Fulham are good but we didn't help ourselves

[headhunter]

You have to say that any side conceding 6 has been thrashed and City were despite a bright opening half hour when goals by Antoine Semenyo had twice put them in front. By half time the game was lost with City trailing 5-2 down to goals that were poor defensively and the sheer power of one player - Mitrovic

If you look at the goals the Serbian scored he got the better of whichever City player was nearest to him and why Vyner and not Kalas seemed to be tasked with keeping him in check was another to add to the list of increasingly baffling decisions being taken by Pearson.

I'd advocated Dasilva playing at RWB and whilst on the pitch he wasn't one of the worst performers if he'd made a meal of the challenge that saw him stumble in the penalty area we might have scored from the spot kick to take the lead for the third time.

This latest episode of the FBC PODCAST has Ian & myself reviewing the action and more: https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-ae883-117dd56 [also on Google, Apple & Spotify]

In our view, despite conceding 6 Max should retain the No.1 shirt, HNM & King were VERY poor yesterday, Weimann was VERY quiet,  & O'Dowda is a complete waste of a shirt. 

If there is to be any transfer activity then it must be a defender and defensive midfielder as there remains open ended uncertainty about what part Baker & Williams will play in the remaining 20 matches.

We won't go down as there are others worse than us but next Saturday's Severnside derby really is a must win game.

On the FBC Podcast we remain supportive of Pearson but that support is beginning to wane

[GrahamC]

So we’re back to slagging Weimann off, I notice.

King looking like the new scapegoat as well.

[headhunter]

20 minutes ago, GrahamC said:

So we’re back to slagging Weimann off, I notice.

King looking like the new scapegoat as well.

I said AW was quiet - that's an observation not a criticism.

How would YOU set the side up against Cardiff next week?

[GrahamC]

55 minutes ago, headhunter said:

I said AW was quiet - that's an observation not a criticism.

How would YOU set the side up against Cardiff next week?

Obviously depends who is fit, but assuming James is back;

O’Leary

Scott Vyner Kalas Atkinson Pring

James King O’Dowda 

Weimann Semenyo 

If not, I’d keep HNM in the side.

Genuinely don’t think we have too many other options in the absence of Tanner, Baker & Williams.

[Bazooka Joe]

6-2. Game, set and match to Fulham.

Some of our lot clearly at fault.

The ball's in our court on Saturday.

The players now need to rally together and serve up a good win against Cardiff.

Time for Semenyo and Weimann to volley a few into their net.

 

 

[italian dave]

1 hour ago, GrahamC said:

So we’re back to slagging Weimann off, I notice.

King looking like the new scapegoat as well.

I’m not into ‘slagging off’ or scapegoating, but both are fair comments about their performances yesterday.

As good as Weimann was last week, he was anonymous and ineffective yesterday. And when you concede 6 you have to look at your defensive mid as well as back 3. Far to much just passed King by yesterday. 

[redsocks]

Just seen the goals from Fulham yesterday.i will be honest our defence was shocking.to week no idea how to defend. Vyner again not good enough kalas not as good as everyone thinks he is.were do we go from here.?

[GrahamC]

16 minutes ago, italian dave said:

I’m not into ‘slagging off’ or scapegoating, but both are fair comments about their performances yesterday.

As good as Weimann was last week, he was anonymous and ineffective yesterday. And when you concede 6 you have to look at your defensive mid as well as back 3. Far to much just passed King by yesterday. 

Weimann has done incredibly well to come back from injury, contribute an unprecedented number of goals that see us in a relatively safe position. 

Everyone has off days, but he is massively in credit for me.

King is obviously not the player he was and is still finding his way back after injury, if either James or Williams had been available yesterday he probably would have done an hour at most, but they aren’t.

Maybe this is his last season, I would like to see us have another option before being quite so sure, for me he’s the sort of squad player we can afford & don’t have many of, at present.

[Pezo]

The only thing I would point out is that (as quite a fierce critic of COD) COD was a complete waste of a shirt yesterday, recently though he has been playing quite well though.

Yesterday felt like what Walsall must have felt like when we we beat them 8-2. Just a better side man for man and in some areas considerably better, they are also playing with a lot of confidence.

[italian dave]

4 minutes ago, Pezo said:

The only thing I would point out is that (as quite a fierce critic of COD) COD was a complete waste of a shirt yesterday, recently though he has been playing quite well though.

Yesterday felt like what Walsall must have felt like when we we beat them 8-2. Just a better side man for man and in some areas considerably better, they are also playing with a lot of confidence.

