The RJW63 Official Jack Grealish Appreciation Thread

[KenjiOgiwara]

5 hours ago, Kiwivillan said:

I think Grealish's biggest problem is the mediocre players surrounding him. 

Then again really good players normally raise the performances of those around them. 

[flamingsombrero]

So he's not performing at the level you all pretended he was at in the summer. You can't get pissy at him about that now.

[lapal_fan]

I only saw the last 20 minutes but I only really saw Jack with the ball.  It was weird.

From the little I saw, I saw Taylor passing him the ball, because Taylor can only do 2 things, go down the line, or come inside.  He rarely overlaps to make space, he's so left footed you can telegraph exactly what he's going to be doing. 

I saw Chester and Axel give him the ball, what more can they do?

I saw Whelan standing exactly left or right of him, but never offering him a pass, and especially not running in front of the ball.  Now before it's suggested, I actually think in certain scenarios Whelan is  very good player for this level.  Chasing a goal in the 80th minute isn't one of them.

I saw Hogan making runs, but he was isolated so had 2 defenders on him, meaning any ball into him would most likely get snaffled up by defenders.

I saw the two wingers playing out wide.  I think El Ghazi put in a good ball from deep towards Hogan, but it was just out of his reach.  He did a couple of nice turns, but I really wanted someone like him to come inside and look to help Jack out. 

I don't even know who was playing right wing, but I don't think it was Elmo. 

Kodjia came on and looked to penetrate their back line, but the had to come short, they linked a couple of times but then we failed to see any penetration.  

All in all, we failed to create any good chances.  I didn't see us have a shot that wasn't blocked.  I didn't see much creativity from the middle, or out wide.  We were trying to break down 11 men, which is always very difficult, especially without a proper physical presence like Davies or something.  Jack had an awful lot of the ball, we got some decent free kick opportunities, which I was disappointed to see Jack step up for, but who else was there?

Without McGinn, we really lacked the glue to bind our defence and attack.  Whelan really was nothing but a ball watcher for as long as I was watching, I'm assuming he probably should have gone off for Kodjia?  I don't even know who Kodjia replaced. 

We just lack ideas.  Jack can't do it on his own, he's getting 2 or 3 men on him constantly now.  

[Bunnski]

No end product! He is having a terrible season so far and we need him to start producing in the opposition box not 40 yards from their goal.

[Demitri_C]

2 hours ago, Bunnski said:

No end product! He is having a terrible season so far and we need him to start producing in the opposition box not 40 yards from their goal.

Yep. His set plays were absolutely dreadful. One assist all year is poor, veey poor.

 

[osmark86]

I think @lapal_fan sums it up pretty well.

[Jay.P.A]

5 hours ago, lapal_fan said:

I only saw the last 20 minutes but I only really saw Jack with the ball.  It was weird.

From the little I saw, I saw Taylor passing him the ball, because Taylor can only do 2 things, go down the line, or come inside.  He rarely overlaps to make space, he's so left footed you can telegraph exactly what he's going to be doing. 

I saw Chester and Axel give him the ball, what more can they do?

I saw Whelan standing exactly left or right of him, but never offering him a pass, and especially not running in front of the ball.  Now before it's suggested, I actually think in certain scenarios Whelan is  very good player for this level.  Chasing a goal in the 80th minute isn't one of them.

I saw Hogan making runs, but he was isolated so had 2 defenders on him, meaning any ball into him would most likely get snaffled up by defenders.

I saw the two wingers playing out wide.  I think El Ghazi put in a good ball from deep towards Hogan, but it was just out of his reach.  He did a couple of nice turns, but I really wanted someone like him to come inside and look to help Jack out. 

I don't even know who was playing right wing, but I don't think it was Elmo. 

Kodjia came on and looked to penetrate their back line, but the had to come short, they linked a couple of times but then we failed to see any penetration.  

All in all, we failed to create any good chances.  I didn't see us have a shot that wasn't blocked.  I didn't see much creativity from the middle, or out wide.  We were trying to break down 11 men, which is always very difficult, especially without a proper physical presence like Davies or something.  Jack had an awful lot of the ball, we got some decent free kick opportunities, which I was disappointed to see Jack step up for, but who else was there?

Without McGinn, we really lacked the glue to bind our defence and attack.  Whelan really was nothing but a ball watcher for as long as I was watching, I'm assuming he probably should have gone off for Kodjia?  I don't even know who Kodjia replaced. 

We just lack ideas.  Jack can't do it on his own, he's getting 2 or 3 men on him constantly now.  

Brilliant analysis. Pretty much spot on. 

[VillanousOne]

5 hours ago, lapal_fan said:

We just lack ideas.  Jack can't do it on his own, he's getting 2 or 3 men on him constantly now.  

