This Exe is on fire: Exeter (A) Sat 9 Mar, 3pm

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

And then a great original post with some thought behind it comes along... one small question though Mar...

In terms of defensive mistakes, there's a number on the right side of the pitch with some intricate passing through our team that has seemingly become an issue. Hard to judge that's a result of the personnel or the style of play as we've had to rotate the squad quite considerably. Either way, there's possibly an argument for shoring up the passing channel there.

Our right or theirs?

[Worthy4England]

For Barnsley's first goal, a player did precisely what the manager told him not to.

Indeed. You'd almost suggest it was systemic.

Aye, as in he worked against the system.

On mentality I think the interview Evatt gave after Wigan was revealing. It didn’t show internal mental strength to me it showed pressure. I’m not sure that generally we have the mentality to cope with big games or the pressure moments.

And yet we've come from behind to get points in 6 of the last 10. Shouldn't have been behind, sure, but a weak team collapses. I've seen it with Wanderers for years...


This place is insane.

Misread on my part. I thought it read "what the manager told him to" as they play ball to Thommo and split right and left, leaving hole in middle. Not the only team to do this in a similar approach. Who's doing what the manager told them not to and what did the manager tell them? Not something I'm privy to.

[Mar]

And then a great original post with some thought behind it comes along... one small question though Mar...

In terms of defensive mistakes, there's a number on the right side of the pitch with some intricate passing through our team that has seemingly become an issue. Hard to judge that's a result of the personnel or the style of play as we've had to rotate the squad quite considerably. Either way, there's possibly an argument for shoring up the passing channel there.

Our right or theirs?

Our right hand side.

Intricate passing to runners for 2 of Blackpool's goals, the Wigan goal and both the Exeter goals. We're not seeing the same on the left side, which I thought was strange.

Don't get me wrong, we've still conceded a few from the left, but nothing to suggest a pattern.

[BWFC_Insane]

For Barnsley's first goal, a player did precisely what the manager told him not to.

Indeed. You'd almost suggest it was systemic.

Aye, as in he worked against the system.

On mentality I think the interview Evatt gave after Wigan was revealing. It didn’t show internal mental strength to me it showed pressure. I’m not sure that generally we have the mentality to cope with big games or the pressure moments.

And yet we've come from behind to get points in 6 of the last 10. Shouldn't have been behind, sure, but a weak team collapses. I've seen it with Wanderers for years...


This place is insane.

When we are losing to Exeter and we throw people forward because there is nothing to lose. Yes it shows some fight to get back into the game. I agree. But broadly when it’s mattered for me we’ve not delivered. Whether that’s mentality or something else I don’t know.

But Evatts interview didn’t scream to me ‘we are confident and full of belief and it’s heads down to prove it’.

We’ve a lot of big games left and potentially a chance at redemption in massive play off games. I guess we will see - if we continually fail when it matters most it can’t keep being brushed off there has to be a reason.

[TANGODANCER]

This place is insane.
Misread on my part. I thought it read "what the manager told him to" as they play ball to Thommo and split right and left, leaving hole in middle. Not the only team to do this in a similar approach. Who's doing what the manager told them not to and what did the manager tell them? Not something I'm privy to.

..

Manager brief to team. "Okay, the game is called football. You kick the ball into the opponents net and don't let them kick it into yours. Team with most ""nets" wins. Well, that's about it lads, so off you go!"....

[dave the minion]

When we are losing to Exeter and we throw people forward because there is nothing to lose. Yes it shows some fight to get back into the game. I agree. But broadly when it’s mattered for me we’ve not delivered. Whether that’s mentality or something else I don’t know.

So we've got a team of mentally weak, leaderless players who are incapable of showing any fight, apart from some recent examples of where they've had to show fight, be strong, and come back from losing positions? Right?

[boltonboris]

But Evatts interview didn’t scream to me ‘we are confident and full of belief and it’s heads down to prove it’.

Evatt could do his interview and scream ‘we are confident and full of belief and it’s heads down to prove it’ and our fans would pick that apart too.

Full scale autopsy going on and that's fine. I would say one thing though. We fans are playing a big part in our poor form, too.

