. Suns us up. So many just want to blame one or two players but the team is crying out for leadership
 
robbiez666 said:
We look fancy and lively going forward but we consistently fail to take chances and finish off games. We were great for 55 minutes and then poor. When things aren't going our way we need players who can galvanise us. Drive us forward. We don't really have any.

We have a soft underbelly and there's no leadership on the pitch.

Norwood and Fleck give nothing in terms of leadership in the middle. Egan is little better.

Pointless having Billy as a captain as Billy only cares about scoring.

We need some steel. We need some big personalities. We need people being loud on the pitch. Talking. Supporting.
Click to expand...
“ Drive us forward”, exactly, but someone will have to explain to the players what that is. The way we are playing at the moment is too slow, too predictable and too many short passes. No one runs through the gaps and no one plays a ball through the line ( Stoke game not included).
We make it too easy for teams to get 10 men behind the ball and unfortunately the players ain’t good enough to unlock a 10 man defence.
They then get sucked in , then find themselves out of position and struggling to get back, then hey presto another “ Worldy” hits the back of the net.
Anyone remember the last time we broke out and within 3 passes , bang a goal? .
 
robbiez666 said:
We look fancy and lively going forward but we consistently fail to take chances and finish off games. We were great for 55 minutes and then poor. When things aren't going our way we need players who can galvanise us. Drive us forward. We don't really have any.

We have a soft underbelly and there's no leadership on the pitch.

Norwood and Fleck give nothing in terms of leadership in the middle. Egan is little better.

Pointless having Billy as a captain as Billy only cares about scoring.

We need some steel. We need some big personalities. We need people being loud on the pitch. Talking. Supporting.
Click to expand...
Chris Basham. CB, CDM, RB, anywhere. Feels criminal not having him in the team
 
Egan has been poor since JOC was out injured. Davies is hit and miss.

I still think the biggest issue, generally speaking, is Fleck and Norwood. Neither are mobile enough and neither have the attacking capabilities that they once had. They’re both too soft and we get bullied in the middle of the park, every game. There’s so many points during a game where we have absolutely nobody in and around the centre circle. We seem to go from defence, straight to attack with nobody in between. Ideally Berge can come back soon and make a difference here, but I just can’t see it based on current evidence.
 
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The players need to take a long hard look and themselves.

They have the ideal coach at the moment who supports them publicly, knows how good football should be played and coaches it into players.

He can't make you concentrate that little bit more when you're baring down on goal or prevent you giving away a soft goal because basics of positioning and closing down have left you.

If you're on what a lot of our players are on, you've got to be pulling together as experienced players and saying "no more shit defeats now lads, no more soft goals".

For all our defeats so far, had we drawn any lf those teams last season in the Cup, we'd have made 6-10 chances and expected to beat them easily.

As it is, apart from Rammers, it's the same squad of players plus 4 additions.

There is little reason other than a lack of individual professionalism why we shouldn't be beating all those we've lost to at home.

The manager has set a style and some of the approach play looked good. So I'm not buying this only fitting Wilder's system because that latterly lost 29/38. Gibbs-White, N'Diaye and Osborn are the three who are playing the most different roles and they have been 3 of our better players. The rest are playing slight variations on what they should be able to do already.

You can't be having 13 goal efforts and scoring none. You just can't. And you can't be in contrast offering up just the 5 shots with only 2 on target and one ending up in the net.

It's time for the players to back up the xG of the system the manager has in place with more professionalism in each box.

So whether it's Billy or the Senior players, they need to sort this out as a group. It's simply not good enough and it's on them.
 

Deano said:
A Chris Morgan type would be ideal. He wouldn’t accept the likes of Egan, Fleck and Stevens just going through the motions.
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I think the Morgan type was meant to be Egan.
 
Bladezz said:
I think the Morgan type was meant to be Egan.
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He is and neither were/are big enough.. Morgan was a hard man no doubt about it but he wasnt that big and when he played against proper strong centre forwards like Daruus Henderson he got pushed around...a lot.

Said it many times we need a 6ft 4in brick shithouse centre half who cleans everything and everybody out. Get one if those and a box to box aggressive central midfielder and a lot of our woes will be solved.
 
We need more than a spine, we need a fucking miracle!
 
Basham needs to play. Said this from day 1 and it's worrying the manager doesn't see it but hopefully now he has no choice. Just having Basham on the pitch will help I think but I'd play him with Egan and hopefully it'll make him better.
 