[PieFacE]

Grealish made some poor decisions at times but he was by no means our worst player. Hourihane had a much worse game. At least Jack looked to try and make something happen. There was very little movement around him and Norwich did a good job of crowding him out quickly. 

There was one moment when he engineered a short free kick routine to put Neil Taylor in a good position to cross it. At times like that I want him to be a bit more selfish and try and do it himself. If it's between him or Taylor putting in a cross in he should be realising he's got far more talent than his teammate. 

[villa4europe]

8 hours ago, Demitri_C said:

Yep. His set plays were absolutely dreadful. One assist all year is poor, veey poor.

not when you look at it in correlation to chances created, for which he will be top of our team and near the top of the league

he's currently sat at 27 chances created in 14 games, 1 assist, to me that suggests that its not him thats poor...

[Tomaszk]

I think under this manager we can progress past "stop Grealish you stop Villa".

Looking forward to it.

[sir_gary_cahill]

1 minute ago, Tomaszk said:

I think under this manager we can progress past "stop Grealish you stop Villa".

Looking forward to it.

We’re not a one man team, far from it

[Tomaszk]

1 minute ago, sir_gary_cahill said:

We’re not a one man team, far from it

When he gets fouled every time he gets it because there's no one to pass to we're a zero man team.

[sir_gary_cahill]

1 minute ago, Tomaszk said:

When he gets fouled every time he gets it because there's no one to pass to we're a zero man team.

We’re a dream going forward, just the basics of defending that lets us down

[Tomaszk]

Just now, sir_gary_cahill said:

We’re a dream going forward, just the basics of defending that lets us down

Loads to improve on going forward I think.

Personnel is there, but clearing the Bruce skidmarks from the system will take time.

Once we start moving the ball round more comfortably, Grealish will get more space instead of having 4 men on top of him waiting to foul him.

[sir_gary_cahill]

6 minutes ago, Tomaszk said:

Loads to improve on going forward I think.

Personnel is there, but clearing the Bruce skidmarks from the system will take time.

Once we start moving the ball round more comfortably, Grealish will get more space instead of having 4 men on top of him waiting to foul him.

Agreed

[smg]

He is touted as a £40 million player by some but at the moment his biggest contribution is winning free kicks some of which are highly dubious.  He has talent but he needs to start influencing matches and adding to the points total.

[KentVillan]

3 hours ago, smg said:

He is touted as a £40 million player by some but at the moment his biggest contribution is winning free kicks some of which are highly dubious.  He has talent but he needs to start influencing matches and adding to the points total.

He is influencing matches. There's a reason why other teams try to mark him out of the game, why opposition players take it in turns to collect bookings for fouling him. These opposition managers aren't all idiots seduced by the Grealish hype. This man-marking *should* be creating extra space for all the other players in the team, but we don't seem to be taking advantage of it...

[nick76]

But all players of his type get fouled or over marked but in the past he's been able to get past them or still create something but this season he hasn't. 

I agree with Lapal but with a slight alteration....Lapal says he cant do it on his own, which I very much agree with but I would also contend that he hasnt done his part either this season.  I've been unfair to be so hard on Grealish but he is one i look to to drive our chances moving forwards.  Yes other players need to help, move and create space or take advantage of space when 2 or 3 players go after Jack but when Jack does have the ball I dont think he has been as effective as either his ability or his past performances have shown.  I believe it is a blip, I am hopeful that Dean improves things and not only Jack but all players improve. 

We are not a one man team but also we do look to Jack as a player that can make a difference.

[A'Villan]

He's just turned 23. Ideally we still have someone ahead of him in his position and he can compete and learn his trade under some guidance for another year or two.

Instead he's the focal point of our team and opposition efforts to thwart him of the ball are constant, relentless even, as soon as he is in an area to do damage.

That killer through ball with the perfect weight isn't going to be the play that we can rely on every game this season. It will come and no doubt it's in his arsenal, as are those curling shots (saw another one against Swansea force a save) and his ability to penetrate with the dribble. Those moments are quite rare for a footballer to produce consistently though.

Then we come back to the fact that he's still only 23 and has been asked to find his feet at the highest level since the age of 18 I think. It's no wonder he's developed some graft to his game and will get in on the nitty gritty as well as the finesse.

If you just look at Messi for Argentina in the WC that's just been and gone. He was having a miserable time for half of it as were Argentina. No need to name the quality of players around him either. In a group of Iceland, Nigeria and Croatia, Argentina nearly failed to make it out and through to the Round of 16. It's a good reminder that even the greats go through periods where they are just making up the numbers.

Personally I don't think Grealish has even been that bad this season.

I think there's an element of people looking to him for that something special because we haven't been where we want to be either in performances or results leading up to Bruce's departure. Disappointment from last seasons failure both on the pitch and from a succession planning POV leaves us looking for answers as to where it's going to come from this time around.