Fantail Breeze

2 minutes ago, The Prophet said:

I think in terms of defending as a unit we've looked a lot better, particularly since he brought Lewis and Manquillo in. The individual errors are killing us though.

That’s not a better defensive unit. That’s a natural byproduct of using two defenders as full backs rather than two wingers.

We’ve looked calamitous every time the opposition comes into our third.

Just now, PlymouthGeordie said:

 

Fraser pen (vs Liverpool) was at 2-1 with 10 minutes to go. 

 

Hayden head injury was at 1-0 up, regardless of opposition it's a key moment.

 

I know VAR doesn't get involved in yellows, but why did Rodri get a warning and Hayden didn't?

 

If we get the pen to make it 1-2 today we're back in it. We'd still likely lose but it's not a reason to not give it.

 

Maddison was at 0-0 approaching half time.

It wasn’t a penalty. It doesn’t matter if it was in the 94th minute at 0-0. It was a good tackle.

Hayden ‘head injury’ wasn’t a reason to stop the game. Again, it doesn’t matter when it occurred.

Hayden didn’t get a warning because he slid in five seconds late and completely cleared out the man. That’s always been a yellow.

Even if we got a penalty today and got it back to 2-1, Man City would’ve stepped it up a gear. We had no gears left.

Again, even if Maddison didn’t get that penalty, our team collapsed i. the second half despite it only being 1-0 and didn’t even look close to scoring. Even if it was 0-0, what difference would it have made?

Just now, 54 said:

Them four players are comfortably better then 90% of our squad, Sissoko even with his legs gone would walk into our CM, ahead of Jonjo, Longstaff, Hayden and Willock.

Sissoko was finished about three years ago. He’s been minging for Watford this season.

Che Adams, Wood and Maupay are better than Wilson?  

I’m not sure they’d be better than Wilson if you combined the three of them together.

2 minutes ago, 54 said:

Starting 11 players from each of them clubs that are better then what we have, and would jump in our team:

 

Leeds: Ayling, Phillips, Dallas, Klich, Raphinha, James, Bamford, Harrison

Burnley: Pope, Tarkowski, Wood, Mee - Burnley are in the bottom three with us so it doesnt disprove my point.

Norwich: Gilmour, Aarons, Cantwell - Norwich are in the bottom three with us so it doesnt disprove my point.

Southampton: Livramento, JWP, Walker-Peters, Romeu, Redmond, Che Adams, even both the Armstrongs would at the very least offer more to us them most of our squad.

Brighton: Dunk, Lallana, Bissouma, Gross, Maupay, Lamptey, Sanchez. 

Watford: King, Sarr, Dennis, Sissoko.

 

And thats without me knowing that much about there sqauds. 

Sissoko? Lallana? Maupay? Che Adams? Wood?  I assume you’re joking at this point.

Wilson, ASM, Big Jow, Fernandez would probably walk into all of those teams too… that sort of thing proves nothing.

As I said, we’re all shite and in the bottom half for a reason - we’re no better than them, but they’re certainly no better than us.

4 minutes ago, hakka said:

I am more and more feeling Howe is right man at wrong time for us. I'll judge him once he's brought his players in from January and had a go, but for what he's improved in possession and getting up the pitch, it's not getting enough goals and it's leaking them at the other end something chronic. We should have been looking for a point today, really sit deep, frustrate City with defending in numbers and counter attack with ASM and Wilson. These defenders are so bad they need a lot of help when against real quality. Did Howe really think we could attack and get goals without that back 4 falling apart over 90 mins?

 

Some games you have to accept it's better to not lose and setup that way over trusting a terrible back 4 to suddenly start getting clean sheets. I feel I'm being harsh, but expected a bit better from Howe. Still support him and knew this run of hard games would be tough.

 

Murphy, Clark, Lascelles and Ritchie is a shocking back 4.

I’m not convinced we have improved as an attacking threat. We look very disjointed and playing as individuals.

So many opportunities to pass or shoot are not taken up and we end up losing the ball, or playing it too late, or playing it into open space in the wrong direction.

The last three games, other than a one-off thump from Jonjo, we haven’t looked like scoring at all.

Even taking into account the Brentford game, six goals in seven games isn’t going to get many points.

9 minutes ago, PlymouthGeordie said:

Difficult not to think the PL don't want us down. In the last 3 games alone:

 

Maddison dived for the pen, VAR did nothing.