Squad is pretty bare and players are tired and rather than help them get over the line and get behind them, we scream at the players, call them shit from the stands, boo them off, accuse them of being bottlers, tell the manager he's not fit for the club, abuse his appearance and his mannerisms, belittle his achievements and dissect every comment he makes, we abuse players, abuse their families and friends and then moan that they're not performing.

I'm very close to stopping following this team and that's not because of the team.

Our fans are absolutely shit. Shit atmosphere, no patience, relish and actively seek out disappointment

[boltonboris]

They actually look a bit dejected, unmotivated and a bit feckin scared. And that's not becuase they're "soft" or have "weak mentality", it;s because they're feckin human beings who have put their bodies on the line allbastarding season and get us wankers as 'thanks'

[BWFC_Insane]

When we are losing to Exeter and we throw people forward because there is nothing to lose. Yes it shows some fight to get back into the game. I agree. But broadly when it’s mattered for me we’ve not delivered. Whether that’s mentality or something else I don’t know.

So we've got a team of mentally weak, leaderless players who are incapable of showing any fight, apart from some recent examples of where they've had to show fight, be strong, and come back from losing positions? Right?

We are 15th in the form table. A team that is meant to be top two is struggling very badly. Barnsley and Derby are too 6 over the same period.

It just absolutely battered Exeter (who we’d already beaten handsomely this season) in the first half then ended up having to salvage a point. We’ve had the manager coming out saying he’s not enjoyed a week where we’ve lost two games to local rivals and he’s not sure he wants to continue. Before then saying ‘ah well it was heat of the moment stuff’.

I don’t think it suggests we are mentally strong. But it’s absolutely fine to take a different view. But it’s very clear whether it’s mentality or tactics or team spirit or whatever that there are problems.

Since we thumped Exeter back in November we have managed an average of 1.57 points per game. Thats a long old chunk to be way way under the needed return.

So either there are problems or we aren’t very good.

[dave the minion]

But Evatts interview didn’t scream to me ‘we are confident and full of belief and it’s heads down to prove it’.

Evatt could do his interview and scream ‘we are confident and full of belief and it’s heads down to prove it’ and our fans would pick that apart too.

Full scale autopsy going on and that's fine. I would say one thing though. We fans are playing a big part in our poor form, too.

Squad is pretty bare and players are tired and rather than help them get over the line and get behind them, we scream at the players, call them shit from the stands, boo them off, accuse them of being bottlers, tell the manager he's not fit for the club, abuse his appearance and his mannerisms, belittle his achievements and dissect every comment he makes, we abuse players, abuse their families and friends and then moan that they're not performing.

I'm very close to stopping following this team and that's not because of the team.

Our fans are absolutely shit. Shit atmosphere, no patience, relish and actively seek out disappointment

I wish I felt I could challenge you on this post, but - sadly - have to say I fully agree.....

[BWFC_Insane]

But Evatts interview didn’t scream to me ‘we are confident and full of belief and it’s heads down to prove it’.

Evatt could do his interview and scream ‘we are confident and full of belief and it’s heads down to prove it’ and our fans would pick that apart too.

Full scale autopsy going on and that's fine. I would say one thing though. We fans are playing a big part in our poor form, too.

Squad is pretty bare and players are tired and rather than help them get over the line and get behind them, we scream at the players, call them shit from the stands, boo them off, accuse them of being bottlers, tell the manager he's not fit for the club, abuse his appearance and his mannerisms, belittle his achievements and dissect every comment he makes, we abuse players, abuse their families and friends and then moan that they're not performing.

I'm very close to stopping following this team and that's not because of the team.

Our fans are absolutely shit. Shit atmosphere, no patience, relish and actively seek out disappointment

The fans at games are outstanding. We have a huge away following. We had two sides at Exeter. Wigan we took 4200 and I heard no complaints screamed just a lot of frustration and disappointment.

When half the ground stood up to shout Megson out and you don’t know what you’re doing in the premiership that was pretty harsh. But we’ve had nothing like that.

If you want every fan to have blind faith and never question or critique anything or be happy with where we are - well I’m sorry but that’s unrealistic and is for any club in football. I’ve seen city fans no ironically say Pep’s time is up this season!

Managers shouldn’t take any notice of what fans say. They shouldn’t even know. When people were screaming at Allardyce to play Borgetti or whatever - he likely didn’t even give it a shred of credence and carried on doing whatever he believed in.

