How do we beat these teams?

[pongo88]

8 hours ago, Back of the Dolman said:

Or we should have recruited somebody whose philosophy was more aligned to the squad we had.

like Nigel Pearson fits the bill

Edited February 18 by pongo88

[BCFC31]

10 hours ago, Midlands Robin said:

I was going to post this in its own thread but I think it sits qutie well here.

I looked back at our possession stats for a number of previous games. On average the less possession we have the more likely we are to win the game. Also, teams that are higher up the table are likely to have more of the ball and we're more likely to play well against them. Its strange but this table seems to show that fact: In this sample range of our last 18 league games, we've never beaten a team when we've had 50 percent or more possession.

Team	City Possession	W/D/L	Home / Away
Birmingham	64%	Draw	Away
Norwich	61%	Lost	Home
Huddersfield	60%	Draw	Away
QPR	59%	Lost	Home
Milwall	54%	Lost	Home
Preston	51%	Lost	Away
QPR	50%	Draw	Away
Hull	49%	Won	Home
Watford	47%	Draw	Home
Blackburn	46%	Lost	Away
Middlesborough	44%	Won	Home
Coventry	42%	Draw	Away
Watford	41%	Won	Away
Leeds	39%	Lost	Home
Sunderland	33%	Won	Home
Southampton	33%	Lost	Away
Southampton	32%	Won	Home
Middlesborough	30%	Won	Away

 

 

This shows what everyone already knows, when we have more of the ball due to the opposition dropping deeper we can't break them down or go around them or over them  to win the game, we have less space to be able to open teams up so we end up going side to side then back to the defence. The only way we solve this is personnel in my opinion, james and Williams just don't have the craft we need neither does hickman, jason knight doesn't have it either as much as I rate him threading those balls through the lines and moving the ball quickly just isnt his game it won't come from king eaither our wide men create very little which also doesnt help maybe twine comes good and we get him on a perm and he is the answer who knows?  I do feel for Conway and wells because if I was a striker running around and putting a shift in  getting my self  Into good areas I'd be fuming with how slow we are in possession and the lack of vision from the midfield to see my runs ( this can be worked on in training to some extent i guess ) but then we get the excuses from manning that he cant train the players because of the schedule wasnt that the main reason he was brough into the club ? Wasnt this discussed in the interview? we need to be supplying our forwards with QUICK forward passes and we just don't do that.

Edited February 18 by BCFC31

[Port Said Red]

I think the issue has already been identified, not enough variation in our options. We miss a Semenyo type, witness his goal yesterday, if that type of player had been available in January and we could have done a deal we would have done. 

BT, said in his interview that it's a priority in the Summer, we still need mobility, but someone more physically equipped for these teams.

[RedorDead BCFC]

14 hours ago, Andy082005 said:

Get a decent coach 

Have we ever had one you’ve liked?

[JP Hampton]

14 hours ago, cidercity1987 said:

Don't play two holding midfielders against shit teams, imagine the abuse that Southgate gets for the same thing

When it's clearly not working don't replace like for like (Cornick for Bell)

Don't play a non creative pressing midfielder in a crucial attacking position against poor team (Knight)

Don't have our most creative player on the bench and make five subs without using him (Twine)

Play two strikers and get the ball I'm the bloody box

Simple enough

Yes this is it. Replacing like for like and expecting something different to happen. It won’t. It’s also become extremely predictable. 
 And surely you start with your best team first and I don’t think we did. Why was Tanner dropped? If Twine was on the bench, play him. If he wasn’t fit enough and as has been suggested was merely coming on if we were winning for some game time, what’s the point, do we know if he played an under 21 game I don’t think so, so presumably he was fit enough. 

[cidercity1987]

Just now, JP Hampton said:

Yes this is it. Replacing like for like and expecting something different to happen. It won’t. It’s also become extremely predictable. 
 And surely you start with your best team first and I don’t think we did. Why was Tanner dropped? If Twine was on the bench, play him. If he wasn’t fit enough and as has been suggested was merely coming on if we were winning for some game time, what’s the point, do we know if he played an under 21 game I don’t think so, so presumably he was fit enough. 

The sad thing is Manning already had one game of City 0 versus QPR to figure out a way to score against them.

His response was to play the exact same system and cross his fingers.

