Pick your team against Norwich

[pjm2019]

Forget DF picking the team ( i wish) lets see who you would pick for the 1st leg against Norwich

[Scoobychief]

Tea lady and ground staff and Co.. cause we ain't got a cat in hells chance of making Wembley. With this lot .

[pjm2019]

Tea lady and ground staff and Co.. cause we ain't got a cat in hells chance of making Wembley. With this lot .

Is the tea lady playing as a number 9 ?

[Scoobychief]

Is the tea lady playing as a number 9 ?

Yeah she'll do better than bamby

[pjm2019]

Change of formation 5-2-3

Meslier
Byram LB
Roberts RB
Rodon CB
Cooper CB
Cresswell CB

Ampadu
Gray

Summerville
Bamford
James

Subs

Joseph
Darlow
Anthony
Rutter
Gnonto
Gruev

[pjm2019]

Change of formation 4-3-3

Meslier
Byram LB
Roberts RB
Rodon CB
Cooper CB


Ampadu
Gray
Gruev

Summerville
Bamford
James

Subs

Joseph
Darlow
Anthony
Rutter
Gnonto
Cresswell

[The Subhuman]

Meslier
Roberts (has to start now)
Firpo
Gruev
Rodon
Ampadu
Georginio
Kamara
Joseph
Gray
Summerville

[Phild]

Unfortunately way too late too much
Think we will sneak through against Norwich but will get played off the park against Southampton.
Have we always looked slow and lethargic with no cohesion this season?
Only the 2 wide players look to inject some pace to our game?
Is it a fitness issue?
Not sure why we are so poor on the eye compared to the way Southampton played.
I guess tactical many will point to

[1964white]

Unfortunately way too late too much
Think we will sneak through against Norwich but will get played off the park against Southampton.
Have we always looked slow and lethargic with no cohesion this season?
Only the 2 wide players look to inject some pace to our game?
Is it a fitness issue?
Not sure why we are so poor on the eye compared to the way Southampton played.
I guess tactical many will point to

Another long & expensive cup final day for me.

I hope Norwich put us out of our misery to save me from all the aggravation & despair.

[Ratscoot]

Can I pick Ipswich?

[The Subhuman]

Can I pick Ipswich?

lol, but against Norwich?

[weasel]

Despite our awful last few matches we have picked up more points than both Ipswich and Leicester since the end of October. Our results were pretty damn incredible for a long time yet many seem to think they are justified in slagging off all our players. Go farke yerselves!

[Phild]

Of course we are justified ( coach included)
What would your explanation be for the last 6 weeks or so?

[Irish Ian]

I read Summerville has an ankle injury, that might allow us to see Gnonto on the left.
But unless we have a CF who can manipulate their defensive line we will inevitably concede.

[Cjay]

I read Summerville has an ankle injury, that might allow us to see Gnonto on the left.
But unless we have a CF who can manipulate their defensive line we will inevitably concede.

[weasel]

Of course we are justified ( coach included)
What would your explanation be for the last 6 weeks or so?

Oh so you simply want to ignore how well they played from Septemeber onwards, the fact that we were the best team from October onwards and just judge them on the last few weeks?

[Phild]

It all depends on your definition of playing well
Winning is different to playing well.
Warning signs galore towards the end of that impressive run which I would say have lasted around 2 months now.
I consider that timescale very worrying and perhaps the bottom line is we overperformed and what we are seeing now is who we really are

[Irish Ian]

Of course we are justified ( coach included)
What would your explanation be for the last 6 weeks or so?

Ill have a go at that if you like.

And these arent excuses or an attempt to happy clap the manager.


The International break was a factor. Thorp Arch was almost deserted of first teamers as they were off, some playing meaninlgess friendlies and Kamara and the Welsh lads alos living with the disappointment of getting knocked out of the Euros. --I posted about this banana skin back in October yay me!-- Factor in the injuries on top.
Rutter having bloody surgery as well. Never useful in mid season, he has been our talisman and he hasnt been on it since.