[truewhite15]

But Evatts interview didn’t scream to me ‘we are confident and full of belief and it’s heads down to prove it’.

Evatt could do his interview and scream ‘we are confident and full of belief and it’s heads down to prove it’ and our fans would pick that apart too.

Full scale autopsy going on and that's fine. I would say one thing though. We fans are playing a big part in our poor form, too.

Squad is pretty bare and players are tired and rather than help them get over the line and get behind them, we scream at the players, call them shit from the stands, boo them off, accuse them of being bottlers, tell the manager he's not fit for the club, abuse his appearance and his mannerisms, belittle his achievements and dissect every comment he makes, we abuse players, abuse their families and friends and then moan that they're not performing.

I'm very close to stopping following this team and that's not because of the team.

Our fans are absolutely shit. Shit atmosphere, no patience, relish and actively seek out disappointment

The fans at games are outstanding. We have a huge away following. We had two sides at Exeter. Wigan we took 4200 and I heard no complaints screamed just a lot of frustration and disappointment.

When half the ground stood up to shout Megson out and you don’t know what you’re doing in the premiership that was pretty harsh. But we’ve had nothing like that.

If you want every fan to have blind faith and never question or critique anything or be happy with where we are - well I’m sorry but that’s unrealistic and is for any club in football. I’ve seen city fans no ironically say Pep’s time is up this season!

Managers shouldn’t take any notice of what fans say. They shouldn’t even know. When people were screaming at Allardyce to play Borgetti or whatever - he likely didn’t even give it a shred of credence and carried on doing whatever he believed in.

That first sentence is bullshit, especially at home. At best, they sit on their hands. There are plenty of folk in and around the North Lower who'd rather spend their time whinging loudly at Santos, Evatt, Maghoma, Victor and the rest than actually cheering on the side. This is a two-way street. The team need our support as much as we need them to show something for us to cheer for.

[BWFC_Insane]

But Evatts interview didn’t scream to me ‘we are confident and full of belief and it’s heads down to prove it’.

Evatt could do his interview and scream ‘we are confident and full of belief and it’s heads down to prove it’ and our fans would pick that apart too.

Full scale autopsy going on and that's fine. I would say one thing though. We fans are playing a big part in our poor form, too.

Squad is pretty bare and players are tired and rather than help them get over the line and get behind them, we scream at the players, call them shit from the stands, boo them off, accuse them of being bottlers, tell the manager he's not fit for the club, abuse his appearance and his mannerisms, belittle his achievements and dissect every comment he makes, we abuse players, abuse their families and friends and then moan that they're not performing.

I'm very close to stopping following this team and that's not because of the team.

Our fans are absolutely shit. Shit atmosphere, no patience, relish and actively seek out disappointment

The fans at games are outstanding. We have a huge away following. We had two sides at Exeter. Wigan we took 4200 and I heard no complaints screamed just a lot of frustration and disappointment.

When half the ground stood up to shout Megson out and you don’t know what you’re doing in the premiership that was pretty harsh. But we’ve had nothing like that.

If you want every fan to have blind faith and never question or critique anything or be happy with where we are - well I’m sorry but that’s unrealistic and is for any club in football. I’ve seen city fans no ironically say Pep’s time is up this season!

Managers shouldn’t take any notice of what fans say. They shouldn’t even know. When people were screaming at Allardyce to play Borgetti or whatever - he likely didn’t even give it a shred of credence and carried on doing whatever he believed in.

That first sentence is bullshit, especially at home. At best, they sit on their hands. There are plenty of folk in and around the North Lower who'd rather spend their time whinging loudly at Santos, Evatt, Maghoma, Victor and the rest than actually cheering on the side. This is a two-way street. The team need our support as much as we need them to show something for us to cheer for.

Our home crowd is not unusual though. City have similar problems. And they won everything last year. At the highest level.

We’ve not had a great atmosphere at home for a while - it’s hard to know why but it’s not because our fans are markedly different to others.

There aren’t many places where it’s a great atmosphere these days in the home end and I suspect there are lots of reasons for that.

Again though it’s hardly the same as we’ve seen in the past where it’s been openly hostile.

And I think the home crowd get behind the team pretty well but they need cranking up. They need something to happen to fire them up.

