We still need to be fitter!

[IdLiketoRogerMoore]

Great week. Unbelievable week.

However.....

Common theme since Wilder has returned is still our ability to fall off a cliff when the better teams stick it on us in the second half.

Think Southampton, Preston, Coventry and yesterday Leicester!

If we're going to compete with the 'big boys' we need to be able to finish games as well as we're now starting them!

If you raise expectations Mr Wilder, expect nitpickers like me nitpicking!

 

[Flatulent_Bob]

The level of fitness across the squad when he came in was commented on as being way below what the current manager expects of his sides. It takes months for that to be fixed.

Another one to mark to a further expected upturn from January until the end of the season.

 

[3Cheers4Ramirez]

Would love to know how Mr Modern Science Sellés managed to preside over such an inadequate level of fitness. He was probably oblivious

 

[Flatulent_Bob]

The lack of press and ability to sustain it, I think was one of the biggest surprises given the previous managers supposed MO.
It was certainly one of the main things I was looking forward to seeing from us.

 

[Kenilworth]

Would love to know how Mr Modern Science Sellés managed to preside over such an inadequate level of fitness. He was probably oblivious

He was useless before he was appointed.
What a waste of money, time and resources.
COH has also presided over an exodus of coaching staff at all levels, which need to be replaced. What a cluster fuck they entered into, the fucking muppets.

 

[3Cheers4Ramirez]

He was useless before he was appointed.
What a waste of money, time and resources.
COH has also presided over an exodus of coaching staff at all levels, which need to be replaced. What a cluster fuck they entered into, the fucking muppets.

If you're going to be that reckless, you need a proper, coherent plan. They had no such thing

If we're still milling about in the championship in 10 years, like the new Stoke.... or worse, I'll look back on that appointment/last summer as the reason why

 

[Peaktrade]

Since his return? How about the play off final as a reminder? Yes it’s common theme - also as per Leicester city fans view from - he goes defensive and allows the opposition to attack us! 1 up front and as many defenders as possible..
looking at that bench yesterday we could’ve easily gone another half hour with some fresh legs and Attack them further

 

[HVR]

We've been woeful in the first part of this season, silly mistakes, giving the ball away, poor defending, unable to score. We've had a great week, but let's remember how poor we were, and how that's affected the confidence of the team. At 2-0, or 3-0 as soon as the opposition score, you can imagine the fear about throwing it away again.
It was great to see players having shots outside the box - would Peck have taken that volley earlier in the season, or pulled it down and passed it to the wing? As we start to pick up more wins, I'm sure we will be a lot more confident and keep pressing in the final part of the game.

 

[Blademan89]

Since his return? How about the play off final as a reminder? Yes it’s common theme - also as per Leicester city fans view from - he goes defensive and allows the opposition to attack us! 1 up front and as many defenders as possible..
looking at that bench yesterday we could’ve easily gone another half hour with some fresh legs and Attack them further

They had extra man in middle. Pushed us further back brought on pace, wilder did exactly what he needed to do and changed it up to match them up in the middle.

The goals was nothing to do with going defensive or wilders tactics, 2 goals game from 1st, lazy defending to leave seriki 2v1 and Cooper missing the ball (after a hopeful punt into box) & 2nd not getting close enough to the player that let of a decent shot straight down middle what Cooper again should have saved.

It could have easily been a 4-0 score like regardless of the 2nd half, they never carved us open.

 

[Wards]

Hard to complain about it yesterday - 3 games in 6 days, a days less rest compared to Leicester and an early KO. Just had to get through it.

 

[Flatulent_Bob]

Since his return? How about the play off final as a reminder? Yes it’s common theme - also as per Leicester city fans view from - he goes defensive and allows the opposition to attack us! 1 up front and as many defenders as possible..
looking at that bench yesterday we could’ve easily gone another half hour with some fresh legs and Attack them further

I think that’s a fair critique from last season but given where our fitness levels have had to come from it would seem sensible that we can’t keep it up for 70-80 minutes. Another one to review in the new year to see if Wilder 3.0 is different to 2.0.

