Observation on our play...

[Jerseybean]

4 hours ago, And Its Smith said:

Can some it up by saying we lack consistent quality when in possession, whether that’s the player receiving the pass or the movement from others to receive the next pass 

I’d add we also are far too inconsistent with our passing, which means too often turning over possession, I know we aren’t Man City but we give the ball away far too cheaply, far too often. 

[Numero Uno]

4 hours ago, spudski said:

... I've noticed something that's crept into our game and it was really noticeable yesterday against a side who did it well. 

Being able to control a ball, with composure, and make angles to receive the ball at the right pace. 

We seem in our eagerness to play fast football on the transition to forget the basics. 

Passes are hit in hope rather than precision with correct pace. 

Often the first touch is like a trampoline and needs a second to control. Or there is no control and it's ' passed ' again into an area, in the hope it will be won again. 

There is a complete lack of composure...everything seems rushed. 

When we play well...we move into space to create angles and time to compose and pick a pass. We aren't doing that so often now. 

It's so rushed. And so many times players are cutting off a pass to themselves by standing in a straight line with an opponent in between. No angle or space. 

Ipswich did those basics very well. They weren't outstanding tactically, they simply did the basics well. 

 

No fault of Andy King who is doing a job but we miss both Vyner and Naismith. When they are in the side our passing along the back line is better (and sharper in particular) and our midfield produces more. It was to slow at the back when we’re trying to start attacks last night. Sam Bell playing in more central areas at times doesn’t work atm either. He’s not good enough with back to goal yet. Those things force us to rush in the final third tbf. It shows what many of us know, our first choice team can do it but we are a bit threadbare currently. To challenge the top half we need a good run with our best players fit.

Edited October 26, 2023 by Numero Uno

[Simon79]

5 hours ago, spudski said:

... I've noticed something that's crept into our game and it was really noticeable yesterday against a side who did it well. 

Being able to control a ball, with composure, and make angles to receive the ball at the right pace. 

We seem in our eagerness to play fast football on the transition to forget the basics. 

Passes are hit in hope rather than precision with correct pace. 

Often the first touch is like a trampoline and needs a second to control. Or there is no control and it's ' passed ' again into an area, in the hope it will be won again. 

There is a complete lack of composure...everything seems rushed. 

When we play well...we move into space to create angles and time to compose and pick a pass. We aren't doing that so often now. 

It's so rushed. And so many times players are cutting off a pass to themselves by standing in a straight line with an opponent in between. No angle or space. 

Ipswich did those basics very well. They weren't outstanding tactically, they simply did the basics well. 

 

The lack of movement has been seeping into our play for a while. Is that tiredness in the legs, in the mind? We aren’t able to change it up too much, so might be a reason. But ultimately, creating angles, passing & moving is basic stuff at any level, let alone Championship. But what I will say is that we stick in there, battle & actually, although they were better, we were in the game. Years gone by, second in the league would be considerably better than us, I don’t get that impression now. Shows how good a job Pearson has done with the tools he’s been given. COYR 

[Harry]

2 hours ago, W-S-M Seagull said:

We had a 80.8% successful passes last night which was higher than Ipswichs. 

It’s not about the success rate though, it’s how it was executed. 
I think the main point of Spudski’s comments is that we are sloppy with the passing and sloppy with the receiving of a pass. 
What I witness quite a lot this season is careless passing - for example a 5 or 10 yard pass, but it goes a yard behind the player, or is hit too slowly. Whilst this registers as a successful pass, it can slow the phase down or stop it completely by making a player have to turn back instead of continue forward. 
It’s the sloppiness in these types of easy passes which are standing out to often for me. 

1 hour ago, Port Said Red said:

The exception to the rule was Jason Knight who was always moving, always available and always knew what he has going to do with the ball. I don't think there was a blade of grass he didn't cover last night.

