Guest chopey Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 Just back from the match and that was s****, we are so slow and ponderous, we hardly ever pass and move and make options we just stick to the same formation no matter what, it's just so f***ing boring All I have seen is the first 30 mins and that was far from the truth. Obviously the game went downhill from there but you seem to be blowing it a little out of proportion. That's 33% of an opinion I suppose Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
mighty__mag Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 Just back from the match and that was shite, we are so slow and ponderous, we hardly ever pass and move and make options we just stick to the same formation no matter what, it's just so Fucking boring This makes it sound like the manager is at fault? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest chopey Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 Just back from the match and that was s****, we are so slow and ponderous, we hardly ever pass and move and make options we just stick to the same formation no matter what, it's just so f***ing boring This makes it sound like the manager is at fault? Not at all, he is just working with what he has got Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bimpy474 Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 He is partly to blame, not for the standard of the players but the tactics (not hoying Murphy on for Ritchie) and lack of urgency after we equalized. Mind you his sub of Joselu got us the equalizer. A genius can't be a genius all the time. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
DJ_NUFC Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 Murphy should’ve played and he would’ve made a difference, I think. Ritchie is a good lad but needs to take on the older player role in the dressing room, and be put on towards the end of the game when players are flagging. He offers us much defensively and pressing-wise, but Murphy’s been in great form up front and we need to let that kid develop. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Figures 1-0 Football Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 Thought we were good at times, again. Thought we were the better team, again. Thought we should have been 2-0 up at HT, again. Thought we were unlucky to have not won, again. May as well just copy and paste this for all home games atm. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wallsendmag Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 Played really well 1st half, not so well 2nd half. If we'd had a decent striker on our books the 2nd half would have been irrelevant anyway. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest neesy111 Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 Just seen that Diame handball again, blatant sending off. Got very lucky with that one. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RS Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 I'm hoping that's not an expensive couple of points. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kasper Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 I agree that Murphy should've played but slightly disagree with "going for it". Our squad clearly isnt good enough to be trusted with that attitude. We almost lost it at the end by committing players forward, luckily Bony didn't even have a look before shooting. We're a complete mess defensively when we fail to keep a tight shape and game goes in the "end to end" fashion. The whole thing is based on team structure that tries to hide the weakness of the individuals, lose that even a little bit and everything falls apart. I guess percentage wise it comes down to how much you value a point in this game vs how likely we're to win/draw/lose by "going for it". Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wallsendmag Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 I agree that Murphy should've played but slightly disagree with "going for it". Our squad clearly isnt good enough to be trusted with that attitude. We almost lost it at the end by committing players forward, luckily Bony didn't even have a look before shooting. We're a complete mess defensively when we fail to keep a tight shape and game goes in the "end to end" fashion. The whole thing is based on team structure that tries to hide the weakness of the individuals, lose that even a little bit and everything falls apart. I guess percentage wise it comes down to how much you value a point in this game vs how likely we're to win/draw/lose by "going for it". 100% agree. Every time we commit players forward we look likely to get hit on the break at home. No lack of effort today but those players simply aren't good enough and Rafa knows it. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
SuperFlat Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 That Mawson kid is a bit of a prick then. Been said a million times, but with an effective striker today would have been a comfortable win. The plan seemed to be to win the game in the first half. They improved in the second (just), and it became more about making sure we didn’t lose. Almost backfired spectacularly, mind. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Optimistic Nut Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 I agree that a top striker would have burried at least one of the Gayle headers given us a half-time lead no doubt, but there was no excuse for the second half in how we approached it and how we went about it even after we equalised. Those missed chances didn’t prevent us picking up 3 points, that second half did. Had we went at them the same as we did in the first half there would have been more chances as we were knocking on the door and one or more would have been converted. Agreed Why can't people see and accept, we're not good enough to go at teams for 90 minutes. I don't think for one minute the intention at half-time is to all of a sudden sit back but we're playing a team who are at least as good as us with a few dangerous players like Ayew, Dyer and Ki was more influential spraying the ball around nicely. Same applied against Brighton. With a better calibre of players we might be able to control things a lot more, but this is a team today which was 8 regulars and 3 squad players when we were in the Championship. Perspective, people. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
