Exactly what was needed

[Tumbleweed 106]

I believe it was an unchanged lineup today?  If so it perhaps reinforces the need for some consistency rather than all the tinkering. Not ecstatic, but I was strangely very pleased we eked it out. May be just one point but could do wonders for confidence.

[By Hook or Ian crook 917]

3 minutes ago, Tumbleweed said:

I believe it was an unchanged lineup today?  If so it perhaps reinforces the need for some consistency rather than all the tinkering. Not ecstatic, but I was strangely very pleased we eked it out. May be just one point but could do wonders for confidence.

Giannoulis started rather than Williams think that was the only change 

[Mullet 293]

5 hours ago, ricardo said:

Spot on.

Away point and clean sheets are hard to come by in this league.

A few positives are a clean sheet, an away draw which is never a bad thing, a roll your sleeves up battling performance, no costly errors at the back and some good individual performances. If we'd have started the season like this we'd be in a better position but credit to the players for putting a shift in today, can't expect much more than that

[Petriix 2,834]

1 hour ago, Ian said:

Yes, Brentford have done wonderfully so far, but we beat Man City last time we were in the Premiership too. It's not about performing well enough to win the odd game here and there if you are at your best, and fortune favours you, it's about a strategy that's going to see you perform consistently enough over an entire season to stay in the league and build on a solid base.

Whatever way you look at it, shipping almost 3 goals on average every game is going to make it almost impossible for you to win consistently, even if you have attacking players like Ronaldo and Messi. Today was not attractive but it was an absolutely necessary step IMO towards building confidence, and a solid spine, before focusing on the nice football.

We have been horrifically easy to go from back to front against in about 2 passes so far this season, so it was very good to see Burnley try to get in behind and go direct on many, many occassions but struggle against a well drilled defence.

Also, I don't agree that we generated far less than Burnley today - we generated some half decent opportunities but lacked confidence to do something decisive (other than Normann who nearly scored a wordly).

We've been shipping goals at one end and failing to score at the other. But we haven't once played the system we spent the last 4 seasons refining. The 4-3-3 didn't work so we've gone ultra defensive.

Sure, it's great not to lose, but it's disappointing not to given ourselves much of a chance of winning. There is a balance to be struck which we aren't even close to finding. We found it last season so I'm baffled as to why we haven't even given that tried and tested system a chance.

[Surfer 1,547]

1 hour ago, Mullet said:

A few positives are a clean sheet, an away draw which is never a bad thing, a roll your sleeves up battling performance, no costly errors at the back and some good individual performances. If we'd have started the season like this we'd be in a better position but credit to the players for putting a shift in today, can't expect much more than that

Three at the back seems to be working, Normann flanked by PLM and KMc was a solid platform.

And pleased to see us passing forwards not backwards. 

Question marks about the cohesion of the front 2 and two wing backs, but we have options there we can experiment with at least. 

For my money, players who would not really be missed if we play this formation, Aarons (controversial), Gilmour, Cantwell, Rupp.