I’d disagree to an extent on Knight. 
I agree on his energy, enthusiasm, willingness etc. He’ll run all night for you and will make tackles and interceptions, but his quality on the ball has been very absent for me - not just last night but in many games so far. 
Don’t get me wrong, I do like him, but the point I make above regarding sloppy passes is very evident with Knight. 
One example that stuck in my mind last night was that awful moment where King completely missed the ball allowing them an attack. This came from the ball dropping on the half way line to Knight, he managed to control it and then had an easy ball on to James, 10 yards inside him, but he instead lofted one in the air 15 yards backwards toward King, who then looked like he’d never played football before attempting to control this loose ball from Knight. 
 

It’s those little moments that for me really hold us back and put us under unnecessary pressure. A simple pass could’ve been made in this instance but he panicked a little because he was being hurried and ended up making King look like a sack of spuds. 
 

We really need to get better at the basics - Spudski is 100% correct on that. Our basic passing is either too slow, or too hurried, or a yard or 2 behind the intended recipient. It counts as a completed pass, but it slows us down or puts the recipient under unnecessary pressure. 

[Davefevs]

5 hours ago, Open End Numb Legs said:

Fair point but remember that Ipswich went a bit AWOL in the last 15 minutes, their movement was poor. They out played us earlier at times so fitness is key.

Had we played the final pass or cross better it could easily have been 2-1 so that is where I would concentrate improvement. Too often we get to the byline, don't look up and the cross goes nowhere near our players. Having done the hard bit.....

One of the differences to Prem players is the whipped in cross, accurate and at pace. We rarely do that IMO.

@spudski definitely lacking in doing the basics well at times, agreed.

As for Ipswich around the hour mark, I started to see Ipswich succumb to a team that runs and runs.  At the 70 minute mark as the subs were starting to be introduced, Luongo and Morsy were making less and less angles.  They still “got out from the back” a few times because they are good footballers, but we started to see more long balls from them, they got deeper, and we started to really get on top.

From a data perspective….from 76 mins to the end of the game, Ipswich managed just 3.6 passes per possession before we won the ball back, or they lost it (kicking it out), fouling us, etc.  The average through the game 9.92.  It showed that

Unfortunately we used up a lot of energy doing so, and lacked that final bit of composure under pressure when it mattered.  But we are a fit team, even if we are getting injuries.  We stick at it.  I think with a better bench to allow others to go full throttle all game we will do better, like we did earlier this season.

[Hello Dave]

To play pass and move football, players have to move. It sounds simple, but the man on the ball, most of the time has no option. I agree with Spudski that our control is poor, but also that we are not on the half turn when we receive the ball. This means, either the ball goes backwards straight away, or we take too many touches to get it under control and get closed down. One thing that has been glaringly obvious , is the amount of times that players don’t look to play forward. Their first thought is to play sideways or backwards. If you look up and there’s nothing on, fine. But ffs look up first! Does my ******* head in!!!

[1960maaan]

52 minutes ago, Harry said:

What I witness quite a lot this season is careless passing - for example a 5 or 10 yard pass, but it goes a yard behind the player, or is hit too slowly.

That is a real bugbear of mine and something that does happen a lot.

So many times the ball forces a player to slow or even stop a run, it slows attacks and stops us getting good possession further up the pitch. 

[downendcity]

3 hours ago, W-S-M Seagull said:

We had a 80.8% successful passes last night which was higher than Ipswichs. 

I speak with limited direct knowledge, having only been able to get to the Brum game this season.

However from that game I could easily see why our pass success rate was high and it's because of the slow, cautious and tedious passing out from the back. Passing 5 yards sideways or back to a fellow defender might do wonders for passing success rate, but does little as far as effective offensive play is concerned, as it gives the opposition plenty of time to get men back behind the ball and into defensive shape.

I've said before that we often hear about opposition teams being hard to break down at Ashton Gate, but I think it could be more to do with our own build up play than the way opposition teams set up defensively.