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

Misread on my part. I thought it read "what the manager told him to" as they play ball to Thommo and split right and left, leaving hole in middle. Not the only team to do this in a similar approach. Who's doing what the manager told them not to and what did the manager tell them? Not something I'm privy to.

Thank god for that, I didn't know whether you'd gone mad or I had. (Either could still be true )

Evatt - who adores Tomo - said this after the Barnsley game:

We do a lot of work on the opposition on their strategy and we knew we would find it really tough to play our usual build up because they are really aggressive on the press. We knew they would push bodies forward and leave Victor and Aaron two v two at the back. We just had to put the ball into good areas with quality, and we did that in the first half. But the first time we made a bad decision and played inside we concede a goal which completely rocked us.

Sooooo I think it's fair to read that on this occasion, the team did a naughty. If that happened in another game, I'd agree it's a system fail - part of the ol' risk/reward 1v1 thing. But not then.

[BWFC_Insane]

Misread on my part. I thought it read "what the manager told him to" as they play ball to Thommo and split right and left, leaving hole in middle. Not the only team to do this in a similar approach. Who's doing what the manager told them not to and what did the manager tell them? Not something I'm privy to.

Thank god for that, I didn't know whether you'd gone mad or I had. (Either could still be true )

Evatt - who adores Tomo - said this after the Barnsley game:

We do a lot of work on the opposition on their strategy and we knew we would find it really tough to play our usual build up because they are really aggressive on the press. We knew they would push bodies forward and leave Victor and Aaron two v two at the back. We just had to put the ball into good areas with quality, and we did that in the first half. But the first time we made a bad decision and played inside we concede a goal which completely rocked us.

Sooooo I think it's fair to read that on this occasion, the team did a naughty. If that happened in another game, I'd agree it's a system fail - part of the ol' risk/reward 1v1 thing. But not then.

It was the ball into Thomasson that was the issue - if the instruction was to 'play into the third line' or strikers or 'go long' in old vocabulary.

But for me the problem is and was that - in that period of the game we were struggling for any decent territorial possession and Barnsley were pressing ever higher - we'd already lost it a couple of times in our half IIRC. Whilst the instruction may be 'third line' or 'go long' or 'hit the channels' we struggle to do that when pressurised at the back.

When Cole was tired and couldn't close us down so much second half we made hay - and I do think its partly systemic - when a team presses high and denies us time and space I don't think we have the answers. When a team does that and drops off a little against our centre backs we have quality to hurt them. But its the initial Wigan half at home or first half Barnsley at home and away where I think we struggle - we don't have a natural target or real outlet wide so our options are play through the press or hit it under pressure or relatively quickly to strikers who really need a bit more quality on the ball.

[boltonboris]

^ I think this is incorrect - Nothing wrong with playing into Thomason. The issue was Thomason playing across the pressing defender. It should have gone back to Coleman to drop it behind the midfielders who jump after the first pass

[BWFC_Insane]

^ I think this is incorrect - Nothing wrong with playing into Thomason. The issue was Thomason playing across the pressing defender. It should have gone back to Coleman to drop it behind the midfielders who jump after the first pass

I think Evatt is saying he didn’t want that ball played into midfield.

I agree that if it goes back to Coleman then we can bypass the press but it’s asking a lot. An awful lot of JC.

[Worthy4England]

I think there's shades of all sorts going on here.

I also generally sit NSL, albeit not very often this season. And it's not an incorrect categorisation from TW15. But at the same time, I suspect not untypical of other places either. I'm fairly sure Big Ric, can't actually hear me muttering "fck me Ric, man on" under my breath. I stand up when we're attacking and somewhere near looking like getting a shot on target (maybe 6 times a game) and sit down when we're not. It's not going to be an even split - we don't play that way. The stadium is actually designed with more leg-room than was typical at the time it was built, to encourage people to sit down (A mate was part of the architect's team, so I know this to be true). I could sit down singing of course, but the 15th iteration of "we're the one and only Wanderers" by 15 past kick-off is wearing a bit thin even when interjected by Manny Road and the new favourite Wanderers get battered....

