Matt Ritchie (now playing for Portsmouth)

[Dave]

Eh? The majority go straight in.

[Guest chopey]

not today

[ponsaelius]

Perhaps because we are playing against a man-marking side with some big players we felt there wasn't the same advantage to be gained from swinging it directly in?

[Tiotes Witch Doctor]

Perhaps because we are playing against a man-marking side with some big players we felt there wasn't the same advantage to be gained from swinging it directly in?

 

[The College Dropout]

Huffed and puffed but ultimately he were pap. At least Atsu put in some dangerous balls in the first half. Poor throughout from Ritchie lad. He'll go again. 

[afar]

That was the same Ritchie that turned up for a while last season, not good enough today. Mixed bag season, he was terrible versus Spuds too and should have been sent off, average against Huddersfield, but excellent in our three wins. Guess if he was excellent every week he wouldn't be playing for us, we need him to step up next week though, as without Shelvey he's our only creative outlet.

[Lush Vlad]

I really like him, but he was one of our worst players yesterday, I thought. 

 

Too often, he'll try and get a shot or cross in, when it is clearly going to be blocked and it has started to piss me off recently.  Never used to notice it until later into last season.

 

His set pieces, work rate and quality means he'll be in the side for the foreseeable.  But he is really hot and cold.  Seems to be all or nothing with him, as afar mentioned above.   

[themanupstairs]

He simply made the wrong decision time after time yesterday. He undoubtedly has the quality to deliver but needs to know when to shoot and when to cross and when to lay it off. Blood rush to the head one too many times.

[Conjo]

Feels wrong to bring out all his limitations after a loss. He's still our best and most valuable player together with Merino.

[Lush Vlad]

Feels wrong to bring out all his limitations after a loss. He's still our best and most valuable player together with Merino.

 

That is probably accurate, TBH.  Like I said, I like Ritchie.  But when you write it down like that, it really exposes the limitations of our squad. 

[STM]

He was shite against Huddersfield, to which I said he should be dropped. He followed it up with a blinder against West Ham.

[Guest firetotheworks]

I think sometimes it's too easy to forget that the opposition are obviously going to single out our most dangerous players and that in those situations it about about others making the extra space it can create count. For my money that was Atsu and Perez, but both were very poor in possession.

[Minhosa]

Yeah - I was sat on his side during the first half and he had hardly any space, very little in the way of support from Yedlin and few options when he did have the ball.

 

One of the major down sides of the one up front is that whipping in an early ball, unless 100% accurate, is pretty much redundant or wasted so I feel a bit for Ritchie in that he can't just swing his leg at a ball early or first time as it'll look shite when it's immediately cleared. If we had two up top that would enable him to be much more effective against organised, deep, compact teams like Brighton were yesterday.

 

And this was where my criticism of Perez came from yesterday. He was SO far away from Joselu that he offered no support with late runs into the box.

 

We so desperately need a proper number 10.

[Guest]

Withdrawn from the Scotland squad. Niggling injury maybe?

[triggs]

Been completely ineffective outside set pieces lately

[Guest firetotheworks]

Been completely ineffective outside set pieces lately

He's got Joselu and Perez doing his bidding. Got no problem with Ritchie tbh, he's always involved, always trying to make things happen, never lets you down.

[Dave]

Played some decent one-twos with Yedlin. That's it. He's better than this.

[Sho Time]

He seems to just burn himself out constantly chasing down a lot of lost causes when the rest of the team isn't behind to support. At this level there's absolutely no point sprinting like fuck to press high is nobody is helping out behind to close down the other options.

 

Both him and Atsu have gone off the boil, the fact that both our fullbacks seem to have to gone off the boil (although Manquillo has never looked anything better than OK at times) doesn't help, mind.

[shakey jake]

Got to see an improvement soon, had a few good efforts in the first half but totally anonymous in the second

[Guest firetotheworks]

Again he's the last of our problems.

[Guest]

He's got no competition for his place. Murphy looks absolutely shot of any confidence...there's no one to keep him on his toes.

[thenige]

An outstanding Championship player, will always work his arse off just doesn't have that extra bit of quality for this level. He's still a decent Premier league player with good delivery and technique, but certainly not one to help us win a match from nothing.

 

Again if he was our biggest problem we'd be in a much better position than we are now.

[Hanshithispantz]

Thought he was good first half, 2nd we let Bournemouth get on top of us as a team and like everyone else he look somewhere between shite and industrious.

[Guest firetotheworks]

He's fine at this level imo. Started off shaky but has picked up a fair amount of assists considering how useless we are up front and has had some good shots saved or hit the post. He's someone to upgrade upon further down the line, when we have a striker, a number 10, a left back, a keeper, then probably a better player on the left first.

[Alberto2005]

Him and Shelvey are the only two that look like creating something. Atsu isn't bad either like.