 

[Loco Blade]

Think this more about the infrastructure of the club . It’s about sports science / dieticians , conditioning. My daughter works at a cryo lab in Manchester. It’s privately run but still gets city and United players dropping in for muscle treatment despite the clubs having their own facilities . Fits the Tim Pot mentality of the club . Several stints in the prem yet money spunked on United World instead of proper best in class player care . Example Tom Davies Jack O C and brewdog . It’s not just down to manager or coaching staff . It’s the owners

 

[Deadbat]

This was an issue last season where we let in a lot of late goals and teams got stronger. I'm not sure it just deteriorated when Selles came in. Been a problem for a while. The playoff final was a casing point but games v Leeds showed how much fitter they were than us. We struggle to keep the intensity of pressing/harrying/running for full games.

Some of it is down to us signing older/players with injury records but it is an area we have to improve in.

 

[LBA_Blade]

Although a valid point, 3rd game in 6 days didn’t help with fitness in the 2nd half of the last game. We have to work on that for the Christmas and Easter schedules in particular.

 

[wadblade]

Some are never happy three games= 9-2

 

[gordoncharles]

They had extra man in middle. Pushed us further back brought on pace, wilder did exactly what he needed to do and changed it up to match them up in the middle.

The goals was nothing to do with going defensive or wilders tactics, 2 goals game from 1st, lazy defending to leave seriki 2v1 and Cooper missing the ball (after a hopeful punt into box) & 2nd not getting close enough to the player that let of a decent shot straight down middle what Cooper again should have saved.

It could have easily been a 4-0 score like regardless of the 2nd half, they never carved us open.

That's a very sunny reading of it.

We almost threw away a three goal lead against a team which was broken.

I expected Leicester to show more spirit in the second half as they have decent players, but that would have been easily remedied by just keeping good possession and limiting their time on the ball.

In the second half we did none of that. We defended far too deep and seemed to be just hoofing it back upfield inviting them to attack again. We looked less and less like holding possession of the ball in their half the longer it went on. The ball was often just bouncing around our area and anything could have happened.

In the first half we were assertive without the majority of possession. In the second half we should have had (and do have) the quality to bore them into submission.

In the end we were relieved for the win when, really, it should never have been in doubt after the total first half dominance.

 

[SwissBlade]

Great week. Unbelievable week.

However.....

Common theme since Wilder has returned is still our ability to fall off a cliff when the better teams stick it on us in the second half.

Think Southampton, Preston, Coventry and yesterday Leicester!

If we're going to compete with the 'big boys' we need to be able to finish games as well as we're now starting them!

If you raise expectations Mr Wilder, expect nitpickers like me nitpicking!

I’d love to see the fitness data for us and other sides. We certainly didn’t look to be hanging on and cramping up.

I don’t think the end of yesterday and the momentum shift was fitness related, if anything we made some smart changes to bring players off at the right time in all threee games this week

Wilder is getting the levels up so that we can do what we did last season. Put teams to bed early on. The problem is this hanging on at the end of games.

Weirdly, despite the recruitment this summer, the options to hold the ball up top look better. We have good experience off the bench and Bamford is more dynamic than Moore was.

What seemed to happen yesterday was that we stopped the high press or they bypasssd it.

 

[b1ade4life]

Speak for yourself!!! My wife likes me being a bit podgy

 

[Berkshire Blade]

I am not sure it's a fitness thing but more of a physical profile.

Someone like souza had the physical ability to dominate players.

We don't have that often.

 

[nopigfansintown]

It's a recurring theme because it's incredibly difficult to fix players fitness issues mid season without simply parking them up and putting them on a mini pre season. There's gradual improvement with some. Just look at the pictures of Campbell at the derby compared to when CW walked back in.

Gus could probably do with an intensive fitness break but realistically who is going to take him out of the side for six weeks to go on an intensive fitness drive? We have to manage our players mid game based on which players are freshest, especially in multiple game weeks. It shouldn't be acceptable but we are where we are.

Yesterday we could've done with removing Brooks (earlier), Seriki and Peck as well as the players we did. Brooks had totally gone and the others were cramping but we had no real options once the other subs were made. I do think we're slowly improving in this aspect but December/Jan is merciless and we have to go with what we have. I think playing fresher players rather than the ones we'd rather see is a sad reality. We could really do with a midfield or two that has shown more than Matos.