Given the above I was disappointed with the starting line up yesterday,  not that the subs did any better 

[Bazooka Joe]

Based on yesterday's performance, we would have struggled to beat the pension-aged City legends of 1974 that were on show yesterday.

[Spike]

20 hours ago, Natchfever said:

Pace aggression and proper wingers pinging it into the box.

Just talking about teams getting behind the ball.

The wings were exactly why we failed today, QPR played to push us wide and keep the middle congested and with players behind the ball. They wanted us to go wide because then they could use the numbers in the middle to cut out the options to get the ball across the pitch or into any dangerous positions in the middle. 

LM said himself in the interview that we couldn't get the ball across the pitch fast enough confirming that his tactics were to go side to side to pull QPR out of position to allow us to create opportunities. The issue was that to get the ball across the pitch we had to go backwards which allowed them time to get into shape to defend it. 

For me it was the lack of a plan B, we set out to go side to side, QPR encouraged this to allow them time to settle and defend and we never once changed this approach. Manning needs to coach the team to play through the middle against these teams, to get us more compact so we have inside options, to get men in the middle who can be scrappy if needs be. 

We had no middles game at all, far too spread out in attempt to move the ball side to side. Manning should have told our 3 midfielders to come closer to the ball carrier, make the team compact and use the passing they've been working on to make QPR uncomfortable in the middle and that would create movement which would have allowed us spacess to play into with the wide men. 

If anything the interview only irritated me further because he identified the issue and rather than coaching and implementing a change of tactics he just changed players and formation but kept the tactics the same meaning QPR didn't have to adapt or change at all, if anything we looked worse with 3 at the back as it played more into QPRs set up. 

At the moment I'm frustrated with LM, you can see he can coach certain tactics, but so far he's looking like another one trick pony and lacks depth in his tactics.

We're never going to compete with some teams quality and so we need to be tactically strong, able to get the best out of our players and adapt to the opposition. At the moment we look very one dimensional and easy to set up against. On our day when a team comes to open the game up against us we can win those games, but the current set up and tactics won't break down a team who look to nullify our single game plan. 

[Davefevs]

1 hour ago, Spike said:

The wings were exactly why we failed today, QPR played to push us wide and keep the middle congested and with players behind the ball. They wanted us to go wide because then they could use the numbers in the middle to cut out the options to get the ball across the pitch or into any dangerous positions in the middle. 

LM said himself in the interview that we couldn't get the ball across the pitch fast enough confirming that his tactics were to go side to side to pull QPR out of position to allow us to create opportunities. The issue was that to get the ball across the pitch we had to go backwards which allowed them time to get into shape to defend it. 

For me it was the lack of a plan B, we set out to go side to side, QPR encouraged this to allow them time to settle and defend and we never once changed this approach. Manning needs to coach the team to play through the middle against these teams, to get us more compact so we have inside options, to get men in the middle who can be scrappy if needs be. 

We had no middles game at all, far too spread out in attempt to move the ball side to side. Manning should have told our 3 midfielders to come closer to the ball carrier, make the team compact and use the passing they've been working on to make QPR uncomfortable in the middle and that would create movement which would have allowed us spacess to play into with the wide men. 

If anything the interview only irritated me further because he identified the issue and rather than coaching and implementing a change of tactics he just changed players and formation but kept the tactics the same meaning QPR didn't have to adapt or change at all, if anything we looked worse with 3 at the back as it played more into QPRs set up. 

At the moment I'm frustrated with LM, you can see he can coach certain tactics, but so far he's looking like another one trick pony and lacks depth in his tactics.

We're never going to compete with some teams quality and so we need to be tactically strong, able to get the best out of our players and adapt to the opposition. At the moment we look very one dimensional and easy to set up against. On our day when a team comes to open the game up against us we can win those games, but the current set up and tactics won't break down a team who look to nullify our single game plan. 

I honestly don’t think the “tactic” was to play wide.  Just that they congested the middle, making us go wide.  When we went wide quickly (not often enough) we got in.  Had we kept getting joy there, QPR would e been forced to chain.  But we didn’t.  LM saying we didn’t wasn’t a confirmation of tactic per se, just an observation.

Agree that he didn’t try to change anything, was just more of the same with different personnel.

Yesterday was the game I wanted to see the team with greater ability on paper (us) drive home the game plan.  Unfortunately it didn’t happen, which reflects poorly on head-coach and players.