The other thing from the Brum game was that when our build up play wasn't working we became more adventurous ( desparate and reckless is probably closer to the mark) spraying long diagonal balls out wide. Unfortunately all to often they were misplaced ( ruining the pass success rate!) Giving Birmingham the springboard for another attack.

Ipswich are on a roll and playing with confidence that a good run brings. By comparison our season has been stop - start and mainly because of the seemingly never ending injury list. At this rate I reckon defenders will wear name badges so team mates know who they are playing with from match to match.

 

 

[spudski]

40 minutes ago, Hello Dave said:

To play pass and move football, players have to move. It sounds simple, but the man on the ball, most of the time has no option. I agree with Spudski that our control is poor, but also that we are not on the half turn when we receive the ball. This means, either the ball goes backwards straight away, or we take too many touches to get it under control and get closed down. One thing that has been glaringly obvious , is the amount of times that players don’t look to play forward. Their first thought is to play sideways or backwards. If you look up and there’s nothing on, fine. But ffs look up first! Does my ******* head in!!!

That happens sometimes when players need to get back in position or need a breather. 

It's simply not possible to play at break neck speed 100%of the time. 

Some players will hide behind another so as to not receive a pass. 

It will go back and forth, then said players will make moves to receive. 

It's a way of keeping possession whilst re grouping. 

[RoystonFoote'snephew]

4 hours ago, marmite said:

I understand possession football but can someone explain why, when we have a free kick in our own half near half-way, we invariably play it back to Max who lumps it up field to be contested by the half-way line. Surely the free kick should be hit into the opponents penalty area to be contested. I'm well aware that other teams do this as well but I find it so negative.

I find this frustrating. Often we do play the first pass forward but we're in such a rush that when the player (Pring say) looks up the rest of the team are not ready and the ball inevitably ends up back where it started. 

[Hello Dave]

9 minutes ago, spudski said:

That happens sometimes when players need to get back in position or need a breather. 

It's simply not possible to play at break neck speed 100%of the time. 

Some players will hide behind another so as to not receive a pass. 

It will go back and forth, then said players will make moves to receive. 

It's a way of keeping possession whilst re grouping. 

The thing is, we don’t keep possession very well. We do at the back, then sloppy passes in midfield, give possession away.  Even our set pieces., corners etc. invariably ended up with the keeper!

[Davefevs]

3 minutes ago, Hello Dave said:

Even our set pieces., corners etc. invariably ended up with the keeper!

Before last night, we’d scored the most in the Champ from set-pieces - 6.  Haven’t looked at the update data.

[Hello Dave]

19 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

Before last night, we’d scored the most in the Champ from set-pieces - 6.  Haven’t looked at the update data.

No disrespect, and I know you’re the man for stats, they don’t tell you everything. Just like the stats about O Leary saving the most shots, the stats don’t tell you if they were straight at him.

[IAmNick]

56 minutes ago, Hello Dave said:

The thing is, we don’t keep possession very well. We do at the back, then sloppy passes in midfield, give possession away.  Even our set pieces., corners etc. invariably ended up with the keeper!

Passes may be sloppier in midfield, or are they just harder to make?

You have less time on the ball, angles will be more aggressively closed down, players are having to look in two directions rather than at the whole pitch ahead of them.

I agree there's sloppy - as in an easy 10 yard pass bobbling at knee height, but there are also other factors as you get further up the pitch. Everything has to be more precise by necessity which will highlight the sloppyness.

[Merrick's Marvels]

27 minutes ago, Hello Dave said:

No disrespect, and I know you’re the man for stats, they don’t tell you everything. Just like the stats about O Leary saving the most shots, the stats don’t tell you if they were straight at him.

Quite. He made an excellent, strong save to his Left in the second half because... he'd made a complete balls up of coming out to clear a through ball he should have let his defenders deal with.

Instead, he created panic and chaos which required a good save to stop us going 2-0 down.

As you say - stats just tell you a part of a bigger picture.

Edited October 26, 2023 by Merrick's Marvels

[Super]

6 hours ago, W-S-M Seagull said:

We had a 80.8% successful passes last night which was higher than Ipswichs. 