McGoaldrick said:
Chris Basham. CB, CDM, RB, anywhere. Feels criminal not having him in the team
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I don't think Bash is the answer, sadly. Unless we go to a back 3. I think time has caught up with him.
 
Reality is we play some very decent stuff, but mistakes at both ends and mental frailty mean we throwing away points. Dont see the issue with style of play, tactics or formation, nearly all of it falls onto the players making individual ricks.

Across the team we've players living of past glories, but unable to shake the losing mentality of the latter part of Wilders tenure. SJ talks every presser about lack of bravery, fear, personality, yet its rife in the squad who mentally are still on the ropes.

The core of former years have lost their nerve and ability to be leaders on the pitch and poor performance levels means they can't even lead by example. Also seem devoid of the ability to adapt, several have mentioned been used to Wilders tactics.

Said countless times, but Sharp, McG, Egan, Stevens, Baldock, Norwood, Fleck, Basham are all only going to get worse, they peaked 2 year ago. None of these can be relied upon for a team competing at the top end of the championship, or god forbid playing in the Premier League if the unthinkable happens.

Add to this the rest of the squad, who not over the hill have been sustained underperformers in red and white and aren't up to being first choice (Freeman, McB, Mousset, Brewster, Burke, Osborn, Robinson, RND et al)

Remove the loanees and Berge (likely sold) and JOC (won't play for us again), then you've not a lot left.

Start of next season, ask yourself who would you be genuinely happy to be in the starting lineup?

Removing all sentiment aside from N'diaye, (maybe Bogle?) wouldn't be disappointed to see any of the squad leave or be replaced.

We are in transition. Squad needs an major overhaul, and think this is going to take 18 months to play out. We need leaders, we need to trim the deadwood, we need strength, we need to rebalance.
 
ekke287 said:
Let’s be fair, we don’t have a midfield, our defence leaks goals, our keeper is a bomb scare and our strikers are feeding off scraps or being under utilised.

Apart from that we’re fine.
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Our strikers had several opportunities yesterday. Had they taken them the defence would not have been a problem
 
please help me on this one
Fulham and West Brom they came down with us they suffered with the covid closed door syndrome as we did but all i seem to hear is SUFC mental stability how being relegated still hurts et al
Was it not the same for the other two,who also changed Managers,Fulham who had to let go numerous loan players
What are we doing differently?To be so far away from them?
 
Champagneblade said:
The manager has set a style and some of the approach play looked good. So I'm not buying this only fitting Wilder's system because that latterly lost 29/38.
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That system was flawed, and limited - and in the most clinical of leagues of all. Those who had performed above their level, struggled for form, confidence and fitness.

The system before that, however was hugely effective in getting us to where we were, and on limited resource.

The first thing he needs to do is admit that 4 at the back simply isn't working, not without sufficient midfield presence and protection. We don't have that, he can't recruit for that right now, so a switch to a back 5 has to be the first port of call.

Then, the system should IMO look at:

Bashan, Egan, Davies
Wing backs
Two CMs, Fleck and Norwood back to their natural roles
MGW as the 10, genius player
N'Diaye just off a striker.
 
pedro said:
please help me on this one
Fulham and West Brom they came down with us they suffered with the covid closed door syndrome as we did but all i seem to hear is SUFC mental stability how being relegated still hurts et al
Was it not the same for the other two,who also changed Managers,Fulham who had to let go numerous loan players
What are we doing differently?To be so far away from them?
Click to expand...
We have much poorer players and our recruitment since relegation has been worse.
 
robbiez666 said:
We look fancy and lively going forward but we consistently fail to take chances and finish off games. We were great for 55 minutes and then poor. When things aren't going our way we need players who can galvanise us. Drive us forward. We don't really have any.

We have a soft underbelly and there's no leadership on the pitch.

Norwood and Fleck give nothing in terms of leadership in the middle. Egan is little better.

Pointless having Billy as a captain as Billy only cares about scoring.

We need some steel. We need some big personalities. We need people being loud on the pitch. Talking. Supporting.
Click to expand...

Agree with every word bar that statement.

Billy runs his nuts off every time he plays. He harries and tackles out of possession, he leads the line, holds the ball and brings others into play. Did you also miss him clearing one off the line recently?

Of course he wants to score more than anything (name me a striker who doesn't) but he is also a proper team player.
 

We need more size, strength, skill, aggression and determination.

This season is one of transition, not promotion.

Let`s see what the next two transfer windows bring. If Slav gets the players he wants in, and gets rid of those he doesn`t, then we will not be floundering as we are at present.

Slav needs players and time. Fans need patience.
 
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