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cambridgeshire canary

Kristoffer Ajer.. The one that got away?

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Just watched the Brentford V Wolves highlights and just like the rest of his games for Brentford he's looking incredible, every part the solid, tough Premier League defender making fantastic blocks and tackles like its nothing.

 

And God it hurts knowing he could have been ours if Webber just decided to spend an extra two or three million on trying to buy him..

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Said it at the time we'd regret not pushing the boat out, said he was better than any of our defenders. I stand by those comments. 

However I'm not sure any defender is going to look good until Farke changes his mantra regarding this area of the field. There are many things Farke is superb at, setting us up tactically to be able to defend properly is not one of them, why on Earth has he never employed a specialist defensive coach??? We must be the only club without one!!! 

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I was not that upset at the time based on Celtic fans claims he was not great defensively but clearly he had gone stale there and was coasting. It does look like a potentially very costly bit of “tightness” from us. 

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It's too early to write off Kabak. 21 years old and played his first league game since May.  I liked his link up play with the midfield. It is our overall defensive play that is the problem not a lack of one player.

Edited by The Bristol Nest
I am illiterate.

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7 minutes ago, MORDENCANARY said:

The probably would have looked a bit 'iffy' playing in this Norwich team as the back line are just so exposed all the time.

Also this. 

As an example, Basham, Egan and O'Connell at Sheffield United in 2019/20 missed a total of seven matches between them as Sheffield United finished ninth, conceding only 39 goals. In that defensive unit and system, with that record, they look fantastic but they're probably not Premier League defenders as individuals and if you took any of them and put them into our current team then I doubt they'd improve things. Ben Godfrey was a regular for us that season and we finished bottom, conceding 75 goals, but Godfrey has proven himself to be better as an individual.

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44 minutes ago, cambridgeshire canary said:

And God it hurts knowing he could have been ours if Webber just decided to spend an extra two or three million on trying to buy him..

Can we please stop perpetuating this fallacy. The difference wasn't £2-3m, it was much more.

We offered £10m all in. Brentford paid a rumoured £13.5m plus add ons that could take it as far as a rumoured £18-20m. They haven't deemed it necessary to sign as many players so instead focused on one or two key positions. We did not have that luxury after trimming the squad by a considerable number.

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42 minutes ago, Ken Hairy said:

Said it at the time we'd regret not pushing the boat out, said he was better than any of our defenders. I stand by those comments. 

However I'm not sure any defender is going to look good until Farke changes his mantra regarding this area of the field. There are many things Farke is superb at, setting us up tactically to be able to defend properly is not one of them, why on Earth has he never employed a specialist defensive coach??? We must be the only club without one!!! 

Agreed - even in the first promotion season we shipped many soft goals but that was glossed over by the goal scoring at the other end. Farke's first priority for defenders has always been that they ...'are comfortable in possession' and 'can play out from the back'. All well and good but that has eff all to do with the basics of keeping clean sheets!  

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Kabak has played one game ffs. I previously felt that on paper Kabak was the much more exciting and ambitious signing. Maybe we should wait more than 1 game before trying to make that sort of judgement.

Worth noting that Brentford as an overall team have looked much more organised than us so far, they’ve conceded just 2 goals in 5 games, as opposed to our 2.8 goals per game, so I’m sure it’s a lot easier for their centre backs to have a solid game with a strong structure ahead of them than it is for ours at the minute. We’re all over the place in the midfield and clearly feeling the impacts of an extremely hectic transfer window.

Now we’ve got Normann and Kabak in the team I think we might start seeing some green shoots.

Edited by Hank shoots Skyler

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52 minutes ago, cambridgeshire canary said:

Just watched the Brentford V Wolves highlights and just like the rest of his games for Brentford he's looking incredible, every part the solid, tough Premier League defender making fantastic blocks and tackles like its nothing.

 

And God it hurts knowing he could have been ours if Webber just decided to spend an extra two or three million on trying to buy him..

Dont think it's a case of Ajer being better. It probably helps that he arrived at Brentford about 4 weeks before Kabak did here.

Not getting these players in early enough and our awfull pre season is really hurting us. 

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It's not the personal, it's the defensive nous and set-up that is wrong, as others above have pointed out.

The second goal yesterday is a perfect example of this. Every single defensive player (with the exception of Krul and Aarons, the later who was at fault for the first goal) had a part to play in that goal being conceded. 

