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Dean Smith


Demitri_C

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Davis and Conor should have come on as soon as they went down to 10 men. This might have forced them to make a defensive substitution and invite pressure for the rest of the game.

I feel like we use our substitutions to react to what the opponent is doing. I don't agree with this way of thinking. At home we must be the team dictating the flow of the game.

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I don't think he uses his subs well generally but it was especially bad last night. I understand the players on the bench aren't great but it was crying out for changes when they went down to 10. I think Smith was happy with a point to be honest. 

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4 minutes ago, sne said:

Think the whole club might have both overestimated themselves and underestimated the step up in quality a bit.

 

I kind of agree. I thought that watching Watford against Arsenal on Sunday.

Even little old Watford have Deulofeu. Palace have Zaha. Bournemouth have a plethora of match winners. I'd take Redmond from Southampton in our current state.

We just don't have the squad and the match winners that these teams do right now, and it will be a year or two slog until we probably will. That will be success, this year and next, just staying up and developing our squad. We will attract them eventually, and a year or two of PL money would be helpful...

We are bigger and better clubs than those listed.


 

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36 minutes ago, villa89 said:

I don't think he uses his subs well generally but it was especially bad last night. I understand the players on the bench aren't great but it was crying out for changes when they went down to 10. I think Smith was happy with a point to be honest. 

I think it was more a case that he saw what we saw, we couldn't score last night even if we played for 10 hours straight and even with 10 men Ham looked more threatening than us. I personally would have gotten Hourihane and Davis on very early, especially since Jota was awful. 

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22 minutes ago, rodders0223 said:

I kind of agree. I thought that watching Watford against Arsenal on Sunday.

Even little old Watford have Deulofeu. Palace have Zaha. Bournemouth have a plethora of match winners. I'd take Redmond from Southampton in our current state.

We just don't have the squad and the match winners that these teams do right now, and it will be a year or two slog until we probably will. That will be success, this year and next, just staying up and developing our squad. We will attract them eventually, and a year or two of PL money would be helpful...

We are bigger and better clubs than those listed.


 

I don't agree with all of this post, but trophy given for the big green bold bit :)

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Lets be honest though. It will be and was always on the cards that we have to fight relegation. We got up through the playoffs, we lost core players. Obviously we could have use for another striker, a winger and a better left back. We signed a whole lot of players and it's a big job getting them to become a team. More signings will come, and hopefully we can escape the drop. We are a huge work in progress.

But it's not like we lost yesterday. We gained another point. 

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Worth noting we are joint-top of clean-sheets with 5 games gone, we have a more than capable defence to survive this league (west ham had 1 shot on target, a speculative effort from noble). Personally, i thought at times last night we played some wonderful football with some lovely one-touch passing, but the attacking side of the team at times seemed disjointed. This is to be expected as the team is still learning to play with each other on matchdays, anyone who thought it would have "clicked" this soon into the season were slightly deluded in my opinion. Give the lads some time, the finished article will be worth the wait.

Edited by carewjust4u
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1 hour ago, Bazmonkey said:

I agree with this..the space between the lines is either too big or to tight especially when we defend.

Last night there were lots of examples of the back four and nakamba being close then no one near..this forces it wide and west ham put the pressure on jota and el gazi.

I'd like to see

       Gilbert   engles mings  taylor (for now)

               Luiz        nakamba

Grealish         hourihane     mcginn

                 Wes or davies.

The three of grealish mcginn and hourihane rotating round.

We also need to press more. We gave too much respect last night. We seem to retreat to the 18 yard box and let them have acres of space and bring the ball forward with ease.  Had Anderson been better he would have had a field day last night

Good post.

I think with Nakamba having a solid debut and Luiz more settled in, and added to the fact that the wingers aren't quite "at it", I would definitely look to playing that team above (more so if or when Targett is fit) - I think it 'could' work well.

Newly promoted I can see why Smith is keeping to a settled formation but Brighton away in the cup would be a perfect chance to try something different IMO.

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Did Mcginn hint at a possible change by Smith if we can't get something out of the next couple of games, he certainly says Smith might possibly change it up if it's not happening.

I seriously still say it's winger issues, not so much as in total quality issues but a timing issue, still seeing that ball on the flanks being held up waiting for players to arrive. Angles of the crosses are from the same spots and coming in at a pace or angle that's easy to deal with by opposition.

At this rate Jota, Trez and Ghazi I'm afraid are going to pop for the first whipping if they don't sort it. Until the service is properly provided into that box to a lone striker off the wings, you can't really take a swipe at Wes. The only thing i do not like what Wes does, is he complains all to easy and doesnt stay on his feet before going to ground. For a guy of his build and height, he has to make the most of it as Mcginn did, Mcginn could of easy went down for a P shout but did his best to stay up.

