Masters of our own downfall

[italian dave]

46 minutes ago, CrackingCheeseGromit said:

Think Wells was playing but was injured in the warm up

Not in the pre match warm up. He wasn't in the starting XI that was published at 2pm. 

[italian dave]

14 minutes ago, The Swan and Cemetery said:

I didn’t think Vyner was as bad as everyone saying (which maybe gives me a clue!), thought he was trying to get some forward momentum, which admittedly didn’t always come off and also thought he made some decent interceptions/tackles. Today at least Tanner made it more difficult for him, his body shape/first touch seemed to be consistently to come back towards his own goal, rather than move the play forward. Roberts and Yeboah at least brightish sparks. There was a lot of space out there today and we definitely should have made more use of it. 

I had just the same thought about the space today. Compared to Preston for example.

We just don't seem to ever move forward with conviction or as a team. 

[TDarwall]

Was surprised to see Cornick go off (unless injured) as thought he had a decent 1st half.  Generally I'm not a fan of h/t substitutions unless someone is having the mother of mares or a big tactical change is needed.

Cam doesn't really seem to have going this season, can't really any rampaging runs. I think Roberts will get a start sooner than later. He did over hit some balls today but I think for now we may be better forfeiting Cams raw pace for Roberts technical ability.  I know it was only v Oxford, but he linked up really well with Mehmeti & so far this season that's the only real success we've seen from a full back/winger combo.

[red colin]

32 minutes ago, pongo88 said:

This is an interesting summary, and I agree with you on some points, but others I have to disagree.  IMO there was never a period in the first half when we controlled the game, or was on top.  It was just a period of average play from both sides that cancelled each other out. I also felt that Cornick never caused any problems for Birmingham. He ran around and got into some good positions but never did anything meaningful with the possession. As for “ Generally we weren’t bad”, well, if that wasn’t a bad performance god help us if we do have one (zero shots on target and of the others not one forced Ruddy to make a decent save) 

Have to agree with pongo

[IAmNick]

Broadly how I saw the game as well.

I thought Cornick had a good first half and was involved in some of our better play - I was surprised he went off. We looked quicker in the second half, but I'm not sure we were more effective.

I applaud Vyner for trying to get the ball moving forwards and being brave, and I like the passes he hits low through the centre... but he needs to know when to do it. They risk becoming the Hollywood crossfield balls he used to play a lot which were rarely effective. On top of that some simple stuff was just awful.

I thought James had a good first half especially with a lot of interceptions and "right place right time" pieces to his game that perhaps we just expect now. There was one break they had where he was the furthest man back, sprinting to clear the danger and the only one who saw it.

Bell... I want to like, but he was very frustrating the second half as others have said. I'm not going to be too hard on him though, he just looks like he needs a lot of game time at the moment.

Overall I just feel with Bell alone up front we're so, so predictable at the moment... and maybe in general in fact. We go back and forth, we go up a wing, we try and get a low cross in from the byline. We've seen it in loads of the training vids, and I feel like it's 90% of what we see on the pitch.

I think our midfield 3 too often get strung out in a line rather than staying as 2 and 1 (or 1 and 2), with Knight furthest forwards, then Williams in the middle, then James at the back. It means passing options are really sparse and as I said, it forces us to go wide every time and be very predictable.

Edited August 19, 2023 by IAmNick

[maxjak]

1 hour ago, Davefevs said:

Haven’t read any else’s comments from about 14:30 so here’s my review.

Surprised at line-up, then saw Wells wasn’t in 20 (19) so kinda got that.  Then found out it was teamsheet error and he was on the bench.  So surprise justified.

Than the game.  Times might not be 100% accurate.

First 5-10 mins: very sloppy, really gave Birmingham a lift early in the game, and then had a few opportunities.  Dembele causing issues for Tanner.  Vyner and O’Leary passing a bit all over the shop.

Next 5-10 mins: parity, we got into the game, started to pass it better, got ball onto Tanner who wasn’t being tracked by Dembele.

