Lessons learned . Away to Cambridge Tues, 26th Nov. 1745.

[Worthy4England]

I agree with some of that. The problem isn't all Sheehan per se. I think he has enough decent tackling in him to sit around where you'd find Dempsey...his defensive frailties are around his defensive positioning and nous as much as anything else. He doesn't have to be on his own, to demonstrate that, and often isn't!

[BWFC_Insane]

"Man City's most successful period was built around height and power with quality up front."

Ok.

I mean it was. How many centre halves did he play with Rodri in front? How good to city look when Rodri isn’t available?

No one is saying the defensive side isn't important. And the best players will have everything. He also won the treble at Barca with Mascherano at CB, and Xavi and Iniesta in midfield. That City team was *built* around technical and tactical quality. But of course physicality doesn't hurt and you'd have both if you could. If you think Pep would pick Karl Henry over Sheehan you're off your head.

All of that is an aside. We aren't city. The issue is tactical. We consistently set up in a way that puts too much defensive and physical responsibility on Sheehan and it isn't his strength.

Can you win a league 1 title with a midfield built around Josh Sheehan? Absolutely IMO. Can you do it by leaving him alone in central midfield when we give the ball away? I sincerely doubt it, not without being amazing elsewhere.

Odds wise - you are much more likely to be successful with a proper defensive midfield player. History tells us this. Most successful teams have one.

By playing Sheehan at 6 we are hurting our chances. Making it less likely we succeed imo. And nothing I’ve seen over the last few seasons has done anything other than reinforce that.

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

Can you win a league 1 title with a midfield built around Josh Sheehan? Absolutely IMO. Can you do it by leaving him alone in central midfield when we give the ball away? I sincerely doubt it, not without being amazing elsewhere.

So would you want us to play a 4231? I know you want the high width but a 433 with free 8s surely risks leaving Sheehan exposed - as it did in our first six months back in this league.

It’s not a trick question, by the way.

[TonyDomingos]

While we're in the business of asking questions: what lessons should be learnt from Cambridge away?

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

While we're in the business of asking questions: what lessons should be learnt from Cambridge away?

Kill a game off because we can’t defend.

[TonyDomingos]

While we're in the business of asking questions: what lessons should be learnt from Cambridge away?

Kill a game off because we can’t defend.

Don't believe that a fortunate win at the weekend means we've turned a corner?

[Prufrock]

Can you win a league 1 title with a midfield built around Josh Sheehan? Absolutely IMO. Can you do it by leaving him alone in central midfield when we give the ball away? I sincerely doubt it, not without being amazing elsewhere.

So would you want us to play a 4231? I know you want the high width but a 433 with free 8s surely risks leaving Sheehan exposed - as it did in our first six months back in this league.

It’s not a trick question, by the way.

Yeah that's what I'd do. Though I think a back four makes it less of an issue anyway (still there in a 433, it's all about trade offs, but less of an issue). Part of the issue with the back 3 is often *everyone goes* and it's Josh and 3, sometimes 2, of the centre backs, there's no-one who can drop in to slow things down and buy time. So he's left with the entire width of the pitch and about two thirds of the depth. With a back four there is v little chance of both full backs being gone at once, so one can narrow up to slow, and even with two 8s they don't need to be underlapping to hit the byline. What we're currently trying to do is still play with high width, which means big recovery runs for the WB or 8s. In a 433 there wont be as few people home, and those who have gone will be a bus rather than a train away.

Until Jan I'd pick:

Bax

Geth/Desmond/JDC - Santos - Toal - Johnston

----Sheehan -------Tommo

Randy/Schon (CMG) ---- McAtee ----- Collins

------------Dion (Vic)-----


You can always beef up the midfield with Matete. Right wing and left back aren't ideal, and I'd want Morley bank or another midfielder in Jan.

An alternative is to change the style, but I doubt that will happen.

[Mar]

I don't necessarily think the formation change to a back four is the problem. I think it's our general approach to the game thats the issue.

GK-3-5-2

That should work fine. Trouble is, we start panicking and turn any 3-5-2 into a 5-2-3. 3 up top to keep us threatening and 5 at the back to keep us solid, when in reality we're sat there chasing shadows. I'm convinced a 4-5-1 for us would work better than a 5-2-3, or a 5-4-1. We've got genuinely threatening players up top but barely anyone to give them the ball from the midfield, and any balls from the defence are hoofed into the final third where they're being used to chase lost causes.

