Merrick's Marvels

8 minutes ago, maxjak said:

What a non-event of a Press  Conference ? ........Nige says we should be shouting from the rooftops about Matty James, as he is the best midfield coach at the club?   And Dan Bentley says we are a young squad (Really?) on a learning curve...Ha!     What a waste of time ,effort, and breath.  Why do they even bother?

The bench at Brum looked like a kindergarten class, dressed in hi-vis jackets, on a trip out from primary school.

26 minutes ago, Shaun Taylor said:

When Lou Macari was manager here in the mid 80's he had the players running along the ridgeway at 6am on a Sunday morning if they hadn't performed the day before and didn't matter if it was home or away and what time they got back on the Saturday evening.

Was that in between visits to the bookies and buying brown envelopes at WH Smith? 

2 hours ago, Redandproud said:

"WHAT"?

It was a light-hearted response to your post yesterday :

41 minutes ago, GrahamC said:

If you play for an hour a man short against a side packed with ex Prem players who were already 2-0 up you will always be in trouble.

From our point of view defeats for Derby, Hull & Cardiff were very good news.

Derby might be down awat, esp if they get a further points penalty. So to my mind, Barnsley losing would have been preferable. 

1 hour ago, big dosser said:

the first thing is to get us playing like a team that fights for one another, all im seeing is a poor bunch of misfits that could not give a shit about the badge on that shirt most weeks. 

Hate to say it but that's horseshit. Did you see the state of them at the final whistle on Saturday?

There's many things still need fixing but committment to the cause ain't one of them.

7 hours ago, The Bard said:

I said to @Harry when Massengo came on there was the potential this could go pear shaped with those 2 together. Both are headless and need a grounded player next to them.

 

In hindsight at this point it would've been better to have gone to a back 4, moved Vyner into CDM and had Bakinson and Massengo either side of him. Probably wouldn't have made a difference but at least someone would've occupied the middle of the pitch.

Adding Vyner to midfield, alongside Bakinson and Massengo, is shuffling the deck chairs on the Titanic!  

5 minutes ago, Peter O Hanraha-hanrahan said:

It’ll need to be far more than 9 points to help our cause.

Agreed. And I'm not convinced Derby won't overhaul us either, unless they get a further points penalty. I certainly can't see us beating them where it really counts - out on the pitch.

Unless January brings a miracle, we're in a scrap with Barnsley, Hull, Peterborough and Preston. Which leaves very little margin for error and I don't like those odds one bit.  

6 hours ago, maxjak said:

  If only he had taken advice from experts who excelled in THEIR chosen profession, namely the big bad world of professional football

 

To be fair, he eventually realised that's what he should do.

He just ****** up the selection process and settled on the wrong candidate (as per usual) - namely, The Snake. 

8 minutes ago, PFree said:

So Nige, come and build us a wonderful new house please...

We are a bit short of mortar and the only tools we have are a fairly short ladder, screwdriver and hammer sorry. That said as you’ve built a few nice new houses before and therefore have great experience, I am sure you’ll be fine. We don’t have a spirit level as we can’t afford one but, just use your eye, you’ll be fine.

Oh, and that nice new shiny hammer you’ve been given, it might be that if we get the right offer, we might have to replace it with an old one with a dodgy handle, we need the money sorry.

You have some labourers to work with but all the decent ones have gone sorry, we had to trim costs hence we’ve been left with those who like to cut the odd corner and are a little work shy sorry.

Good luck with the build.

Yours Faithfully,

A multi-millionaire owner

And the previous owners built their house with straw, on dodgy foundations, so you'll need to demolish it before building yours. 

Just now, Mr Chappers said:

Tanner & Atkinson look promising, but caught out a lot defensively, James looks shattered (understandably), Baker & Weimann bit of a stretch. King & Simpson have not really been a success.

Personally wouldn't have re-signed Baker on account of his injury record but there's more good signings than bad ones.  

2 minutes ago, Mr Chappers said:

And Nigel’s signings are?

Tanner is. Atkinson is. James is. Baker is. Weimann is. 

3 hours ago, Johnr1986 said:

Great topic, this would be my squad for current and former players since 2015

 

               Bentley 

Ayling Kalas Webster Bryant  

                Nagy

    Massengo    Brownhill 

elliason                       Ried

               Abraham 

 

oleary, federicks, benkovic, smith, freeman wells, 

 

 

 

Interesting.

You're allowed to bring back 5 ex-players but pick 12!

I know we're shite right now but still... 

33 minutes ago, OneTeamInBristol said:

First half an hour on Saturday he had a shocker, got dragged into the box towards the goal and left his man free out wide on multiple occasions, Massengo was pointing it out continuously. Think it affected his confidence as he kept hoofing the ball forward.

If he wasn't playing as his manager instructed him to do, he'd have been hauled off. How do we know this? Because that's exactly what happened the week before!

So I'd have thought that tucking in, playing close to Kalas, and leaving space out wide was, in fact, exactly what his manager had asked him to do. 

Pring was doing exactly the same on the other side. Further evidence, if it were needed, that our full backs weren't having "a shocker" at all. 

As for "hoofing the ball forward" - presumably you missed the fact that, rather a lot of the time, our full backs had no-one available to pass to other than a ball down the line aimed at Chris Martin (in case you hadn't noticed, this has been our default way of playing since day 1 of this season).

My amateur analysis is that our full-backs often had no-one to pass to for numerous reasons -  the way Barnsley set up, the fact we played with no width at all, the fact Bakinson is frequently a passenger, the fact Massengo's attempts to cover every blade of grass on the pitch, at least twice, means he ends up anywhere but central midfield, and Matty James can't be everywhere at once.          