joeyt Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 Thought Ki had a good game for them, similar to when he played against us for Sunderland at SJP. Thought Bartley and van der Hoorn looked incredibly shakey, was surprised that the former was their captain. Swansea looked really poor though. Two bad teams Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mistle17 Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 Think he kept Ritchie on because he wanted that protection for Yedlin but also what he thought he might get in set-piece delivery. Murphy would have made a positive difference, though. My only real gripe is that we're not finding a place for Merino at the moment. Next week I'd start him as a CB in a 5-4-1 like he was when he come on vs City. The lad is a class act and Rafa needs to take a risk in playing him over Diame in games like today as we just need that bit of quality on the ball. I think Diame's physical traits are the only reason he gets a look in- Shelvey is so immobile that if you're going to play two in midfield you need someone with legs around him (although Diame wouldn't exactly be lightning...). Otherwise I think people have to realise that we're in such a shit situation as a club, and Rafa is simply stopping the bleeding to speak metaphorically. If we don't get sold and Rafa stays for some bizarre reason, it will be this all over again next season and by that stage I really won't be able to give a fuck anymore. Stay up and pray we get taken over. Every point will count. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Greg Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 Think he kept Ritchie on because he wanted that protection for Yedlin but also what he thought he might get in set-piece delivery. Murphy would have made a positive difference, though. My only real gripe is that we're not finding a place for Merino at the moment. Next week I'd start him as a CB in a 5-4-1 like he was when he come on vs City. The lad is a class act and Rafa needs to take a risk in playing him over Diame in games like today as we just need that bit of quality on the ball. I think Diame's physical traits are the only reason he gets a look in- Shelvey is so immobile that if you're going to play two in midfield you need someone with legs around him (although Diame wouldn't exactly be lightning...). Otherwise I think people have to realise that we're in such a s*** situation as a club, and Rafa is simply stopping the bleeding to speak metaphorically. If we don't get sold and Rafa stays for some bizarre reason, it will be this all over again next season and by that stage I really won't be able to give a f*** anymore. Stay up and pray we get taken over. Every point will count. Merino started against Brighton and was poor. He's clearly a very talented young lad, playing in a new team, a new division, in a new country etc. It's only natural that he will have ups and downs and as such will be in and out of the side at this stage of his career. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kaizero Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 Think he kept Ritchie on because he wanted that protection for Yedlin wat Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Karjala Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 Same old story, miss a hat full of chances and scrape a draw. Should have been 3 up at HT. How many 'must win' 'relegation 6 pointers' have we actually won now. Can only think of Swansea away. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest neesy111 Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 Same old story, miss a hat full of chances and scrape a draw. Should have been 3 up at HT. How many 'must win' 'relegation 6 pointers' have we actually won now. Can only think of Swansea away. Stoke away. Stoke home. West ham away. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Greg Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 Same old story, miss a hat full of chances and scrape a draw. Should have been 3 up at HT. How many 'must win' 'relegation 6 pointers' have we actually won now. Can only think of Swansea away. West Ham away, Stoke away, Stoke home, Crystal Palace home. So quite a few, pressure increasing as the season draws on though. We clearly struggle at home, as we did at times last season when the onus was on us to break teams down. After 5 straight defeats Rafa seems to have gone for approaching the second half of home games as must not get beat. I can sort of understand that. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vinny Green Balls Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 Same old story, miss a hat full of chances and scrape a draw. Should have been 3 up at HT. How many 'must win' 'relegation 6 pointers' have we actually won now. Can only think of Swansea away. Stoke away. Stoke home. West ham away. Well apart from that, what have the Romans done for us? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest neesy111 Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 Same old story, miss a hat full of chances and scrape a draw. Should have been 3 up at HT. How many 'must win' 'relegation 6 pointers' have we actually won now. Can only think of Swansea away. West Ham away, Stoke away, Stoke home, Crystal Palace home. So quite a few, pressure increasing as the season draws on though. We clearly struggle at home, as we did at times last season when the onus was on us to break teams down. After 5 straight defeats Rafa seems to have gone for approaching the second half of home games as must not get beat. I can sort of understand that. If that happens next home game then I think it'll be curtains for us. Would mean going 1/2 the season without a win at home, don't see us coming back from..that unless we keep winning away from home which is unlikely looking at our fixtures. I think we really need to bite the bullet at home now. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 Nearly all of our points have come against teams below us in the table. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest neesy111 Posted January 13, 2018 Share Posted January 13, 2018 Nearly all of our points have come against teams below us in the table. Which is a major worry, as even our previous managers were able to get a win Vs a top club to keep themselves above the horizon. Needs to change soon. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Unbelievable Posted January 14, 2018 Share Posted January 14, 2018 I agree that Murphy should've played but slightly disagree with "going for it". Our squad clearly isnt good enough to be trusted with that attitude. We almost lost it at the end by committing players forward, luckily Bony didn't even have a look before shooting. We're a complete mess defensively when we fail to keep a tight shape and game goes in the "end to end" fashion. The whole thing is based on team structure that tries to hide the weakness of the individuals, lose that even a little bit and everything falls apart. I guess percentage wise it comes down to how much you value a point in this game vs how likely we're to win/draw/lose by "going for it". I'm with this. I feel Rafa is just papering over the cracks really. It's no surprise we're more at ease away from home where there's generally more space, than at home where we're naturally expected to be a bit more adventurous. We have precious little creative quality in our squad, let alone goal scoring ability. The only thing keeping us in it right now is our team spirit and our defensive organisation. Player for player this is by some distance our weakest Premier League squad I've seen since I started following NUFC. I don't subscribe to the notion that Rafa Benitez is some sort of saint who can do no wrong, but it's plain to see he's forced to be pragmatic here and is pretty much wringing everything possible from a Championship squad with maybe a handful of PL quality players. Years and years of underinvestment are taking their toll, and it's painfully clear we are in desperate need of reinforcements. Just imagine for one moment what a difference a creative midfielder like Ben Arfa or a striker like Demba Ba would make to our team and our survival chances. We're a team of plodders, so it should be no surprise we play like one. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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