Providing everyone is fit:
Baxter
Toal, Santos, Johnston
Osei Tutu, Thomason, Sheehan, Matete, Schon
Charles, Collins

Approach to the game needs to change drastically. Go out to get the ball forward early and often and go out to attack. Win the ball back in the middle of the park, not in our final third and their final third. If they have the ball in their final third, great thats not a threat. If we have the ball in our final third, get rid, that's threatening us. Its not rocket science.

We shouldn't be happy with having the majority of the ball in our own threatening areas.

[TANGODANCER]

Before offside paranoia became vouge, the full back's job was to guard the posts( particularly the back one) at set pieces and corners. Seems to still make sense, but rarely happens now.

[Prufrock]

Will be interesting to see how much money there is in Jan. Talk about whether you'd back the manager seems off to me. Either they do, so back him, promotion is still very doable this season, or they don't, in which case sack him!

That's a different q to whether there is any money, mind.

[Worthy4England]

Maybe if we start at the front, we might sort some of this shit out. The "philosophy" is that the overload is creating shit loads more chances and therefore ultimately "goals." Evatt has had this team into its 5th year, now, and it's difficult to compare say Evatt's 3rd year with Parky or Toddy or Bruce. There's argument that it's a "different game" than Bruce from nearly 30 years back (whether it should be is a whole new topic). If you look at our comparison within the year and Division, it's certainly not created any runaway competitive advantage as in "we were top of the goals scored charts," but that's probably unfair as (for example) we didn't invest like Ipswich when they went up in SECOND having bagged 101 and a GD of +66 - 19 more than champions Plymouth. Maybe it's not the advantage it's being made out and sold as - and what you actually need isn't focus everything on one end of the pitch, and it's all about balance. Outside of last year when we were second highest scorers and neither us nor the top scorers were promoted, it's actually been much nearer top of the middle 21/22 - 74 (7th top scorers), 22/23 62 (9th), 23/24 86 (2nd), this year (current) 9th.

The notion of "ultimate firepower" is difficult to achieve, not a guarantee, is patchy/bursty - yeah you beat Exeter by a shedload then get dumped at home by 24th placed Carlisle. For me it's more about consistency than just dropping random formations, which will all have holes.

The scenario Pru uses of Sheehan on his tod with the full width and half a pitch deep to cover, isn't the reason I'm critical of him (coz nobody's going to do that job great), but we see that lots. But that's much more likely to occur when striving for an overload than when you're set up to back your man against theirs in even numbers with maybe one late runner. When they look at it analytically, they need to be looking wider than whether it caused an advantage that led to a shot vs a less overload oriented approach and more at whether it created an overall benefit in shots created vs shots conceded at the other end, because their team, when it breaks down, is pretty much through on goal (or at least last line of defence) if they can hit one or two passes against defenders back-pedalling 50 yards.

Whatever the formation, if you have 7/8 of them around the oppos box, there isn't much in between that and our onion bag.

The teams I've seen go up in the automatics (for me and I only usually see them twice a year, max) don't seem to try and do what we're doing to the same extent, that they get stranded with their arses outta their keks anything like the number of times per game, we seem to. This to me is more important than how you line your troops up.

When we have got a decent defensive shape against an opposition attack, for me, is where we still have a lot of problems (and again, I'm not convinced formation sorts it). We seem pretty comfortable to allow the oppo to push out to the flanks on a non-set piece attack, but then our focus is typically on push the player wide so they put in the worst cross possible as opposed to try and win the ball back so the cross doesn't happen. Whilst not advocating "diving in, just because" for me, we need players who can better read the defensive side of the game in the 6 slot (and a few other defensive slots, Toal springs to mind, GJ and Santos are sometimes better at this). Unfortunately this often leaves us short in the middle on the edge, as we double up on the flanks because players can't fcking tackle well.

Finally, on set-piece, we're pretty horrific. The number of times they get free headers 6 yards out (in a packed defensive box), ball drops to them free between 6 yards and to the edge etc. is truly awful.