In fairness a lot of that is inside our own half mainly along the defenders. Generally our build up play is painfully slow not helped by having no creative midfielders.

Edited October 26, 2023 by Super

[Davefevs]

1 hour ago, Hello Dave said:

No disrespect, and I know you’re the man for stats, they don’t tell you everything. Just like the stats about O Leary saving the most shots, the stats don’t tell you if they were straight at him.

Indeed they don’t, but the point is we are successful at the ultimate objective of set pieces - scoring goals!  We’ve been crap in the past, but this season is different.  6 from 13 games is good, good points earners too!

Even last night, from corners we put the ball into good areas

Corner 1, TGH, punched clear, James volley blocked by defender with keeper beaten (couldn’t tell whether it was sneaking in or not)

Corner 2, TGH, good near post area, just missed flick on, headed away, and recycled by us

Corner 3, HR, short, MS earns enough corner

Corner 4, MS, short to HR, headed away for another corner

Corner 5, MS to TGH edge of box, curled in, wrestling of players, ball didn’t fall for us.

We have of course “chipped” balls into keepers hands with no challenge at times, but it’s happening less and less.  TGH is an asset from set-pieces.

Corners are generally low percentage scenarios (2-3% chance) because defences are set, but I think as fans we get excited by the thought, always a bit of a roar, and then ultimately 9/10 they come to nothing.  And perhaps that brings a view that we aren’t very good at them.

 

At the opposite end, we are seeing less teams trying to drop the ball on top of O’Leary, because it’s no longer a weakness.  When he first came into the side, every corner was inswinger to the 6-yard box.  Players like Dickie, Atkinson (last season) and Naismith have improved us defensively, competing aerially, whilst they Max is just gonna be decisive and punch.  So teams keep it away from Max.

 

Re shots saved by Max as a metric on its own, that’s why it’s good to add in some extra context like xG of the shots faced, as that gives a better indication of the quality of chance.  As it stands (league games only) he’s conceded 14 goals vs 14.58 xG (against), so a tad better than expected.  And he is just in the top half of keepers in that regard.  Let’s not get into his kicking though!

 

[Red Billy]

4 hours ago, Davefevs said:

@spudski definitely lacking in doing the basics well at times, agreed.

As for Ipswich around the hour mark, I started to see Ipswich succumb to a team that runs and runs.  At the 70 minute mark as the subs were starting to be introduced, Luongo and Morsy were making less and less angles.  They still “got out from the back” a few times because they are good footballers, but we started to see more long balls from them, they got deeper, and we started to really get on top.

From a data perspective….from 76 mins to the end of the game, Ipswich managed just 3.6 passes per possession before we won the ball back, or they lost it (kicking it out), fouling us, etc.  The average through the game 9.92.  It showed that

Unfortunately we used up a lot of energy doing so, and lacked that final bit of composure under pressure when it mattered.  But we are a fit team, even if we are getting injuries.  We stick at it.  I think with a better bench to allow others to go full throttle all game we will do better, like we did earlier this season.

To my untrained eye we seemed or felt like we hit less passes blindly into the channels once Sam Bell came off which helped retain possession. You might have the stats to back it up but we seemed to start passing shorter and retained possession more. I was a couple of beers in so probably wrong! and to add that’s not a dig and Sam Bell either.

[Harry]

2 hours ago, IAmNick said:

Passes may be sloppier in midfield, or are they just harder to make?

You have less time on the ball, angles will be more aggressively closed down, players are having to look in two directions rather than at the whole pitch ahead of them.

I agree there's sloppy - as in an easy 10 yard pass bobbling at knee height, but there are also other factors as you get further up the pitch. Everything has to be more precise by necessity which will highlight the sloppyness.

Thats why midfielders are generally better footballers than defenders. 
Of course its going to be more difficult in that area than the easy passes which CB’s can knock to each other with all the space in the world. 
I think the main point being that our midfielders haven’t been quite as good at this as other teams midfielders this season. 