They did have that confidence, didn’t they. And given that they’d gone five (league) games without a win, and went behind twice, you’d wonder why. Our heads regularly drop the moment we go behind. Maybe another area where we need to learn from whatever they do. 

[Rossi the Robin]

1 hour ago, italian dave said:

They did have that confidence, didn’t they. And given that they’d gone five (league) games without a win, and went behind twice, you’d wonder why. Our heads regularly drop the moment we go behind. Maybe another area where we need to learn from whatever they do. 

Didn’t they thump Reading in the week by even more? 

[italian dave]

4 minutes ago, Rossi the Robin said:

Didn’t they thump Reading in the week by even more? 

My mistake, sorry! Teach me to assume that just because we didn’t have a midweek game others didn’t too!!

Maybe that’s where a bit of the confidence came from! We just need a 7 goal away win and we’ll be OK! 

[Shaun Taylor]

Considering NP was a no nonsense centre Half I'm surprised that you have the joint second worst goals conceded in the championship.

[Mike Stone]

1 hour ago, Shaun Taylor said:

Considering NP was a no nonsense centre Half I'm surprised that you have the joint second worst goals conceded in the championship.

The selection that is baffling a lot of people from yesterday is how Atkinson, a lump of a centre half we bought from Oxford who can play a bit as well didnt get selected to have a battle with Mitrovic. 

For Pearson to say he picked Zak because he has been playing well was a nonsense. We lacked a physical presence, surely its horses for courses  and needed someone to go toe to toe with the Serb yesterday. 

[Shaun Taylor]

6 minutes ago, Mike Stone said:

The selection that is baffling a lot of people from yesterday is how Atkinson, a lump of a centre half we bought from Oxford who can play a bit as well didnt get selected to have a battle with Mitrovic. 

For Pearson to say he picked Zak because he has been playing well was a nonsense. We lacked a physical presence, surely its horses for courses  and needed someone to go toe to toe with the Serb yesterday. 

I agree not picking a big centre half to try and nullify Mitrovic is baffling as he scores goals for fun in the championship If allowed time and space to dictate the game.

[headhunter]

6 hours ago, GrahamC said:

Obviously depends who is fit, but assuming James is back;

O’Leary

Scott Vyner Kalas Atkinson Pring

James King O’Dowda 

Weimann Semenyo 

If not, I’d keep HNM in the side.

Genuinely don’t think we have too many other options in the absence of Tanner, Baker & Williams.

If we're going to play a back 4 yours is about as good as it gets; shame we let Hunt move on with hindsight?

Middle i'd go James, Scott & HNM - we really don't need COD for his pace as he rarely threatens offensively and defensively, as others have commented, he has a track record of inadequacy! 

Weimann and Semenyo have both been used as so called "wide players" which further validates the omission of COD; in another post someone commented that he can't be that bad as he is regularly picked for his country - can anyone tell me one match winning display he has put in for his countrymen. 23 appearances - based on his scoring record with us he's due one for them. He's 27 in the summer and should be in his prime .... can't see anything coming now, sorry

[Numero Uno]

Numerous false dawns with O’Dowda. 8 assists and a handful of goals in 150 odd games tells me what I need to know. Always one step forward and two back with him.

Much to the disagreement of many I’m also struggling with Massengo. 1 assist, a couple of assisting the assists and no goals in 90 odd games doesn’t suggest he’s what we need right now and then compare that stat to Alex Scott who is basically a kid with a handful of appearances making his way in the game.

[GrahamC]

37 minutes ago, headhunter said:

If we're going to play a back 4 yours is about as good as it gets; shame we let Hunt move on with hindsight?

Middle i'd go James, Scott & HNM - we really don't need COD for his pace as he rarely threatens offensively and defensively, as others have commented, he has a track record of inadequacy! 

Weimann and Semenyo have both been used as so called "wide players" which further validates the omission of COD; in another post someone commented that he can't be that bad as he is regularly picked for his country - can anyone tell me one match winning display he has put in for his countrymen. 23 appearances - based on his scoring record with us he's due one for them. He's 27 in the summer and should be in his prime .... can't see anything coming now, sorry

Hunt was on circa £12k, we simply couldn’t afford it. I bet Simpson & Tanner aren’t on that between them (& yes, I do realise the former was a mistake).

He’s playing RWB at Wednesday, one division down, of course.

[frenchred]

3 hours ago, Shaun Taylor said:

Considering NP was a no nonsense centre Half I'm surprised that you have the joint second worst goals conceded in the championship.

