Brighton 1 v Wolves 0 a disappointing visit to the south coast verdict thread

[Alan]

Yea why not raul,give the young ones a go for 45 mins,tell em to just enjoy themselves,like I say they can't do a worse job,might even do a better job,

Because Raul oughtn't be dropped. Not yet, anyway.

 

[Freddeno]

We need goals to win games, simple as that..we shouldnt have lost that game but Murray is a proper goalscorer I guess..

 

[Siggy]

Just on the Costa debate, as far as the IF's go at the moment he is the one who is offering most. Sadly that is a very low bar at the moment as no-one is really doing anything close to enough but from my perspective;

Costa - All round game has been gradually improving and whilst he doesn't have the stats some of his runs and crosses have lead to goals (Jiminez taking some of those assists) he has also worked hard and linked play well.
Jota - Improved a little bit after the first few games, has worked his socks off but offered very little creatively. He has also been very guilty of sloppy passes and giving the ball away in bad areas. He had a little mazy run yesterday and a shot, which is more the sort of thing you expect from him. I think a few games on the bench coming on as an impact sub will do him good. He will make it at this level hes a terrific player just needs a bit of time.
Cav - In the limited time he has had on the pitch he has shown why he should be considered to start, he doesn't rely on one or two characteristics he has so much to his play and looks a threat. For me he should be starting the next game in place of Traore.
Traore - Ok where to start, further up the pitch in the right area's he is terrifying but yesterday he seemed to be very deep. A few little runs and a nice run and shot but that was about it on the positives. The problem is when we don't have the ball he is fucking dreadful, his positioning is all over the place, doesn't track back, forgets what he is doing......Impact sub nothing more at the moment until he sorts that out for me.

Also not wanting to be repetitive we must consider Dendoncker and Vinny for games like this where we are on the front foot, we play a possession game and sadly Bennett is often the one that spoils that as good as he has been. I would happily drop Doc after yesterdays performance, I don't buy the "his movement was great" argument at all, Corica and Keogh both had good movement but were shit so get Otto over to RB and get Vinny in for games like this.

 

[sycophantia]

Don't think we can do a lot to change things, our tactics are spot on for the most part. Drop Doc? I don't think so, yes he missed a decent chance but others were at least as culpable, Bennet for Dendoncker? possibly although harsh on Bennet, I love Jonny, he's probably our best defender but when we're in the ascendancy Vinagre is probably a better option. As for our 6 forwards, they all have to do better, Cav simply has to play 70+ minutes, Jiminez is better than Leo and we don't have anyone else to play that role with the style of play Nuno prefers. That leaves 3 players for the other wide forward slot, Traore is still an impact sub imo and so its between Jota and Costa...not much to pick between either atm

 

[b3h]

Getting fed up of watching Doc watch everyone else run back while he jogs back tbh. Every time. Don't care how far forward he is, or how decent of a shot or whatever he had. Move, man.

Doc played the ref once and got a free corner, just to mention that.

Boly hoofed it quite a few times as well as Bennett yesterday.

Think it's rubbish to say Boly wouldn't work in a back 4.

I agree that Cav should have started and also think Vingare would have been a good sub. Jonny is good defensively but just doesn't seem to have much effect going forward does he.

 

[Tredman]

Boly spends a good proportion of the game being shouted at by Coady and told where to go - sure when he started he said himself he has a propensity to switch off too.

Our back 3 is the mainstay of our team and our success, change the personnel if we must, but changing the successful formation we have played and practised for the last 18 months now is just ridiculous

 

[east-coast-wolves]

The formation won't and shouldn't be changed. Tweaked maybe, but the back 3 stays.

 

[Deleted Cyber]

There is nothing that needs major surgery!
The strikers need their shooting boots that's all. Costa and Jota need to find last season's form and confidence. When they do they will score and that will reduce the pressure on Raul.