January can't come soon enough at this rate, I feel we are already in need of some much needed quality reinforcements at the Wings, and one striker we could do with breaking the bank for who Wesley could easily partner with.

Edited by Dave-R
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1 hour ago, lexicon said:

I think the fans have, rather than the club. 

Yeah might very well be so.

I've said all along that I'd be content with 17th and building a foundation for future seasons.

Just hope the club and players understand that for example Grealish and McGinn won't be able to do in the PL what they did in the Championship.

I was also very worried about that Mings would not be able to adjust to the higher level pressing and his habit to be a bit adventurous on the ball. But that's not been an issue as of yet.

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6 minutes ago, Dave-R said:

Did Mcginn hint at a possible change by Smith if we can't get something out of the next couple of games, he certainly says Smith might possibly change it up if it's not happening.

I seriously still say it's winger issues, not so much as in total quality issues but a timing issue, still seeing that ball on the flanks being held up waiting for players to arrive. Angles of the crosses are from the same spots and coming in at a pace or angle that's easy to deal with by opposition.

At this rate Jota, Trez and Ghazi I'm afraid are going to pop for the first whipping if they don't sort it. Until the service is properly provided into that box to a lone striker off the wings, you can't really take a swipe at Wes. The only thing i do not like what Wes does, is he complains all to easy and doesnt stay on his feet before going to ground. For a guy of his build and height, he has to make the most of it as Mcginn did, Mcginn could of easy went down for a P shout but did his best to stay up.

January can't come soon enough at this rate, I feel we are already in need of some much needed quality reinforcements at the Wings, and one striker we could do with breaking the bank for who Wesley could easily partner with.

I also think the squad is mostly fine but with a serious lack in PL quality in a few key areas.

LB and the wide positions on both sides, possibly also the striker.

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6 minutes ago, sne said:

Yeah might very well be so.

I've said all along that I'd be content with 17th and building a foundation for future seasons.

Just hope the club and players understand that for example Grealish and McGinn won't be able to do in the PL what they did in the Championship.

I was also very worried about that Mings would not be able to adjust to the higher level pressing and his habit to be a bit adventurous on the ball. But that's not been an issue as of yet.

We're building from the bottom up, literally. Once we get shot of Taylor our back 5 will be very solid and respectable at this level. Whilst I maintain Grealish and McGinn are still taking time to adapt (and at times struggling), I think we have a respectable midfield 3 (if we persist with that set up) with some pretty decent depth with Luiz, Hourihane and even Lansbury. 

However when you look at the front 3, clearly the job wasn't finished. I think to a point we've been naive in expecting El Ghazi, Trezeguet and Jota to be competent at this level consistently. Wesley was a big gamble that hasn't paid off thus far. The lack of strengthening in these positions in terms of depth was a massive oversight. I think we made choices to back out of signing the likes of Benrahma and Maupay based on money without considering that we will have to revisit these positions in January and likely pay even more of a premium such is the nature of that particular window. As a result we go into the first half of the season with a weaker squad with limited attacking quality and will have to spend even more money in January to push for survival. I think the backroom probably over-estimated the quality of the attacking players we have, for sure. The fans have over-estimated us even more so. Idiotic posts on Facebook and even here were suggesting a top half push given the money we spent, absolutely ridiculous assertions. 

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4 points at home from Everton and West Ham is pretty good going I'd say. Keep that home form up this season and we should be fine.

When you think about how we deserved something from every game we played bar Spurs without our front line clicking, it's very encouraging. 

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1 hour ago, Dr_Pangloss said:

We're building from the bottom up, literally. Once we get shot of Taylor our back 5 will be very solid and respectable at this level. Whilst I maintain Grealish and McGinn are still taking time to adapt (and at times struggling), I think we have a respectable midfield 3 (if we persist with that set up) with some pretty decent depth with Luiz, Hourihane and even Lansbury. 

However when you look at the front 3, clearly the job wasn't finished. I think to a point we've been naive in expecting El Ghazi, Trezeguet and Jota to be competent at this level consistently. Wesley was a big gamble that hasn't paid off thus far. The lack of strengthening in these positions in terms of depth was a massive oversight. I think we made choices to back out of signing the likes of Benrahma and Maupay based on money without considering that we will have to revisit these positions in January and likely pay even more of a premium such is the nature of that particular window. As a result we go into the first half of the season with a weaker squad with limited attacking quality and will have to spend even more money in January to push for survival. I think the backroom probably over-estimated the quality of the attacking players we have, for sure. The fans have over-estimated us even more so. Idiotic posts on Facebook and even here were suggesting a top half push given the money we spent, absolutely ridiculous assertions. 

I think you may have found the solution there. If we play 5-3-3 we may be in with a shout ;)

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We don't need to nor will Smith start changing formations. That will only make things worse, we've only played five games, players, many of them new to the country, need more time to settle and gel with each other. Chopping and changing is the last thing we need.

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