Because tactically he is inept

[shelts]

Nigel tbf has said at times his selections have been wrong . Poor old Vyner who had previously been playing well given the task of stopping the big man was a mistake . A left footer at right back smacks of desperation to me . We’ve been unfortunate with injuries and I think we’ve deliberately gone with a smaller squad as to save money and is now biting us on the arse, more of a club decision than the boss’s . We have limited options which has forced the kids into playing and as long as we stay up, major surprised If we don’t , these lads have talent and will be a year wiser next season 

[Shaun Taylor]

7 minutes ago, shelts said:

Nigel tbf has said at times his selections have been wrong . Poor old Vyner who had previously been playing well given the task of stopping the big man was a mistake . A left footer at right back smacks of desperation to me . We’ve been unfortunate with injuries and I think we’ve deliberately gone with a smaller squad as to save money and is now biting us on the arse, more of a club decision than the boss’s . We have limited options which has forced the kids into playing and as long as we stay up, major surprised If we don’t , these lads have talent and will be a year wiser next season 

Do you think your missing a Aiden Flint type centre half to go with the talent you have?

[shelts]

3 minutes ago, Shaun Taylor said:

Do you think your missing a Aiden Flint type centre half to go with the talent you have?

Yes I do . I think Atkinson is the answer and a better footballer than Flint who knew his limitations 

[Shaun Taylor]

4 minutes ago, shelts said:

Yes I do . I think Atkinson is the answer and a better footballer than Flint who knew his limitations 

Sometimes it works having a big brickhouse type centre half who can do the dirty work alongside a ball playing more cultured footballer that's why I'm surprised Pearson hasn't sorted that out from day one and used that a platform to build a side that won't concede many goals. 

[The Swan and Cemetery]

The team selection did have a hint of trying things out to see what’s needed for the future, ie accepting that 0 points likely, anything more a bonus. If NP expects all his CB’s to be able to deal with all strikers, then testing Vyner was an opportunity to learn. Our run of games up to Blackburn indicates we’d expect to pick up a fair few points and be reasonably close to safety, given the troubles of teams below us. 

All that said, just trying to come up with a hypothesis that it was deliberate (don’t necessarily agree the right thing to do if it was), rather than pretty straightforward errors in tactics. Whilst Vyner wouldn’t be who I’d choose to put against Mitrovic if we were desperate to win, don’t think unreasonable to expect him to have performed a lot better than he did. Not acceptable just to be pushed off the ball etc - maybe he grows as a result, maybe he doesn’t. 

Some of what we see indicates NP has been told to keep us up, no more, invest time/effort in building something better, but cheaper, for next season and beyond. 

Hoping there’s some defensive talent in the U23’s, as currently those coming through all further up the pitch, but critical there is some, as we’ve made progress going forward, but getting worse defensively, with a lack of cash to spend.

[shelts]

5 minutes ago, Shaun Taylor said:

Sometimes it works having a big brickhouse type centre half who can do the dirty work alongside a ball playing more cultured footballer that's why I'm surprised Pearson hasn't sorted that out from day one and used that a platform to build a side that won't concede many goals. 

It surprises m too that we gift teams goals and the gaffa a decent stopper. Nigel can only work with what he’s got I suppose 

[Shaun Taylor]

2 minutes ago, shelts said:

It surprises m too that we gift teams goals and the gaffa a decent stopper. Nigel can only work with what he’s got I suppose 

Could he not get a couple of loan players in as he must have a lot of contacts 

[Davefevs]

10 minutes ago, Shaun Taylor said:

Sometimes it works having a big brickhouse type centre half who can do the dirty work alongside a ball playing more cultured footballer that's why I'm surprised Pearson hasn't sorted that out from day one and used that a platform to build a side that won't concede many goals. 

I think that was the plan, perm any 2 of Baker, Atkinson and Kalas.  Which we did early season, and we looked solid(er).

[1960maaan]

2 minutes ago, Shaun Taylor said:

Could he not get a couple of loan players in as he must have a lot of contacts 

Been mentioned that Nige doesn't like loans.
That said we may be forced into it. No money to spend, and no fit right back.

[Shaun Taylor]

Just now, 1960maaan said:

Been mentioned that Nige doesn't like loans.
That said we may be forced into it. No money to spend, and no fit right back.

Sometimes it can be the best option if you get the right ones in and you may end up signing them in the summer if they impress and they're not wanted at their parent clubs 

[shelts]

3 minutes ago, Shaun Taylor said:

Could he not get a couple of loan players in as he must have a lot of contacts 

Could be to do with money . Thought we might’ve had a couple in . Been in the game a long time . Plenty of talent in the lower leagues but always a gamble