 

A player down with a head injury in 6 yard box, ref plays on, we concede.

 

Trent is last man, kicks through Fraser to get to the ball, no pen.

 

Joelinton gets goal side of Rodri, brought down cynically, no booking. Two minutes later, Hayden mistimes his first tackle and is booked. Rodri then gets what should of been a second yellow for stopping another counter attack.

 

Ederson cleans out Fraser, no penalty.

 

Huge game changing decisions, nearly all of them clear as day and all given against us. 

 

Difficult to feel there isn't a conspiracy at this stage.

 

 

 

There is no conspiracy, we get the same shit decisions other teams get. Every forum on Earth claims there is a conspiracy against them.

The Fraser/Trent one wasn’t a pen, was a good tackle.

The head injury wasn’t a reason to stop the game. 

The Rodri thing today, VAR can’t give second yellows. Atkinson was also clear he gave him the benefit of the doubt for the first, which is why he booked him for the second.

Also disagree, other than Maddison, that the others were game changing decisions. We’d still have got pumped vs Liverpool and Man City. Probably the same at Leicester too.

1 minute ago, 54 said:

Nah thats not true, all the other teams have strengthened we bought only Willock in the summer, the squad has been so stagnant for so long, that we're comfortably have one of the three worst squads in the league. 

How have Leeds, Burnley, Norwich, Southampton, Brighton and Watford strengthened?

They’ve got the same shit they’ve had too. 
 

We’re no worse than any of them.

Just now, Khalidao said:

This has nothing to do with Howe or Bruce tbf. The squad is clearly at championship level, and not top of the championship either.

Same squad has comfortably stayed us last two seasons, with a worse manager in charge.

This squad is no worse than anyone in the bottom half bar Everton.

Not sure how anyone could manage us for 7 games and still pick Clark.

Big Jow about the only player to improve under him so far, which is quite disappointing.

People can blame individual errors, but most of those are only happening because Howe keeps picking the players creating those problems.

A big few weeks coming up. I’m hopeful he’ll start to get it right, but it’s been pretty poor so far.

If we nick the next goal I reckon we’ve got a great chance of going on to lose 4-1.

1 minute ago, reefatoon said:

It’s a fucking disgrace of a decision. Does that mean players can go around wiping other players out off the ball? 

As long as their team mate runs off with the ball, apparently so.

Why do none of our players seem to pass or shoot? They hold onto the ball far too long, sometimes even in the middle of the pitch.

Compare that to the penalty given against us for Maddison…  

9 minutes ago, Collage said:

ASM and Schär on the bench means we have something to throw on at least

 

 

 

Not sure how beneficial it’ll be to throw them on when we’re 8-0 down.

Fucking hell, Eddie.

Find it incredibly hard to believe anyone wants to shag that ginger minger  

7 minutes ago, nbthree3 said:

After Darlow and ASM I'd have hoped we'd be far down the line for vaccines 

 

Thick off the pitch as well as on it.

18 minutes ago, Joey Linton said:

Are they still taking the direct debits? 

I’ll tell you after work.

11 hours ago, joeyt said:

The whole point of why The Athletic was created is because they believed sports fans would be happy to pay for really high quality journalism. Posting articles on a forum defeats the point of that, meaning they'll lose money and could ultimately not be able to continue to post those articles

Yet people post other paywalled articles on here on the daily?

Don’t particularly disagree with you, but it should be all paywalled articles rather than just The Athletic.

At least we have someone.

4 hours ago, Pata said:

Saw a few stills of that and it honestly should never have stood. Attacker makes that run in an offside position and it would always be taken off by VAR. Harsh on TAA but it's all on Dean.

 

 

 

 

 

Dean isn’t offside though, tbf.

Just now, SUPERTOON said:

Wouldn’t class Man Utd as a favourable game still.

Absolutely nowt to fear with them at home, especially at the minute. Would fancy our chances against them at home any time.

Thought we were okay last night. Still in touch with 17th.

One more difficult game before a favourable run of games.

If you hate on Big Jow your da sells Avon.

1 minute ago, HaydnNUFC said:

Individual errors are fucking killing us and have been all season. Players just aren't good enough, and that isn't Howe's fault.

You’re susceptible to making more errors if you spend 90% of games under the cosh.

This style of football puts us under pressure, the players aren’t good enough to play out from the back, we put ourselves under pressure and make more errors.

We need to make some signings immediately in January or Howe needs to reassess what these players can actually do.