Williams - Has the stamina and speed so no idea why he wasn't sprinting back as soon as the ball is switched by Sissoko 

Normann - the biggest culprit in the goal and I'm hoping this was purely down to lack of match-fitness as he was taken off early. He could see the player and the danger right infront of him and he still just casually jogged back (this is where a certain Skipp was so good). 

Hanley - Positionally was fine but just that half a yard too slow at this level in the initial reaction process against decent players. 

Kabak - Again positionally fine, but the lack of communication (perhaps understably right now) was clear and evident all match long between himself with Hanley and Aarons. It's the perfect movement by Sarr that did both Kabak and Hanley here, Kabak simply has to follow him though and get his body in the way. 

.....

Ultimately though, the space for that second goal once Sissoko switched it was what was wrong with the whole 4-3-3 set-up, simply way too much space for Normann/Gilmour/Mclean to cover. It does not work. 

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A disjointed midfield is more of an issue for me. I think the personnel in defence are good enough to be competitive at this level. We haven't (yet?) got the system or balance right in the engine room. I still hope we achieve this, but I am getting increasingly concerned that we may be in too big of a hole by the time we do. We are only 5 games in but yesterday was a bitter pill to swallow. Two tough away games coming up, and we really need to stop the rot & get a few points on the board. A filthy 0-0 would help to steady the ship.

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What struck me from the highlights was how big the Brentford players are - not just Ajer. 

Despite the plan to learn from 2019/20 I still think we look flimsy, lightweight and too easily bullied.

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Just now, KeiranShikari said:

Our offer was up to 10m. Thier offer was up to the best part of double that. It's not like we lost him over nothing.

 

No, but we spent £30 odd million on players that aren't starting in a team embarking on possibly the worse run in EPL and club history!

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3 minutes ago, Dean Coneys boots said:

I got roasted for suggesting we dropped the ball in letting him go…well…

…well he was positionally very poor and let the significantly shorter Jota score an easy header.

Had that been a city player we’d be roasting them for yet another simple mistake.

Hes not one that got away, move on

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Worse run in club history!!!!11exclamationpoint!!!

lol

How many of our other seasons have started with this many top 6 sides? How many seasons have our pre seasons been thaat disrpupted. Not to mention soon to key players coming in at the death of the window. We're also looking to replace the heart and lungs of our side.

Still a way to go obviously but some of you people are so short sighted.

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Just now, KeiranShikari said:

Worse run in club history!!!!11exclamationpoint!!!

lol

How many of our other seasons have started with this many top 6 sides? How many seasons have our pre seasons been thaat disrpupted. Not to mention soon to key players coming in at the death of the window. We're also looking to replace the heart and lungs of our side.

Still a way to go obviously but some of you people are so short sighted.

How many times will some fans wheel this one out? 

It's excuses. End of. We're not good enough! 

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We didn't need Ajer just like we didn't need Kabak. We needed a proper out and out defender, a taller, stronger player who can deal with crosses and corners. Semi Ajayi would have been a much better target to pursue and he can play defensive midfield if needed, we might have had to pay a bit more, but we would've gotten a better player. 

 

When I watch Brentford I don't see Ajar as what we're missing, I just think their whole playing style and the physical profile of their players suits this league so much better than ours and it's why their competitive. I don't think Ajer would be making too much of a difference for us.

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1 minute ago, KeiranShikari said:

Worse run in club history!!!!11exclamationpoint!!!

lol

How many of our other seasons have started with this many top 6 sides? How many seasons have our pre seasons been thaat disrpupted. Not to mention soon to key players coming in at the death of the window. We're also looking to replace the heart and lungs of our side.

Still a way to go obviously but some of you people are so short sighted.

Come on. The tough start is acknowledged. But Pre season is now meaningless because you said so many came in at the death and we have played 6 games, with a differrent tactic, style and lineup nearly every game. Who is going to get a decent run in the team? Apart from Hanley of course.

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I'm not saying I think we're getting it all right but the reality is we could have been at our best in every single one of those games and still not been much better off. That's a fact, not blind optimism.

From 15 down in the league only 1 team has actually won a game tthus far this season.

 

 

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No.

Brentford continue to deploy the same style and approach to games as well as formation. Ajer has slotted into that well, but the players around him are well versed and can help him get used to his role as a result.

None of our new players have been afforded that yet as the existing players are too busy trying to get to grips with their roles.

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