The pressure of leading from the front, this has also affected the other two as well. Remember though that we have been under pressure all season since that poor start, it hasnt never went away, take for example the whole run of games in the West Country and Wales we had to come through, the stress at times has been very high. You could see it coming, even during the great run we had, we rarely won a game in regulation fashion for a promotion chaser, we had awful games where nothing would go right until a moment of luck or very high quality won the day. Away to Wendies, at home to Preston late penalty, at home to Leicester a blind linesman and a late pen.
We were riding our luck.

It ran out at home to Sunderland and away to Coventry, the momentum shifts. We were so inflated but fragile as well. The balloon burst.

How many of those problems were " manageable" -- some point to Farke not throwing on subs to win games earlier or not playing certain players or giving players minutes when we were cruising , but we rarely were.. many many of our games were a grind with the points not being secured until well into the game) So squad size some say, but the bench is never as strong as the starting 11.

Recruitment in January, realistically you only get good players if you can promise their club the player would get minutes.
We could have had Carvallio hey say but that meant dropping Rutter. Moore suits Ipswich play but he hardly been prolific which is why he was surplus to requirements. there. Also in January goals were not a problem. By the end of January were were probably playing our best stuff of the season. My only thought would have been drafting in a CB, but again with the partnership between Rodon and Ampadu blossoming you wonder what the benefits could have been then, especially as Gruev and Kamara were going well. I would have liked one as Farke fortold Kamara running out of gas at some point due to him having no pre season training. As he has by the look.

So can you manage when International breaks come? DF had already held Gray back earlier in the season, but there was no way he could hold back the others.
Rutters injury, it was already there by the time the break came and it was hoped that he would recover enough.


Back to August and the poor start.

Ipswich, SH, Leicester and us all have been head and shoulders above the rest of the league.

All have had bad runs and wobbles. SH lost 4 in a row , then battered us and went on a 24 game unbeaten run. And finished 4th!
We had that bad start and therefore had no buffer zone when this crash came.
Ipswich had theirs but managed to turn losses into draws during the late winter time which was a protection for them.
Leicester made hay while the sun shone which allowed them time to put their wobble right.
Ours came at the culmination of an insane run, but the run only got us on a par with the others.

So too many bad things coming together at the pressure point of the season.

Thankfully we still have the time and the opportunity to get it right.

Im off to bed

[Phild]

Thank you Ian for a very well thought out response.
What worries me is we never seem to have dominant spells in games nor during this lean spell can point to missed clear cut chances or goalkeeper heroics.Set pieces an utter and complete waste of time.
Don’t think the above points are anything to do with feeling pressure nor the timing of the international break.
I’ve said before we look sluggish and totally inept of ideas and have done for many many weeks.
I sure as hell hope something changes during the next 2 weeks.

[weasel]

It all depends on your definition of playing well
Winning is different to playing well.
Warning signs galore towards the end of that impressive run which I would say have lasted around 2 months now.
I consider that timescale very worrying and perhaps the bottom line is we overperformed and what we are seeing now is who we really are

That for me is why it is important to judge the team over the full season. Results wise, like you say we over performed during our impressive run, and then perhaps the rub of the green we got during the good run deserted us during our bad run. We aren't as good as we appeared during the good run and aren't as bad as we were during the bad run - but like I say from October onwards we were the best team pointswise in the division which is not something to be dismissed. One simple thing would be to take the penalty away that we got against Preston and give us the penalty that we didn't get late on v Sunderland. Suddenly we drop 2 points during the good run and pick up 2 points during the bad run and the gap between the good and the bad narrows. There were others moments too that went for us during the good run and didn't in the bad run - less obvious than the penalty decisions but equally as important.

So over the season we were the 3rd best and that is a fair reflection. It is a good achievement and one most of us would have joyously taken at the start of the season, and certainly one we would have taken a few weeks into the season.