 

[Frank the tank]

Great week. Unbelievable week.

However.....

Common theme since Wilder has returned is still our ability to fall off a cliff when the better teams stick it on us in the second half.

Think Southampton, Preston, Coventry and yesterday Leicester!

If we're going to compete with the 'big boys' we need to be able to finish games as well as we're now starting them!

If you raise expectations Mr Wilder, expect nitpickers like me nitpicking!

It's definitely improving ,players like riedewald and mee look far more capable of lasting games than previously
Think the 6 day week was a big factor . Leicester played Saturday Tuesday and would have had an extra days rest

You can definitely see a higher intensity than before particularly in the press which we couldn't even attempt before as we would have been dead by half time

 

[Houston_Blade]

Despite the last umpteen managers coming in and bemoaning our fitness levels, none of them seem to have improved it during their tenure.

I think with Selles that a big part of it was the players downing tools and going to the kebab shop instead of Shirecliffe, as it’s not possible for a football manager to be that unaware of what a Championship team’s fitness levels need to be.

 

[IdLiketoRogerMoore]

Despite the last umpteen managers coming in and bemoaning our fitness levels, none of them seem to have improved it during their tenure.

I think with Selles that a big part of it was the players downing tools and going to the kebab shop instead of Shirecliffe, as it’s not possible for a football manager to be that unaware of what a Championship team’s fitness levels need to be.

Being overly cynical - we've got the same team behind the scenes. Tom Little was brought in by Hecky a couple of years back, and dare I say whatever league we've been in, we've looked off the pace. I assume the metrics say differently, otherwise he'd be gone.

As SwissBlade says, it would be good to see the data. The eye test would say we look a lot more mobile with increased intensity during first halves, but it still looks like we have a full roast dinner with a bottle of claret at half time. Plus our subs come on and look more tired than the people they're replacing. McGuiness came on yesterday and looked like he's been shifting a piano during the first half!

 

[Houston_Blade]

McGuiness came on yesterday and looked like he's been shifting a piano during the first half!

McBurnie was always the same, he ran on the pitch like he was in the final mile of an ultra marathon.

 

[IdLiketoRogerMoore]

McBurnie was always the same, he ran on the pitch like he was in the final mile of an ultra marathon.

Leon Clarke was the master of that. He'd come on in the 89th minute and look like he's spent the previous hour and a half playing squash.

Still reckon he was fitter than Campbell!! Would love to see the stats on all our strikers! Who was the fittest: Clarke, Sharp, McBurnie, Campbell?!?!

 

[Houston_Blade]

Leon Clarke was the master of that. He'd come on in the 89th minute and look like he's spent the previous hour and a half playing squash.

Still reckon he was fitter than Campbell!! Would love to see the stats on all our strikers! Who was the fittest: Clarke, Sharp, McBurnie, Campbell?!?!

I saw someone say on the Bamford thread that we could do with him being like McGoldrick, we actually only need him to be the new Leon Clarke for him to be a success. Someone who can come in and be a thorn in the side of the opposition while he’s on the pitch and chip in with a few goals.

Out of the 4 you mention the obvious would be to say Sharp (latter career), I bet the stats between Sharp in his early career and then into his 30’s showed a massive change with the improvement coming as he got older.

 

[jt64]

Some are never happy three games= 9-2

Some people assume that winning games means that there can be no criticism of anything whatsoever

 

[Ned the Donkey]

Eat Y'self Fitter

 

[Working Class Hero]

The fitness may not be up to scratch, but those games mentioned all swung due to the opposition scoring and the subsequent momentum shift. That's a mentality thing more than anything, but it still happens even if you have the most mentally strong set of players you could find. Football is played in the head much more than a lot of people realise.

I think anyone who's played the game competitively, at any level, can probably testify that it just happens sometimes and it's a difficult thing to stop.

 

[TJ blade]

I am not sure it's a fitness thing but more of a physical profile.

Someone like souza had the physical ability to dominate players.

We don't have that often.

Even he ran out of steam after 60mins!