[Davefevs]

16 minutes ago, Red Billy said:

To my untrained eye we seemed or felt like we hit less passes blindly into the channels once Sam Bell came off which helped retain possession. You might have the stats to back it up but we seemed to start passing shorter and retained possession more. I was a couple of beers in so probably wrong! and to add that’s not a dig and Sam Bell either.

To my eye, I think you’re right.

I think Sam’s “problem” is that his first thought is to run “in behind”, doesn’t come short often enough, even if as a decoy.  It’s a huge development area for him imho.  It forces more attempted “Hollywood” balls…and we give up possession.  It’s great when it works, but you need good passers (eg Naismith).

I also think he needs to drag the RB infield at times to open up space for Pring.

[spudski]

10 hours ago, Harry said:

Thats why midfielders are generally better footballers than defenders. 
Of course its going to be more difficult in that area than the easy passes which CB’s can knock to each other with all the space in the world. 
I think the main point being that our midfielders haven’t been quite as good at this as other teams midfielders this season. 

And stats back that up Harry. 

As I said earlier in the thread, Matty James being the exception. 88% pass success rate. Vyner, Dickie and Naismith are decent.

However...Bell 64%, Weimann 62%, Cornick 58%, Knight 72%, Pring 66%, Yeboah 51% (that's only 1% more than Max), Tanner 72%.

Stats back up our eyes. 

[Davefevs]

37 minutes ago, spudski said:

Stats back up our eyes. 

Which is the right way around 99% of the time imho…eyes then data.

[Gert Mare]

Agree with a lot of the observations on this thread. There is another aspect to factor in here and that is confidence. Ipswich have started very brightly this season and so they are playing with more mental freedom and they are looser as a result. 

In my opinion @Harry is bang on when talking about the pass either being over hit or under hit.

An example of this that I can remember is towards the end of the game (I recall we were pretty much in control of the match for the last 20 minutes) when we were in the attacking 3rd. Cornick (who gave us extra attacking impetus when he was introduced) had the ball near the touchline of the Lansdown and was facing Mark Sykes for a straightforward pass. We had bodies in the box and a bit of momentum, but the simple pass to Sykes was under cooked. Sykes had to move forward to receive the ball allowing Ipswich to close him down and snuff out the attack.

One of Alan Dicks comments from years back was about passing and said “If you are passing, pass, get it there”. If you don’t do the basics well then you’re going to end up frustrated.

If we have players fit and build a bit of momentum then we’ll have more belief and the football will start to flow.

As @Davefevs mentioned. We’re fit and are still able to compete well when out of sorts. We can battle. With the right mindset and improved passing we’d have less battling to do and more opportunities to be creative as solid passing creates extra time and space on the ball. Very fine margins.

[spudski]

12 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

Which is the right way around 99% of the time imho…eyes then data.

It always surprises me how many managers on the sidelines, are consulting with their analyst's during games asking for data. 

I guess it's to back up what their eyes are seeing, or in some cases showing data they haven't spotted. 

[Davefevs]

7 minutes ago, spudski said:

It always surprises me how many managers on the sidelines, are consulting with their analyst's during games asking for data. 

I guess it's to back up what their eyes are seeing, or in some cases showing data they haven't spotted. 

Would be interesting to know whether they are passing on data or “info” (e.g. shape issues, patterns, etc)?

I know this isn’t the best pic of the game, but was taken at 21:15, so something like 20 mins to go (just after the subs), and yes, the ball is out of play.

But you can see that even though we are chasing an equaliser we have Dickie and Pring (now LCB) marking nobody, although Jamo is hiding Hirst.  So assuming they go 2 for 1 on Hirst, Jamo can push on.  Roberts (LB) is on nobody, meaning Yeboah unsure whether to go to B.Williams or the player by the ref.  Luongo and Morsy are in acres.

