Lavanche

As said in other thread I would drop Brady just for keeping him fresh. 3 games in a week is quite hefty sum. Also if they keep playing 3-5-2 there should be lot of room at wide areas for Pritchard or Naismith to use for cut ins. Hard one for midfield. Mulumbu would offer some strenght in front of CB''s, but Dorrans is more comfortable with ball and if we win midfield tomorrow we probably win the game. Most of their goals have come from crosses and run from midfield so keeping Irvine and Naylor at bay should do the job. If they keep ball long enough to push their formations forward we are asking trouble. Their strikers alone should not possess real threat. So I would go for Nottingham team with replacing Brady for Pritchard or if we choose to go for not winning the possession Pritchard, Mulumbu and Bennett in for Brady, Dorrans and Martin.

Morty: I think Wes never was a killer passer. He does that once in a while in advanced positions, but his major job is keep us going and he is still doing that very well even in deep positions. It is the vision and all those small passes to transfer from defense to offence. Thats why we look poor most of the times without him. I think we didn''t prought any replacement for him thought during the window. Maddison could be in long term. Pritchard for me was to replace Brady and get more competition for wide players as Redmond left and we had no idea how influential Murphys would be this season. Canos was 1 to 1 back up for Redders. Too bad we haven''t seen him more thought as Josh clearly isn''t comfortable playing right side of the field. He constantly in first half tried to cut in with his weaker foot to only get himself in trouble. Second half from him was way better tough and even outside the goal he was defending with more confidence and kept the width better. Good tactical decision from AN anyway to use 4-4-2 instead of 4-2-3-1. With Canos it probably would have been our normal formation as cutting in is not efficient without advanced positions. I would go for Nottingham team at saturday with exception of giving Brady a breather. 3 games in a week is quite much for anyone. I would probably use Pritchard in his place, but Naismith could start too. Josh and Jacob in a same team would be asking trouble as their defensive work rate is nowhere near at the level of Naisy or Pritch.

Yesterday he was ok and got a goal, but have to remember we played quite much 4-4-2 which suited him more than our normal 4-2-3-1. We very rarely face teams in champs that give us so much room to run as Everton did, so personaly I hope this doesnt give AN a sign to give him more game time as a starter. He is good player and I think he gets too much negative reactions from fans, but he is also a signing that I never understood why we did it, because of his favoured position as secondary striker, age and squad structure we had in Prem. Anyway depth is good and having him on the bench and occasionaly starting is nice asset to have.

Lafferty has started a cup game and constantly plays as a starting striker at international level. He is able to start if that is needed. Naismith also has started as a striker in league and also has played that position in his national team. I really struggle to see the problem in depth there. Only problem I see with our striker situation is that we dont know yet if Oliveira fits the team. If he is going to be equally good with Jerome, we have no problem at this slot. If he is a flop, Jerome is carrying too much weight in his shoulders. Our third, fourth and fifth options are more than up to task at this level. I would be more happy if we had managed to sell Lafferty and Naismith and get a 20-24 year old second or third choise striker to get a developing element in our quite old strikeforce. Still as said our depth is not a problem. If we lose both Jerome and Oliveira we have ok options at this level. Naismith was poor in one game as a striker, but I remember quite many games where Hooper and Grabban were poor for us, but that doesn''t mean they can''t do the job if asked. Laffs has attitude problem, but still at the end I am quite sure AN will let him lose if needed.

As I said in other thread it clearly is a myth as Nutty says. We have well balanced squad, if Oliveira will show that he was worth of buying and that really is only questionmark in our team. 4 pure attackers and Naismith is more familiar as a striker than as a CAM and thats why I never really understood why we bought him, so that makes 4/1 or 5/1 Tettey, Howson, Mulumbu, Dorrans and Thompson for two deeper roles. So 2,5/1 Hoolahan, Murphyx2, Pritchard, Canos, Naismith and Brady for 3 upper positions. That makes it 2,3/1 or 2,6/1, when Jarvis comes back and 3/1 if Howson is counted here. LB Olsson, Brady and Whittaker 3/1 RB Pinto, Whittaker, Martin 3/1 (Thompson has also played here) CB Klose, Martin, Bennett, Bassong, Turner 2,5/2 There is no point of arguing about it and have to remember very rare teams have more than 2 quality (their standards) pure strikers in their roster. 2+1 youngster is quite common with multi purpose players supporting if needed. Bayern: Lewandowski, Muller and Green Barca: Suarez, Paco Real: Benzema, Morata, Mariano ManC: Aguero, Ikenacho ManU: Zlatan, Martial, Rashford Arsenal: Giroud, Akpom, Sanogo (Welbeck) Lucas Chelsea: Costa, Batshyai (that belgian whose name I cant pronounce), Solanke PSG: Cavani, Jese, Augustin You get the point. Outside of Arsenal none of top teams have more strikers than we do and in Arsenal''s case Welbeck is out until next year and Sanogo has been injured more in his time at Arsenal than being fit. Also Lucas and Welbeck have played more winger in their carreer than as a striker. Everyone of these teams have players that can play as CF or SS as do we, but you should get the point about team structure. If they can be succesful teams with 2 main strikers, so should we. Jerome, Oliveira, Lafferty and Naismith is at this level very good strikeforce and even though I would have wanted us to replace two latter with one new signing there is not many teams in this division who can look at their roster and say they have equal quality with us. And you can add to that the fact that we have players like twins, Pritchard and Canos who are well known to be good finishers at this level, I think we will be just fine in goal wise.