 

[sycophantia]

Anybody who thinks our formation or defensive style should be changed is nuts, its served us very well for 18 months, at no stage, even in the Premiership, have we really been 'under the cosh' yes occasionally Doc will lose his runner, Bennet will hoof it, Coady will be out muscled and Boly will switch off, but overall we are as solid as any team

 

[Freddeno]

We are very solid but not scoring enough goals..only problem we currently have

 

[Parkins left foot]

The highlights showed that there was a fair case for a penalty from the handball from Doherty's shot - arm in an unnatural position & far enough away to have reacted & not done that.

We played well on the whole, but 25 shots (7 on target) but no goals tells its own story (a lot of shots this season, but few goals needs to be resolved) - insufficient numbers in the box on many occasions. Though Ryan made a tremendous save from Bennett's snap shot.

Their goal was defendable - have watched it a number of times and can't quite work out exactly who was to blame, but you cannot give a player as experienced as Murray that much room or time that close to the goal even if was a bit fortuitous that it reached him as Bruno was trying to shoot anyway & just spannered it across the area.

If Nuno was going to make a change then would have preferred to see Cav in rather than Traore - greater footballing intelligence & defensive covering when needed. Not a disaster, but with Spurs & Arsenal (A) as the next 2 games we could have done with something from this (& realistically should have got it)

 

[Parkins left foot]

Another example of why football is not 'life & death' (whatever Shankly was supposed to have said

 

[The Saturday Boy]

Getting fed up of watching Doc watch everyone else run back while he jogs back tbh. Every time. Don't care how far forward he is, or how decent of a shot or whatever he had. Move, man

A lazy stereotype. I doubt there is anyone on the pitch who covers the distance our wing backs do they can’t just keep running up and down the flanks for 90 minutes. You rarely see Nuno or any of the coaches berating him from the touch line so you can be fairly sure it isn’t a problem. We are a team that defends collectively and we don’t concede many goals.

 

[Tom Hark]

I notice that Nuno switched Adama and Costa in the second half, presumably to keep him within earshot à la Pulis?

 

[Premier Quality]

I hadn’t seen the Boly penalty shout until match of the day - no idea how Jeans thinks that’s not a penalty..

Said the doc shot one was though....

 

[Siggy]

We have 2 main problems that need to be addressed for me,

1) we are creating some very nice openings with movement but the players that are then occupying those spaces often can't hit a barn door. Its all well and good to get Doc or Otto making those kinds of runs but if the resulting cross or shot is shit its completely worthless. Otto was brought in for his defensive capability no doubt about that and he is miles ahead of the others in that regard. He does get up and down far easier than Doc although lets be honest they are on completely different levels.
2) If we are going to play a patient possession game, which is how we are setting up against those around us EVERYONE needs to be able to play, knocking the ball around 10 times then someone hoofing it is just not going to work. I accept fully that personnel for a counter attacking game against the likes of City, Chelsea, Liverpool etc....where we need to move the ball much faster.

 

[Deleted Cyber]

https://www.premierleague.com/stats/top/clubs/total_scoring_att?se=210

Wolves are 5th in shots at goal this season the same as Liverpool. Liverpool have scored 20 goals we have 9. That says it all to me.

Brighton have 11 goals from just 81 shots by comparison.

 

[Paddingtonwolf]

To be fair, Liverpool have Firmino, Salah and Mane.

Maybe one day, but a forward line like that would be a massive case of running before we can walk, at least for this season!

 

[Deleted Cyber]

To be fair, Liverpool have Firmino, Salah and Mane.

Maybe one day, but a forward line like that would be a massive case of running before we can walk, at least for this season!

Agreed, but its shows where the problem is given the talk about changes. Everything is ok bar sticking it in the net. Merson said yesterday if Murray was playing for Wolves then we win that game.

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

Which only serves to show how embarrassingly facile Merson is.

1) Our striker wasn't the one who missed the three clear chances we had inside the box, that was our RWB and a CH.

2) Quite clearly a striker like Glenn Murray would not work in our team. It works for Brighton to a point, but then they've had to watch a newly promoted team completely dominate possession on their own patch and more often than not they would have lost that game (they're also below us in the table).