[Spike]

18 hours ago, Davefevs said:

I honestly don’t think the “tactic” was to play wide.  Just that they congested the middle, making us go wide.  When we went wide quickly (not often enough) we got in.  Had we kept getting joy there, QPR would e been forced to chain.  But we didn’t.  LM saying we didn’t wasn’t a confirmation of tactic per se, just an observation.

Agree that he didn’t try to change anything, was just more of the same with different personnel.

Yesterday was the game I wanted to see the team with greater ability on paper (us) drive home the game plan.  Unfortunately it didn’t happen, which reflects poorly on head-coach and players.

LM said on the interview that he wanted the team to switch across the pitch quickly to pull the players out of position, essentially word for word explaining that his plan was to use width to create spaces. 

I think considering we played 90+ minutes we barely had any success going wide. There were a few occasions but if you play a full match trying the same thing over and over you're going to have a few "successes" but even when we got in behind them they had plenty of conver in the box. 

From what I observed QPR played to give us the wings, then as we pushed them they moved to double up on the side position and closed in the midfielders to stop any inside passes and it worked flawlessly. We mostly opted to come backwards to the defenders and try to switch the play where they just shifted across and repeated the same thing on the other side of the pitch. It got to a point where we were trying to come inside despite them convering the middle and this is where we were making sloppy passes and losing possession and being countered. 

If I'm honest I'd rather I was wrong because it would mean this may be a one off, but I fully expect to see us tactically beaten again if LM cannot coach the team to adapt and play through the middle of a congested pitch. If he can't then all the opposition needs to do is sit back, compact themselves and hit us on the break when we fail to adapt.

[Davefevs]

7 minutes ago, Spike said:

LM said on the interview that he wanted the team to switch across the pitch quickly to pull the players out of position, essentially word for word explaining that his plan was to use width to create spaces. 

I think considering we played 90+ minutes we barely had any success going wide. There were a few occasions but if you play a full match trying the same thing over and over you're going to have a few "successes" but even when we got in behind them they had plenty of conver in the box. 

From what I observed QPR played to give us the wings, then as we pushed them they moved to double up on the side position and closed in the midfielders to stop any inside passes and it worked flawlessly. We mostly opted to come backwards to the defenders and try to switch the play where they just shifted across and repeated the same thing on the other side of the pitch. It got to a point where we were trying to come inside despite them convering the middle and this is where we were making sloppy passes and losing possession and being countered. 

If I'm honest I'd rather I was wrong because it would mean this may be a one off, but I fully expect to see us tactically beaten again if LM cannot coach the team to adapt and play through the middle of a congested pitch. If he can't then all the opposition needs to do is sit back, compact themselves and hit us on the break when we fail to adapt.

I know he said that.  But that doesn’t mean playing wide was the tactic / plan, just that was the way it played out that was the only way City could play up the pitch.  What he bemoaned was that having had to go wide, we didn’t do it quickly enough.  Happy to agree to disagree.  One of his Coaches Voice videos talks about this (going wide from side to side).  It also talks about having done this that they then create 3v2s infield in the final third.  So the tactic is much more than just going wide.

Of course QPR tried to keep us out of the centre of the pitch, just like we do to our opponents.

This has been a regular occurrence, I’ve mentioned several times over the past few months, that whilst we can get the ball to 30 yards out in wide positions, we struggle to find a way back inside from there.  It has to go back.  U-shaped attacks!

I would’ve thought he’d have found a bit more ingenuity in solving that conundrum by now.  I imagine the lack of discipline / structure in Lg1 / Lg2 defences makes this a bit easier!

Instead, our main way of success in the middle of the pitch tends to come on the counterattack, or when our opponents aren’t allowed to get into shape / structure.

[Mr Popodopolous]

Wondering if Sykes and Twine in wider areas could give us a second dimension vs such tactics, especially Twine.

Plus in such games, one of the 3 who were so excellent on Tuesday being replaced by more of a passing option as one of the 3. Still think a fully fit Naismith..maybe Bird would be one next year.

Broadly similar shape and structure but tweaks in emphasis and personnel basically.

Edited February 19 by Mr Popodopolous

[Mr Popodopolous]

Then again in this particular game, that wasn't so feasible.

If McCrorie scored instead of hitting the side netting how does the dynamic change? Do we still make that triple change, do we defend their goal better etc.