So if anyone's had a shocker... 

It's what happens in front of them that causes us to be at 6s and 7s a lot of the time.

On Saturday Kalas and Atkinson played very well together. Tanner and Pring, instructed to tuck in and cover, also played well especially when you consider they often had opponents galloping towards them in acres of space out wide as well.

If the rest of the team had been set up to 1) retain possession better and 2) offer better protection to the back 4, it might not have required such a monumental effort to beat.... the worst team in the league. 

I appreciate we have players missing through injury but even the ones available on Saturday might have been deployed rather more effectively, in my amateur analysis. But what do I know?

Perhaps the manager should be applauded for being brave and "going for it" in what was, pretty much, a must win fixture?    

An exciting prospect who had an excellent game today. Comfortable on the ball (often no passing options in front of him today), good in the air for his height, defensively sound - one brave brilliant goal line clearance second half. 

Well played young un!

I love away fans (I don't really, at all, ever) - as he lay injured inside our goal, having made that last ditch clearance second half and been clobbered for his pains, the tykes sang "you soft southern bastard".

George is from Blackpool.

F wits.

7 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

I remember that incident…I agree.

This next comment is not about Benarous, but generally about how “match-like” training is?  I watched Callum O’Dowda skin his man 3 times in one Robinstv clip recently, and then I saw him try to “do” Joe Williams, who just put his arm across him and eased him off the ball.  That’s not having a go at O’Dowda either, but Williams for me, showed how you train at “match intensity”.

I've been wanting to post something about that Failand Uncut video! 

O'Dowda looks like Messi in that video - skinning people for fun in tight spaces with incredible skill.

Who the hell is that bloke cos the fella who turns up on matchday is someone completely different!?!

14 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

He’ll realise he has to think a bit quicker next time.

He had 1 moment where he had the ball under control and was facing up 2 defenders just outside their area.

He didn't look to just keep possession and pass backwards to a team mate (first mistake).

Instead he wanted to take them on. Fair play lad, I thought, show us what you're about.

He started to dribble... and was dispossessed like taking candy from a baby. 

As you say - absolutely everything he did needs to be quicker. Sharper. More precise.  

He's better than what he showed today.

What I question is the person who thought he was ready.

Just now, billywedlock said:

You don't recall Palmer and COD at our previous home game ! 

I do and I've also given up on Palmer as the answer to any of our problems - which indicates how poorly i think the young man played today.

Just telling it straight, like Pearson does Bill !

He's obviously a good player but is he ready?? Not on the evidence of that today - even if it's just for 20 mins, I expect him to control the ball and find a team mate, something he failed to do repeatedly. Never mind tackling his own team mate when we had possession which gifted the ball to Barnsley in our own half.

Not the lad's finest moment.

I agree wholeheartedly with your point that we're unlikely to buy our way to promotion and so the likes of Benarous will form the basis of any successful City side going forward.

But based on the team's performance today, that might be a successful City side that wins promotion from L1 to the Chamlionship.  

9 minutes ago, billywedlock said:

Who was your choice of sub ? Or no sub maybe ? 

Scott. 

I'd back him not to have a heavy touch virtually every time he had the ball, or choose wrong options or, extraordinarily, tackle - and flatten - his own team mate and in the process gift possession straight to the opposition in our own half (at which point, because I was looking right at him, Pearson went mental - and I mean mental).

The lad's clearly a talent but I'm struggling to remember a worse sub cameo. 

9 minutes ago, Port Said Red said:

This young man.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josh_Benson

I thought he ran the game in the 2nd 45.

I watched him warming up during half time (yes I'm sad!!) and thought he was striking a lovely ball but thought he'd probably not produce that if we got into him. 

We didn't get into him. 

3 hours ago, Davefevs said:

They weren’t dominating at all….it was a scrappy half, a pretty even half.  

3 hours ago, 054123 said:

Our own frailties gave them impetus, but even with that they didn’t strike me as being able to construct anything of note.

 

 

Only one team had a coherent pattern of play.

Only one team looked like they had a plan when in possession of the ball.

And it wasn't us.

At home. To bottom of the league Barnsley.

Forget the result. Everything else about today screamed relegation. 

5 hours ago, GrahamC said:

I don’t want to knock the kid, but how much off the standard was he?

Could see a case for taking him back off, so weak and letting his man go repeatedly.

It was like playing with 10 men, not sure he made a single positive contribution.

I hate to say this but...

I seriously worry about a manager's judgement if he thinks this kid is ready because for that 20 mins cameo we were, like you say, playing with 10 men. Then again, he replaced Bakinson, which meant we'd be playing with 10 men for the previous 70 mins anyway. Palmer would have held onto the ball better, which says it all. 

We are a shambles.

It's a no from me.

Plenty of other players from their side today who would improve us but not him.

Who the heck was their no.10 who came on at half time? 

26 minutes ago, ohhhshauntaylor said:

So 0 surprises really. 
Cheers, Nige 

I'd say Bakinson getting another chance is. And young Benarous on the bench.  

Wait until they get a brand new soulless bowl somewhere. No atmosphere. They'll be pining for noisy Loftus Rd then.

The mighty Mick Jones might write a song about it, so not all bad, eh - "The Ballad of South Africa Road" - a 1,2 3 4! 

If not, perhaps "I fought the council and, the council won". Yes indeedy, it'sbeen a long week. 

Taxi!