They're not going to get me on the edge of my seat passing it across the back line. I doubt too many (apart from maybe the odd statistician) is going to stand up and applaud this approach. There's no steamboat tackles flying in, generally, so not going to get too excited by one of those tackles "warming it up a bit" - even the red cards are generally fairly innocuous. Ad Hoc skill is discouraged in favour of "follow the process and ye shall reap rewards of thy labours"

It's a poor product (for me) at the moment. It has very little engaging about it. It's like watching a spreadsheet recalculate percentages. It is ultimately fecking boring apart from the odd sporadic moments.

But there's a world of difference between my indifference and the high crimes and misdemeanours that Boris mentions, which have little to do with football and everything to do with idiots being given a platform. I doubt it was much different this time last year at Hillsborough - not condoning - just suggesting that I think all teams have their vocal detractors. I suspect some of the same people are in both camps. The ones likeliest to get up and generate atmosphere are probably the most likely to gob it off negatively too. That's pure assumption on my part. But if true, then the way to get a better atmosphere is to make it translate off the pitch and stop playing "oh woe is me" cards, when you're earning probably 5/6 times what most folks in the stands are.

If the players want me stood up, they need to provide something that's exciting, coz I don't stand up as easy as I used to.

[Worthy4England]

Misread on my part. I thought it read "what the manager told him to" as they play ball to Thommo and split right and left, leaving hole in middle. Not the only team to do this in a similar approach. Who's doing what the manager told them not to and what did the manager tell them? Not something I'm privy to.

Thank god for that, I didn't know whether you'd gone mad or I had. (Either could still be true )

Evatt - who adores Tomo - said this after the Barnsley game:

We do a lot of work on the opposition on their strategy and we knew we would find it really tough to play our usual build up because they are really aggressive on the press. We knew they would push bodies forward and leave Victor and Aaron two v two at the back. We just had to put the ball into good areas with quality, and we did that in the first half. But the first time we made a bad decision and played inside we concede a goal which completely rocked us.

Sooooo I think it's fair to read that on this occasion, the team did a naughty. If that happened in another game, I'd agree it's a system fail - part of the ol' risk/reward 1v1 thing. But not then.

They did do a naughty in that sense. But as the naughty was rolling forwards towards Thomo, they also went and did what the text book said do. Separate the centre of the defence for the return pass, leaving a fooking big hole with their striker reading a book, in the middle of it. There's risk/reward and then there's just risk with some very unlikely rewards accruing.

[BWFC_Insane]

I think there's shades of all sorts going on here.

I also generally sit NSL, albeit not very often this season. And it's not an incorrect categorisation from TW15. But at the same time, I suspect not untypical of other places either. I'm fairly sure Big Ric, can't actually hear me muttering "fck me Ric, man on" under my breath. I stand up when we're attacking and somewhere near looking like getting a shot on target (maybe 6 times a game) and sit down when we're not. It's not going to be an even split - we don't play that way. The stadium is actually designed with more leg-room than was typical at the time it was built, to encourage people to sit down (A mate was part of the architect's team, so I know this to be true). I could sit down singing of course, but the 15th iteration of "we're the one and only Wanderers" by 15 past kick-off is wearing a bit thin even when interjected by Manny Road and the new favourite Wanderers get battered....

They're not going to get me on the edge of my seat passing it across the back line. I doubt too many (apart from maybe the odd statistician) is going to stand up and applaud this approach. There's no steamboat tackles flying in, generally, so not going to get too excited by one of those tackles "warming it up a bit" - even the red cards are generally fairly innocuous. Ad Hoc skill is discouraged in favour of "follow the process and ye shall reap rewards of thy labours"

It's a poor product (for me) at the moment. It has very little engaging about it. It's like watching a spreadsheet recalculate percentages. It is ultimately fecking boring apart from the odd sporadic moments.

But there's a world of difference between my indifference and the high crimes and misdemeanours that Boris mentions, which have little to do with football and everything to do with idiots being given a platform. I doubt it was much different this time last year at Hillsborough - not condoning - just suggesting that I think all teams have their vocal detractors. I suspect some of the same people are in both camps. The ones likeliest to get up and generate atmosphere are probably the most likely to gob it off negatively too. That's pure assumption on my part. But if true, then the way to get a better atmosphere is to make it translate off the pitch and stop playing "oh woe is me" cards, when you're earning probably 5/6 times what most folks in the stands are.

If the players want me stood up, they need to provide something that's exciting, coz I don't stand up as easy as I used to.

This with bells on. Far better articulated than I could. Especially the last bit.