As I said the ball is out of play and my next photo was all blurred, but I felt we could’ve gone a bit more “risky” and a bit more 1v1.

I kinda hope this is one small example of the type of info being passed back from the analysts, not just passing and physical data.

[Grey Fox]

Or in other words, if you continue to flog off your best players at the very first opportunity, you won’t be as good.

[Davefevs]

15 hours ago, Red Billy said:

To my untrained eye we seemed or felt like we hit less passes blindly into the channels once Sam Bell came off which helped retain possession. You might have the stats to back it up but we seemed to start passing shorter and retained possession more. I was a couple of beers in so probably wrong! and to add that’s not a dig and Sam Bell either.

I ran some updates over lunch:

Just to explain the charts:

every field that starts PR is a percentile rank, ie where in the ranking of their peers (Champ Wide and Attacking Midfielders - all 203 of them) do they fit.  The longer / darker the bar the better / more they do.  Near the red line means they are in the middle.

I’ve highlighted in red some key areas where data = eyes!

Top Right:

Receives less passes than most

Of the passes received he receives more long balls than most

in terms of numbers he receives long passes 21% of all passes, one of the highest in the division.  Here’s the top 15

Mmmmmm

Looks like Cardiff will be pinging a fair few balls to Yakou Meite tomorrow whether he plays wide or central.  No surprise to see Dykes / Smyth (QPR) and Wilks / Gregory / Paterson / R.James (Wednesday) at the top either.

Bottom Left:

Doesn’t make make passes compared to his peers

Doesn’t make many successful passes compared to his peers

Bottom Right:

Makes a lot of duels (aerial and loose ball) indicating the slightly scrappy nature our play.

My summary:

I think his nature to try and run off the shoulder is in some way forcing his teammates to try high-risk passes.  He would benefit the team by mixing it up more, pulling his RB short / deeper.

 

 

 

[wayne allisons tongues]

16 hours ago, Davefevs said:

Indeed they don’t, but the point is we are successful at the ultimate objective of set pieces - scoring goals!  We’ve been crap in the past, but this season is different.  6 from 13 games is good, good points earners too!

Even last night, from corners we put the ball into good areas

Corner 1, TGH, punched clear, James volley blocked by defender with keeper beaten (couldn’t tell whether it was sneaking in or not)

Corner 2, TGH, good near post area, just missed flick on, headed away, and recycled by us

Corner 3, HR, short, MS earns enough corner

Corner 4, MS, short to HR, headed away for another corner

Corner 5, MS to TGH edge of box, curled in, wrestling of players, ball didn’t fall for us.

We have of course “chipped” balls into keepers hands with no challenge at times, but it’s happening less and less.  TGH is an asset from set-pieces.

Corners are generally low percentage scenarios (2-3% chance) because defences are set, but I think as fans we get excited by the thought, always a bit of a roar, and then ultimately 9/10 they come to nothing.  And perhaps that brings a view that we aren’t very good at them.

 

At the opposite end, we are seeing less teams trying to drop the ball on top of O’Leary, because it’s no longer a weakness.  When he first came into the side, every corner was inswinger to the 6-yard box.  Players like Dickie, Atkinson (last season) and Naismith have improved us defensively, competing aerially, whilst they Max is just gonna be decisive and punch.  So teams keep it away from Max.

 

Re shots saved by Max as a metric on its own, that’s why it’s good to add in some extra context like xG of the shots faced, as that gives a better indication of the quality of chance.  As it stands (league games only) he’s conceded 14 goals vs 14.58 xG (against), so a tad better than expected.  And he is just in the top half of keepers in that regard.  Let’s not get into his kicking though!

 

Am I being stupid bur who is HR in the corner explanations?

[Davefevs]

23 minutes ago, wayne allisons tongues said:

Am I being stupid bur who is HR in the corner explanations?

Haydon Roberts.

[wayne allisons tongues]

1 hour ago, Davefevs said:

Haydon Roberts.

Thank you, couldn’t work out for the life of me who it was