Wolves 0 - 2 Crystal Palace: The Verdict.

[Tredman]

Bennett's slowness of thought hurts more. His pass out to Jonny was ok, but nothing that Coady doesnt do 5 or 6 times a game, and Neves dropping it right onto Doc's foot was much better.

 

[Tony Towner]

I really don't know what some of you expect. Dendoncker who has played zero PL minutes in that position may be better but who knows? Saiss at Cardiff was adequate, but a car crash in pre season. It's bizarre that the passing of a centre half which is at least adequate is being used as the reason as to why we fail to break defensively minded sides down, because it really isn't. It's delusional and for where we are at as a side a little bit weird

 

[Tony Towner]

Bennett's slowness of thought hurts more. His pass out to Jonny was ok, but nothing that Coady doesnt do 5 or 6 times a game, and Neves dropping it right onto Doc's foot was much better.

Using the Chelsea comparison, could Cahill have done that?

 

[Tredman]

I really don't know what some of you expect. Dendoncker who has played zero PL minutes in that position may be better but who knows? Saiss at Cardiff was adequate, but a car crash in pre season. It's bizarre that the passing of a centre half which is at least adequate is being used as the reason as to why we fail to break defensively minded sides down, because it really isn't. It's delusional and for where we are at as a side a little bit weird

It's the way we use our CDs though, which is different to other teams. As mentioned above we often vacate the centre and let Boly bring it forward to there. If we had another CD capable of instigating attacks then we would be much less one dimensional and teams wouldn't be able to just mark Doc. Partly the reason that Bennett's pass to Jonny stood out is it was unusual.

Using the Chelsea comparison, could Cahill have done that?

Umm, dunno.

 

[PuntsWolf]

I really don't know what some of you expect. Dendoncker who has played zero PL minutes in that position may be better but who knows? Saiss at Cardiff was adequate, but a car crash in pre season. It's bizarre that the passing of a centre half which is at least adequate is being used as the reason as to why we fail to break defensively minded sides down, because it really isn't. It's delusional and for where we are at as a side a little bit weird

100% this. I’ve said it weeks ago last time Bennett was getting stick for “shit distribution”. Changing our RCB last night Isn’t suddenly going to mean we had 10 shots last night.

It isn’t going to mean when Moutinho, Doc and Costa are playing keep ball by the corner flag we actually look like scoring because a) there is still no one in the box b) they won’t/ can’t beat a man 1 v 1.

 

[Premier Quality]

No one thing will change everything - there’s a few things we need to change and the RCB’s distribution and contribution offensively is one of them.

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

Of course. It's small margins now we're at this level (until we just go and buy better players).

You can add in that our RWB still can't cross from conventional areas, our first choice LWB very rarely ever goes down the outside and one of our regular IFs hardly ever takes his man on these days. It all adds up to us being quite predictable in certain situations.

 

[MARKakaJIM]

The biggest issue last night, and generally in similar games, isn't anything to do with personnel. It's a wider problem with the way the team is setup and that comes from the manager, they're not doing enough to force the game in their favour, it's far too passive. Changing the odd player here and there might bring a few extra bits to the table but unless that overriding mentality changes then nothing much will make an impact.

 

[Freddeno]

Slow, slow and slow..soft passes side- and backways. Not much movement at all..Palace had pace when they attacked. We need more players attacking, more players in the box. Running off the ball, faster passes and combinations, not walking football which is so easy to defend for 90 mins.

 

[Paddingtonwolf]

Gerrit forward and all that...?

 

[Freddeno]

No, more like play faster and move to create space and make it harder for teams to defend against us

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

Surprised Fred wasn't bemoaning us failing to sign Defoe ahead of Rangers today...

We do need to move the ball quicker, that was the massive difference against Fulham after a largely tepid first half.

 

[Tredman]

Jota will help with that, as could MGW.

We struggle when Moutinho has an off day to move it quickly. I'd like us to be looking at signing a faster better version of Saiss.

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

Yeah, Saiss has been largely very good over the last month but in the long term, for where we want to be...probably not.

If someone could get Philip Billing to stop his Gued tendency of twatting the ball anywhere from 30 yards out, he could be a shout. Physically he's got everything and a decent footballer already. Only 22 as well.

 

[Johnny75]

I wonder if that's why we keep getting linked to more combative type midfielders.

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

I wonder if that's why we keep getting linked to more combative type midfielders.

Great days :icon_lol:

 

[Johnny75]

Combative/ shithouse it's a fine line.

 

[sycophantia]

Of course. It's small margins now we're at this level (until we just go and buy better players).

You can add in that our RWB still can't cross from conventional areas, our first choice LWB very rarely ever goes down the outside and one of our regular IFs hardly ever takes his man on these days. It all adds up to us being quite predictable in certain situations.

These issues have happened a number of times now, we've got options to change things in these type of games i.e. rest Doc, Jonny to rwb (where I would expect him to be more comfortable) Vinagre lwb, MGW possibly at 10 but Nuno doesn't seem to want to change things there

 

[VanWolfie]

Not seen it back, but he looked in line from my seat directly in line with it.

I was able to freeze the frame when the ball was hit. He's still coming back and is therefore offside by a foot. Once he receives the ball, he's onside because he kept moving back to receive the shot/pass. Another piece of evidence is that, as soon as the ball reaches Ayew, Coady (who up till then hadn't moved, unlike Boly) is seen moving backwards to his left to try to get to Ayew but it was all too late and too sloppy. Coady and Boly messed up but Ayew was also offside when the ball was hit. I can only assume that the AR's view of when the ball was hit was blinded by the many bodies in the box. With VAR, the goal would have been disallowed.

 

[VanWolfie]

I was able to freeze the frame when the ball was hit. He's still coming back and is therefore offside by a foot. Once he receives the ball, he's onside because he kept moving back to receive the shot/pass. Another piece of evidence is that, as soon as the ball reaches Ayew, Coady (who up till then hadn't moved, unlike Boly) is seen moving backwards to his left to try to get to Ayew but it was all too late and too sloppy. Coady and Boly messed up but Ayew was also offside when the ball was hit. I can only assume that the AR's view of when the ball was hit was blinded by the many bodies in the box. With VAR, the goal would have been disallowed.

BTW, VAR will be in operation next Monday evening at the cup tie with Liverpool. http://www.thefa.com/news/2018/dec/19/fa-cup-third-round-var-191218