Ricardo's report v Leeds

[ricardo 7,384]

Today''s wind and rain came with a sudden drop in temperature so it was no surprise that Ricardo gave his woolly hat and gloves their first airing of the season. The Johnson haters got their wish as the former Leeds man was named as a sub and Howson, Lafferty and Murphy came into the starting line up.City should have drawn first blood when Martin had a free header from a corner but he made poor contact and the ball flew well over the top. Then Tetty dragged a 20 yarder wide as City dominated play. There was little of note coming from Leeds who seemed content to sit behind the ball, although Ruddy almost gave them an opening when tarrying too long over an easy clearance. Thankfully the Leeds striker could only square the loose ball across goal and not into the net.That was about all we saw from Leeds for the rest of the half as City huffed and puffed, playing innumerable passes across the field without much penetration. Redmond and Murphy both looked sharp early on but too often the good work was spoiled by an inaccurate cross or pass. Tetty finally tested the keeper with a firm 25 yard effort but City were finding it difficult to create clear cut openings.There was some sort of tussle between Jerome and the Leeds central defenders mid way through the half, aimed at getting the big man booked and it looked to me that Clattenburg had fallen for it when he produced a yellow card after a long delay. The niggly stoppages were annoying the crowd and breaking up play but after some prolonged City pressure, Lafferty was only a yard wide with a low shot. By now City were camped out in the Leeds half and as City upped the pace, Silvestri in the Leeds goal did well to parry a Redmond effort. We were out of our seats in the ensuing scramble as Laffers had two bites at the cherry before a flag brought a halt to proceedings.It was frustrating stuff alright, Jerome lashed a long shot just over and then another corner went to waste and when the whistle went for halftime I was beginning to wonder when this misery was going to end.The signs didn''t look promising as play resumed it''s familiar pattern. Jerome almost got on the end of a through ball but if anything City were getting more ragged as they crowd began to lose patience as the confidence drained away. Redmond and Murphy swapped wings and they combined well to earn a corner just before the hour mark. This time the delivery was spot on and Martin headed low past the diving Silvestri to give City the lead.All plain sailing from here on in, we all though and as Murphy was withdrawn for Hooper everyone must have been thinking that it''s now just a case of how many. Somewhere along the line we have offended the God''s of football because out of the blue and quite against the run of play, Leeds got their one shot on goal and as has happened so many times recently it just had to go in the net. There seemed little trouble as they broke down the left and even when the ball reached Doukara he had two men in attendance. Somehow he got a shot away and I don''t think anyone was surprised that it flew in the corner.From then on we plugged away but there always seemed to be a loose pass or brilliant block to stop our progress. In the final minutes Bellusci, clearly handled a cross from Odjidja but Clattenburg pointed to his chest when we could all see that it was the hand that flicked out. When Hooper was bundled over in the box a minute later I didn''t even bother to appeal. It was totally in keeping with the whole game.You usually have to endure one or two games a season like this but I''ve now seen four on the trot and if it weren''t for the different colour shirts I''d be thinking I was seeing the same game over and over again. 20 shots, 6 on target against 4 shots 1 on target, how does this end up at 1-1?When will this misery end?[:@]

[Drazen Muzinic 1,445]

Thanks Ricardo - another great report.

Yep, deja vu. Four almost identical games where you come away feeling mugged. Two-thirds of the play, 20+ goal attempts but the away team sit deep and score with their only meaningful shot.

I though both Howson & Tettey were great tonight but the problem was losing the pace of the attack down each flank - too much checking back or cutting inside rather than beating the defender.

Whittaker for me is not up to it. Too many misplaced passes or lost possession too. Martin is a better FB and I feel works well with Redmond.

We also don''t seem to drill too many shots or crosses into the box. These are the things that bring you the ''luck'' people are saying we need.

Is it tactical naivety? It it the weight of expectation at Home? Is it managerial inexperience? I''m not sure but we have witnessed four almost carbon copy games in a row and I think that''s at least two too many. We should be able to make our own luck by now.

[mrs miggins 0]

Another good report Ricardo, although you make it sound as if we deserved more, much like the other recent results where we''ve dominated but not created much of any real note, again I personally don''t think we did enough to deserve to say we should have won that game

[Dubai Mark 0]

Many thanks Ricardo as always.

I am getting concerned, how much longer are we going to under perform? Sure this is a league in which you can have a couple of poor runs, lose a dozen games and still go up via the play-off''s. BUT, this squad IS good enough for automatic promotion and all of a sudden we are getting relegation zone type results..........it needs fixing quickly I feel as this season really is a golden opportunity for the bounce back.

[Indy 3,297]

Two things stand out for me from last night.

1st, why is it we think we have a good back 4 and why keep playing Turner who cost us yet another goal, that header directly to the Leeds player was utterly avoidable.

As Charlton one shot one goal so what was an easy night for tge back line and they still managed to score.

2nd Johnson haters is going a bit far, I doubt anyone on here influenced Adams he just seen what a lot of have that Johnson has been poor.

Howson was heads above anyone else last night and it was the right choice to drop Johnson.

What I saw last night was a very negative slow build up which allows teams get set.

what is missing is a tempo the only time we hit a high tempo is when we''re chasing a game.

One minor point Jerome wasn''t booked after a long delay, he was booked when play started for a rough challenge.

Lacklustre, negative and slow is the way to sum us up at the moment.

[Mutley 74]

Thanks Ricardo for your report. I was overseas with work for the last four games but was able to follow all of the matches on twitter feed and then to read your reports helped me get a grasp on how we have been playing.

Would you say that we played as well last night as we did in the previous two home games? I got a sense that we did deserve to win those but last night I did not agree with NA who said that we played ''very well'' and ''I could not fault the players''.

I also think that the incident with Jerome really had an impact on the game as he then was not as effective.

Thoughts?

[ricardo 7,384]

[quote user="Mutley"]Thanks Ricardo for your report. I was overseas with work for the last four games but was able to follow all of the matches on twitter feed and then to read your reports helped me get a grasp on how we have been playing.

Would you say that we played as well last night as we did in the previous two home games? I got a sense that we did deserve to win those but last night I did not agree with NA who said that we played ''very well'' and ''I could not fault the players''.

I also think that the incident with Jerome really had an impact on the game as he then was not as effective.

Thoughts?[/quote]I thought we didn''t play as well as in previous home games but having said that we were still far superior to Leeds and had more than enough chances to win the game. You only have to look at the balance of possession and shots totals to see which way the wind was blowing. Unfortunately we don''t seem to be able to convert this into 3 points.

[nutty nigel 7,528]

Yes plenty good enough to win the game but if you don''t score goals you don''t win. Thought the main reason we were not so good was the absence of Wes. We also could have done with BJ bullying them in midfield. But I guess we all have our favourites.