Canos thing makes you wonder a bit as he has used his few minutes very well for both ends of the pitch and while Jarvis is out we really dont have anyone else than Jacob that has successfully played right winger and even he is more fluent at right. Ofc as long we keep using unbalanced 4-2-3-1 with Howson at wing there is no room for attacking winger. Still as said you would think he would fit the bench for the situation where we trail and Jacob is out of fume. Hard things to understand from couch as you dont know what happens in training etc.

It is only good sign if we are getting 3 points with a bad game. That means when we hit the form we should have no problem to keep it up. Too bad I can only listen the games so cant really comment tactics, but at least it sounded that we managed to stay somewhat top off the game even if we raise our foot from the pedal.

[quote user="RUDOLPH HUCKER"]This is what happens when you need strikers and central defenders but just buy more midfielders of a similar ilk..[/quote] We have 5 spots for midfielders in our current tactics Pritchard/Jo Murphy - Wes/Naismith - Ja Murphy/Canos -------------Tettey/Mulumbu-Howson/Dorrans----------- That does follow modern concept of having 2 players for each position and leaves only long time injured Jarvis out from players that AN has thought to be in range of selection this far, plus Thompson as emergency choise. We currently have also 2 strikers and 2 emergency choises for that spot and few midfielders that have played that spot. 4 fullbacks, 4 centre backs with 1 emergency choise. I really find it hard to see where our squad would be unbalanced or position where we have too much choises

Yeah defence tried to play it safe by numbering the box instead of focusing man marking and it looked like it took deflection, so really frustrating goal to give away at last minute after dominating the game last 15 minutes.

Quite odd one if true. He has played as advanced lone striker, but is more efficient in countering tactics and as wide striker where there is room for him to run, but would at least offer different type of striker for us. Just hopefuly he could adabt the league and previous season wasn''t odd one as stat wise he has not been anything special before this sesson I have followed Elche quite closely previous season as my old buddy plays there and he also said that guy is a bit air head, but aren''t most of jockies ;)

As I said in other thread there is lot of suitable options there for us and we only need to find them. For example Real Madrid is looking loan options for their striker Mariano who scored 25 in 28 in third tier spanish league. Would be cheap 1 year option for us with decent record and there is plenty similar options out there and I bet Alex with his scouts are trying to find right one.

Pff counted Maddison twice...

First of all we have 3 strikers in our books and only one of them is going to play most of the time. Naismith is a striker or second striker. He certainly is not a attacking midfielder. It goes without saying we should replace at least one of Lafferty/Naismith duo to get a striker who fits our system. But behind them there is 3 places to fill and we had before signing 8 players to fill them. Murphys, Wes, Canos, Maddison, Brady, Jarvis and Maddison. Naismith can be used here, but as said it isnt his place and tactics need to be altered for it. Also we are most likely going to lose Brady, loan other Murphy and Jarvis will be gone for big part of season. That would make 5 players for 3 places for first part of the season + Naismith and from those players 2 are quite young and 1 quite old to play week after week. For me it was quite obvious we are going to get 1 player more for those slots. So yes we needed Pritchard and most of all I am happy that we are going for creativity as that was something we lacked in premiership outside of Wessi and Redders. Also Canos, Josh and Pritchard are proven goalscorers on this level so we most likely dont even need 20 goal striker, but a striker that can get most out of his supporting players. Thats why I am personaly happy that we probably dodged a bullet with McCormack.

I liked this Brexit so much more

Yeah and when we would sign Jones and he would score 0 for us in 20 games, not because of his mistakes, but the delivery, would he become useless player on the field? The volley he had was very dificult and came quickly. It comes to pure luck to convert one of those.

[quote user="tele"]Plenty of chances created there, and still our forwards can''t score. At least Elmander puts himself about. As soon as RVW comes on it''s like playing with 10 men.[/quote] You dont dominate the game with 10 against 11. RvW didnt do much wrong in those minutes he was on the field and gave few decent game improving passes. Stop single outing players.

Have to give it for the team even thought we lost. Good game outside of odd 30 minutes from which 25 was decent too. Really heart broken for this loss. We were better team and we should have used those chances and their equalizer should never come which led for 2 minute panic. Damn..

As I said earlier.. so unlucky..

2 black minutes seems to take this game from us... God football is sometimes frustrating.

city4eva I dont know if you watch the game, but before my comment we hit the post.

city4eva I dont know if you watch the game, but before my comment we hit the post.

So unlucky..

And then players crap in their pants..

For a good sake how stupid mistakes make it easy for Cardiff.. no threat at all and Hooper goes to give them a goal.

In my opinion Elmander was our best player and Tettey with rust just shows up how much we have missed his mobility. Johnson has again so much more time to do his job. Anyway 25 great minutes and after that players some how started to forget how to pass. Reason can be that Cardiff started to press quite high, but still in 3 vs 4 counters we should be a bit more clinical with passing. We had great chances to get it 2 - 0 from those counters, but last pass was always poor except the time when Johnson shot was blocked. Anyway decent game from lads. Would prefer game to calm down a bit ^^ it is getting on my nerves that we play so open.