BRISTOL86

I’m sure he is aware and won’t like it. But I still think that’s it’s not in isolation a very useful stat. Extreme examples of course - but if you only create one CCC per game but are excellent defensively and prolific when those chances do come then you may win the league. Whereas you may play scintillating attacking football and create 5 CCC per game, but if you squander more than you take and can’t keep the ball out of your own net you may well get relegated. All that aside let’s just hope for a positive performance and result tonight. I think the reaction to Saturday was massively over the top, however I do appreciate the fact that it’s not just about these 3 games this season.

Haven’t seen the interviews but I think it’s pretty normal for them to be divvied up between LJ/DH/JM

Wow is it really that long? Jeez.

As far as I can tell we’ve adopted the ‘stand around and watch’ approach to defending so I can’t say I’m surprised! (And still we’ll all clamour for a striker )

That’s why the clear cut chances stat is nonsense. Combined 5 goals from 2 clear cut chances between us and QPR. Is there even a standard definition or is it down to someone’s personal judgement? I think you’d probably find the same at most clubs though. In fact I’d wager the majority of goals in the whole league don’t come from ‘clear cut chances.’ Just looked at the stats of all Boro’s games to date. They’ve created 6 clear cut chances apparently and scored 11 goals. Agree with the final paragraph, simply put we make it far too easy for teams to create chances against us because we’re piss weak as a team defensively.

When did I infer otherwise? Simply stating that you’d expect a strong correlation between possession and attempts to regain it.

Wouldn’t you expect 2) based on 1) ie if you have the most possession you’d make the least attempts to regain it? And 3) is just an inevitable outcome of 1) and 2) ?

In the last two games we’ve had 34 attempts at goal. You seem to be disregarding anything that isn’t a ‘perfect’ chance like a one on one, whereas the majority of goals don’t come from what you’re calling clear cut chances. None of the goals we’ve conceded have been incredible chances borne out of some amazing piece of creativity. You’ve illustrated my point perfectly by saying we’ve had one chance in three games - well we scored three goals from that ‘one chance’ Point being the problem isn’t a lack of creativity per se. A lack of being able to turn those opportunities - whether you deem them ‘clear cut’ or not - into goals, yes. But also like I keep saying, if you keep putting yourself in a position where you have to score two or three each game just to get something out of the game, you ain’t gonna win much. All good teams are hard to score against, and we are absolutely piss easy to score against. Just like last season And the season before And the season before I agree with you that the problem isn’t necessarily defensive personnel. It’s a symptom of the flawed system we are insistent on playing, a symptom of the fact that we don’t have a single defensive midfielder at the club, and a symptom of the fact that we lack any kind of fight when out of possession.

I don’t disagree that we could and should create more. But like I said you shouldn’t have to score 2 goals every game just to salvage a point. We’ll score a reasonable amount of goals this season IMO but once again it’ll be goals against that will be our downfall. Just like 17/18 Just like 16/17 Just like 15/16 Simply have not learned.

Well we hit the woodwork two or three times so you can’t get much closer. Weimann had a decent chance first half and we got in behind loads in the second half. Sadly we seem afraid to shoot at times.

Fair points. Thought I do think that we were actually pretty unlucky in front of goal today. We actually did create a few decent chances and didn’t really get that bit of luck. For me the problems are so much worse at the other end of the pitch. 4 out of our 5 goals conceded in the league were just desperately poor defending. Yea I’d like to see us be more clinical but we didn’t lack opportunity today.

Agreed but I think on the whole our performance was considerably better. There were times when Boro could barely get out of their half, and they were even trying to do it(!) If you mean me I didn’t say we didn’t change the way that we played, just that we weren’t exactly playing badly prior, unlike today when we were second best for most of the first half

Deserved something out of that second half in fairness. If we’d have played that way from the start we may have actually got something from the game.

So much better second half. Why do we have to wait until 2 down to play this way?

Not a chance he survives a third.

Sad thing is Boro haven’t even been good. They haven’t needed to be to comfortably beat us.

I was watching the stream and it looked an absolute certain penalty. When the Bolton commentators started talking about what a blatant penalty it was this - funnily enough - made me think it was indeed a penalty. I’m not even going to ask what on earth made you want to pull me up on this some 30 hours later, but clearly someone’s living it up on a Sunday night

Baker really confuses me. At times he looks quality and other times it’s like he genuinely can’t even be bothered to try.

The fact that you basically said we were awful which we weren’t. Bar one really poor spell we were completely dominant in both halves and never looked under threat. We weren’t clinical enough given the amount of the ball we had, I agree, but we’re also without our main striker so that’s not altogether surprising, is it? Of course there are always going to be things to be improved on, and we’re not always going to get what we deserve out of games. But I saw many more positives than negatives. Some people love to fixate only on the negatives and that’s their prerogative. I agree that Paterson was poor.

We don’t have many big players? I wouldn’t say we have zero bravery, simply that it was always going to be an uphill battle trying to beat Bolton on physicality alone. Agree on Watkins I thought he looked excellent (despite reading on here that he was useless and a wasted signing before he’d kicked a ball) Hunt looks great with the ball going forwards.

A much fairer assessment. We controlled both halves bar a terrible short spell in the second IMO. Lack of end product was disappointing but I see plenty of evidence that when the new boys bed in a bit more, and Diedhiou is back, we’ll get better.

To be fair we’re never going to out-head Bolton are we. We’re not that kind of team, and obviously the threat of Flint has been removed.

Watched

Diedhiou is going to thrive off of Eliasson. Not sure what he was taking in pre season but he looks a different player.

16 attempts on goal Es. I don’t know what the average in this league is but I’d wager it’s considerabky above it. Making them count is another matter of course but that wasn’t my point. We never looked remotely troubled at 0-0. Maybe it was complacency. But it’s still frustrating to see people fail to take any kind of positive when there were lots there today for those willing to see them.