Next phase of game until roughly 40 mins: we controlled the game, Williams finding pockets in midfield, Dickie feeding Pring and sometimes getting the ball in front of him too!  Bell occasionally dropping in and then spinning in Cornick.  Cornick getting space, causing a few problems, although a few crosses straight to Ruddy.  Mehmeti pegging back Laird, Knight reversing a few passes onto runners.  Dickie heads over, think it was Tanner had a shot blocked after Cornick’s endeavour.  City, well on top, starting to create chances (5 shots v 4 shots appt this point having been 0-4 after 10 mins).  Looking better, Dickie driving into their half, etc, etc.

40 mins: Laird goes off injured, a moral victory you’d think.  Bacuna back to RB, Miyoshi on in RW.

41 mins:  Vyner whose distribution had been suspect anyway tries to play a Marlon Pack ball through the eye of a needle, underhits it, gets intercepted, they break on us, almost score but for a combo of Williams and O’Leary on the line to deny Miyoshi.  Then comes a flurry of corners and chances that leads to Miyoshi volleying home exquisitely.

HT: basically undone by a stupid 5-8 minute period.  Tanner has been poor, I see Sykes warming up.  I assume he’s the sub.  Take my seat to see Roberts on for Pring.  I’m surprised.  Also see Tanner is out there, surprised further

2nd half:

First few minutes: not a lot happening.

Next 10 minute or so, up to the hour mark: a bit of huff and puffing but we are in the ascendency.  Knight steals from Long, sets Sykes away, fouled, free-kick, hits the wall.  We make some subs.

Next 10 mins, up to 70 minute mark: putting a lot of pressure on from corners, without getting real chances.  Bell wastes at least three chances to sling the ball in with his left foot when beyond Bacuna, each time he tries to check back onto his right foot and the chance is lost.  Roberts has fed him a few times.  Knight is starting to find pockets and feeding Sykes.  Birmingham look out on their arses fitness wise.  Bielik and Sunjic are leaving huge gaps.  But we decide to let them have a couple of chances, one that clips the post, and that gives them a boost.

I lose a bit of track of the timeline at this point.

Next: Dickie suicide.  I assume first half yellow was for backchat.  It comes back to bite him on the arse.  He gets a second yellow.  Game over surely?

Next:  Wells chance.  Oh the effing irony of Bell slinging one in with his left foot.

Game peters out, they score on the counter.

Other points:

O’Leary: couple of crap passes, but distributed the ball decently to Tanner.

Tanner with Dembele back to him got rolled inside everytime. Poor today

Vyner: poor all game, defensively too, but passing especially.

Dickie: stupid.  Played quite well otherwise.

Pring: decent enough / Roberts: decent enough, played Bell in a few times, overhit some pinged cross field passes.

James: important foot-ins early game, did ok

Knight: a bit of the periphery at times, but ok

Williams: decent game, against a low bar, my City MOTM. / Naismith: did ok….shit pass intercepted led to 2nd goal.

Cornick: our first half threat came predominantly down the right side and he did ok. / Sykes: did ok, looked like he might create something

Bell: didn’t impact the game as CF, then wasted lots of chances to cross when LW, poor. / Yeboah: did ok

Mehmeti: worked hard, did ok without really being creative. / Wells: could’ve been the saviour.

 

Overall, our effing stupid passing out from the back was own downfall.  Generally we weren’t bad…we weren’t great either.  But we have to learn not to conced chances in batches and allow sides off the hook.

Birmingham:  decent enough side.  Gifted the goals / points really.

 

Today was far more open than I was expected.

 

In the week, @Spike put up a chart from sofascore to say how poor attacking we were, especially Preston.  Here’s today’s that I’ve just screenshotted.  City top, Brum bottom

I’m sure most will say how shit we were today, but the timeline tells is slightly different.

Did we create great chances, certainly not.  But we did work the ball into good areas.  That isn’t enough, I accept that.

Generally, we just about played ok, but the individual errors exaggerate the performance negatively.  Those errors frustrate / anger me tonight.

 

Mods - merge if you like, but I’d prefer you didn’t.

Nice assessment Dave........may i ask what you think we should do?  Stay as we are....or do u think we need a forward and a midfielder....as i do.  We have sold our best two players, and our best striker is injured.  Do we recruit some quality (If Poss) or persevere with what we have?