You can put any combinations of 5-3-2, 4-4-2, 1-2-3-1-2-1, but if you don't set up to defend as well as you attack, you will always have a huge problem.

[BWFC_Insane]

Will be interesting to see how much money there is in Jan. Talk about whether you'd back the manager seems off to me. Either they do, so back him, promotion is still very doable this season, or they don't, in which case sack him!

That's a different q to whether there is any money, mind.

Or they don’t want to pay him off so won’t offer him anything and will wait for him to pay walk or his contract to expire. We all know that is a bad option but it’s also not unheard of in football.

Or they want him to have the season but feel he has enough resources already.

[officer_dibble]

Who decides how much money there is in Jan? We aren’t generating it so presumably it’s the investors? Here lads, fancy backing this clown who you let spend money in August to make the team worse than last season?

If it were my business and I was patient enough to give him the season I still wouldn’t let him waste anymore. Iles is talking about attacking midfield being a priority. How much was Lolos, the poor mans Liam trotter?

[boltonboris]

I think he's spaffed his budget for the year already and probably next years too, based on still being in League One.

We may pick up a loanee from up above on a cheap deal, but I highly doubt we'll see any permanent deals done. Including Freebies, as we're not going to spend wages on somebody who's going to take until 2027 to get the content downloaded now the wifi's fecked

[Prufrock]

Will be interesting to see how much money there is in Jan. Talk about whether you'd back the manager seems off to me. Either they do, so back him, promotion is still very doable this season, or they don't, in which case sack him!

That's a different q to whether there is any money, mind.

Or they don’t want to pay him off so won’t offer him anything and will wait for him to pay walk or his contract to expire. We all know that is a bad option but it’s also not unheard of in football.

Or they want him to have the season but feel he has enough resources already.

All possibles. For me if they'd have spent the money with another manager, looking at the table and the importance of promotion, then they should spend it with him. If they aren't willing to that should make up their mind on whether he should stay in charge.

Other possibilities are available, but yeah, not good ones.

[Prufrock]

I don't really disagree with anything Worthy says above. For me though still biggest issue, and the one that drives me wildest is the one I outline where we ask too much of Sheehan on transitions. That is purely tactical (as he says, anyone would struggle), and has been there throughout.

Well that and set pieces. Again, they are fixable and they haven't been...

[BWFC_Insane]

I don't really disagree with anything Worthy says above. For me though still biggest issue, and the one that drives me wildest is the one I outline where we ask too much of Sheehan on transitions. That is purely tactical (as he says, anyone would struggle), and has been there throughout.

Well that and set pieces. Again, they are fixable and they haven't been...

Agree. The other problem we have is very little drive from midfield. Thomason offers it. Matete can from deeper offer it. But rest default to sideways too much for me. We need someone who wants to and enjoys a higher tempo in there at times. It’s what Lee added off the ball. Really high tempo.

[The_Gun]

I don't really disagree with anything Worthy says above. For me though still biggest issue, and the one that drives me wildest is the one I outline where we ask too much of Sheehan on transitions. That is purely tactical (as he says, anyone would struggle), and has been there throughout.

Well that and set pieces. Again, they are fixable and they haven't been...

Agree. The other problem we have is very little drive from midfield. Thomason offers it. Matete can from deeper offer it. But rest default to sideways too much for me. We need someone who wants to and enjoys a higher tempo in there at times. It’s what Lee added off the ball. Really high tempo.

Kieran Lee was excellent. Miss that guy.

[Worthy4England]

I don't really disagree with anything Worthy says above. For me though still biggest issue, and the one that drives me wildest is the one I outline where we ask too much of Sheehan on transitions. That is purely tactical (as he says, anyone would struggle), and has been there throughout.

Well that and set pieces. Again, they are fixable and they haven't been...

Those two things are certainly bits we can work on.

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

I think he's spaffed his budget for the year already and probably next years too, based on still being in League One.

We may pick up a loanee from up above on a cheap deal, but I highly doubt we'll see any permanent deals done. Including Freebies, as we're not going to spend wages on somebody who's going to take until 2027 to get the content downloaded now the wifi's fecked

Evatt: “I think it will be busy, both in and out. We are always looking to do business but I think we are in a position where we can do maintenance on the squad and we have a pretty clear idea of what we want and what we need. We will be working hard to make that happen.”