[redsocks]

Well i thought we were shocking.no shots on goal at home.birmingham were strong but nothing special.we need to be better at home or we could be drawn in to danger.

[Davefevs]

8 minutes ago, maxjak said:

Nice assessment Dave........may i ask what you think we should do?  Stay as we are....or do u think we need a forward and a midfielder....as i do.  We have sold our best two players, and our best striker is injured.  Do we recruit some quality (If Poss) or persevere with what we have?

I honestly don’t think 3 across the front line works.  We have to get a pairing going.

I think we have the players to play something akin to 4312/4132.  But it will mean the forward pairing having to split and do a lot of work to stop teams playing out through their full-backs, and mean a flatter midfield-three has to work sideways much quicker.

I think we have the players to play it…and I think it would get the best out of Wells, Conway (when fit) and Cornick.

[Redrascal2]

57 minutes ago, pongo88 said:

This is an interesting summary, and I agree with you on some points, but others I have to disagree.  IMO there was never a period in the first half when we controlled the game, or was on top.  It was just a period of average play from both sides that cancelled each other out. I also felt that Cornick never caused any problems for Birmingham. He ran around and got into some good positions but never did anything meaningful with the possession. As for “ Generally we weren’t bad”, well, if that wasn’t a bad performance god help us if we do have one (zero shots on target and of the others not one forced Ruddy to make a decent save) 

Spot on.

[Mr Popodopolous]

2 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

I honestly don’t think 3 across the front line works.  We have to get a pairing going.

I think we have the players to play something akin to 4312/4132.  But it will mean the forward pairing having to split and do a lot of work to stop teams playing out through their full-backs, and mean a flatter midfield-three has to work sideways much quicker.

I think we have the players to play it…and I think it would get the best out of Wells, Conway (when fit) and Cornick.

I wondered abour Weimann behind Wells and Conway earlier in the season but do we drop Bell, Mehmeti, Sykes? The wide men.

A passer in that CM 3 is a must, perhaps 2 if Knight is the 1.

[Davefevs]

Just now, Mr Popodopolous said:

I wondered abour Weimann behind Wells and Conway earlier in the season but do we drop Bell, Mehmeti, Sykes? The wide men.

A passer in that CM 3 is a must, perhaps 2 if Knight is the 1.

Yes, if those are the 3 “forwards” you choose in “my system”.

I hate best elevens, as you know, but I’d happily play this front 6 against Hull on Friday (Conway injured / Naismith CB for Dickie)

Wells / Cornick

Weimann

Williams / James / Knight

 

 

[Mr Popodopolous]

1 minute ago, Davefevs said:

Yes, if those are the 3 “forwards” you choose in “my system”.

I hate best elevens, as you know, but I’d happily play this front 6 against Hull on Friday (Conway injured / Naismith CB for Dickie)

Wells / Cornick

Weimann

Williams / James / Knight

 

 

Think the midfield still a bit samey well that's not quite the word but minus Scott and Naismith who could give something different- at home certainly away it worked quite well at Millwall. However we have what we have across the team.

[Davefevs]

Just now, Mr Popodopolous said:

Think the midfield still a bit samey well that's not quite the word but minus Scott and Naismith who could give something different- at home certainly away it worked quite well at Millwall. However we have what we have across the team.

One pair (2 players) up top is better than three individuals imho.  Allows you to play Weimann or Mehmeti in the hole.

It also allows Pring room to get forward, assuming he plays.

[Mr Popodopolous]

Just now, Davefevs said:

One pair (2 players) up top is better than three individuals imho.  Allows you to play Weimann or Mehmeti in the hole.

It also allows Pring room to get forward, assuming he plays.

Get that too, just thinking of the balance in midfield and query James, Williams and Knight a bit. At home anyway. Certainly we need Naismith as one of the 3, IMO anyway.

[The Swan and Cemetery]

Just now, Davefevs said:

One pair (2 players) up top is better than three individuals imho.  Allows you to play Weimann or Mehmeti in the hole.

It also allows Pring room to get forward, assuming he plays.

Think on balance I agree, albeit we miss TC a lot. Overall think Birmingham were vulnerable and should have been easier to beat than PNE, who we hardly got a look in against. Birmingham were very decent going forward, but not great without the ball, we just failed miserably to threaten due to lack of concentration/precision. Not really a core strategy (or at least shouldn’t have to be), but endlessly letting balls run under our feet for throw ins summed up the weird mindset today. 

[Davefevs]

3 minutes ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

Get that too, just thinking of the balance in midfield and query James, Williams and Knight a bit. At home anyway. Certainly we need Naismith as one of the 3, IMO anyway.

As I said, Naismith is LCB for Hull.

Of course he could go Pring with Roberts at LB or Roberts with Pring at LB…that would leave Naismith to play in midfield.

[Mr Popodopolous]

1 minute ago, Davefevs said:

As I said, Naismith is LCB for Hull.

Of course he could go Pring with Roberts at LB or Roberts with Pring at LB…that would leave Naismith to play in midfield.

Oh yeah that could work. Roberts has some decent experience at Centre back too.

[Davefevs]

1 minute ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

Roberts has some decent experience at Centre back too.

At Academy level in the main.

[Mr Popodopolous]

Just now, Davefevs said:

At Academy level in the main.

Thought he played in a back 3 at Derby?

[Davefevs]

Just now, Mr Popodopolous said:

Thought he played in a back 3 at Derby?

Predominantly LB and LWB.

[Guest]

There is only one master at this club, so he must be master of it

[CheddarReds]

2 hours ago, ExiledAjax said:

Exactly, hence why the answer to the problem isn't signing one striker. When you have the information here, and the resulting shit/xG numbers, then you can see where the chain broke today.

That's still a link that needs fixing though, and that's the challenge. A new player could be part of that...but personally I'm not convinced.

So you're thinking the issue that needs fixing is more related to coaching? Have I interpreted this correctly?

[ExiledAjax]

7 hours ago, CheddarReds said:

So you're thinking the issue that needs fixing is more related to coaching? Have I interpreted this correctly?

Perhaps.

I think there was a question yesterday over decision making.

Mehmeti is a good case study. I've seen a few posts saying they he no longer takes people on in the way he did when he arrived last season. Now my memory is that when he did that, he often lost the ball, and I said at the time that he needed to learn to use his teammates and tone down the lone ranger runs.

But he may have gone too far the other way. He needs to be able to decide when to run, when to pass, when to cross etc. And yesterday I think he often got that wrong. Is that coaching? Probably yes, but it's also the player himself.

I'd say though that Birmingham played their part. Bell in particular seemed almost unable to get the better of the defenders and was therefore unable to get the pass or shot away. Overall Birmingham won most of the duels  and basically stopped us using the 64% possession we had. Is that coaching? Probably - but it's Eustace's coaching.

[spudski]

Re the poor distribution, passing and crossing. 

 

[Rob k]

8 minutes ago, spudski said:

Re the poor distribution, passing and crossing. 

 

Jesus Christ - that’s worse than i remembered 

[Engvall’s Splinter]

13 minutes ago, spudski said:

Re the poor distribution, passing and crossing. 

 

Well that’s warmed my Sunday feeling. Thanks Fevs. 

[CityCiderEd]

28 minutes ago, spudski said:

Re the poor distribution, passing and crossing. 

 

I watched the game yesterday and this montage of play sums up the performance. I really can't take any positives from such an abject display. It also highlights that possession stats mean absolutely nothing..... Brum allowed us to have the ball without any worries that we could hurt them and just waited until the inevitable bad pass handed them the ball back. We were poor from 1-11.

[luke_bristol]

30 minutes ago, Rob k said:

Jesus Christ - that’s worse than i remembered 

That is embarrassing.

[And Its Smith]

53 minutes ago, spudski said:

Re the poor distribution, passing and crossing. 

 

Good choice of song! ‘Sing me to sleep’. 

[ralphindevon]

1 hour ago, spudski said:

Re the poor distribution, passing and crossing. 

 

When I was driving home I was telling myself not to over exaggerate how bad the passing and at times the receiving of passes was.

Then I saw this. You’d have to drop down some leagues before you’d find a team where that was not an embarrassment.