I’ve explained in great detail my point of view on the matter, and it doesn’t concur with yours. Shock horror. So in tried and trusted fashion it gets personal. How very boring. Snooze time.
The problem with suggesting that the tactics were spot on because we 'should have' scored three goals is that it conveniently ignores the fact that no team can ever expect to score all the opportunities it creates, even if Gray's miss in particular was one of the more unforgivable and appalling examples that you will ever see on a top-level football pitch. In fact, creating three opportunities to score is actually relatively poor, and by the exact same token Sheffield could say that they 'should have' won based on the possession they had, or the opportunity they 'forced' in which Cathcart almost scored an own goal. Is that true? Probably not, but it has exactly the same logical underpinning as any assertion that we should have won based on the meagre attempts we did fashion. We can really only tell whether this approach was a positive, building towards something greater, in a few weeks, once we've had a sample size of a few further games to compare. Some of us have our doubts about that whilst others don't. It's almost impossible to tell from a one-off game, but I can't deny that what we did seems like a slightly cowardly way to approach the match. Perhaps, cowardly was required, but as I've said, only time will tell.
If you line up with 7 defensive minded players, it tells the opposition you don't want to lose, rather than a case of you want to win. No one can seriously say with any truth we set up to win that game. We set up to not lose. There's a massive difference between the mentalities. If you cannot see that, or even admit that's how it looks, then so be it.
I believe we were set up to be tight defensively and that of course would have a direct effect on attacking and but that doesn't mean we didn't go out there not to win, sorry I don't accept that at all. Anyway, the pair of us are probably boring everybody else to tears now! Lets win at Spurs and forget this all happened!
I disagree our emphasis has to be on the defence we have conceded far too many goals this season and for all our apparent attacking flair we have only scored 4 goals all season which is the worst in the league so it is highly doubtful that we would outscore any opponent considering we would have to score 3 goals or more to win most of our games.
I fail to understand why people are upset at QSF starting from the back. We've tried fluid football and it has steadily fallen flat in recent months leading up to Gracia's departure. It was always a murmured undertone but given our positive results earlier in the Season and good morale in the squad it was shoved to the side. Even in our best games there was rarely a standout defensive performance more than the midfield carrying the team defensive responsibility further up the pitch through top level covering to hide how weak our defence was. Additionally, Foster was in excellent form and helped again to mask our defensive deficiency. Up until Arsenal at home you rarely had a dud Foster performance, distribution aside. Now we're in a situation where we have to start from the back and build it back up to a suitable level where we can then try to be more expansive afterwards. Foster has dropped down a level or two where he is no longer untouchable in the starting lineup, especially with his distribution which has been diabolical for months. His kicking and throws are worse than Gomes' to me now, not that that was ever a high benchmark. I can understand Flores wanting to stay with experience when trying to stabilise a flimsy and porous back line though even if I disagree with the goalkeeper chosen. If he wants a stable, experienced goalkeeper I would have Gomes over Foster but would prefer Bachmann. Left back has been done to death. Holebas is finished at this level, and Masina I think is too reckless in a tackle and just like Holebas is also positionally questionable at times. In their defence (hah) the midfield ahead of them provided very little cover, especially when Hughes wasn't playing on the wing where he is wasted anyway. In a back 3 against Sheffield the extra CB gave the protection that had been missing for the fullbacks before. when being passed past with quick 1-2's like against Wolves and pretty much every other game before. The same argument applies to RB, except for Janmaat still being a decent RB at this level. The CB's are serviceable at this level when they are on form and have protection ahead of them to avoid being overly exposed. Currently they have neither. Every game we watch with head in hands as a mildly quick forward runs at the CB's, and apart from Kabasele you know if they get past there is no-one able to run back and catch up between them. They are also all capable of a lapse in judgement on and off the ball which stretches an already bad back line out of position when it does happen. The back 3 helped a lot with this as when one centre back occasionally misjudged it, another was there to either head away the initial danger away that would otherwise have developed into a dangerous scenario. This for me should be our preferred formation from now on as it mitigates our weakest area. The central midfield has badly regressed. Doucoure's tackling is his only asset currently on the back of his worst display to date vs Sheffield. His driving runs didn't come through at all and his passing was diabolical. Every slightly demanding pass went straight to Sheffield after he won the ball consistently. If we value him at £40m and he thinks he is worth it then a sharp reality check is needed. Capoue is able to make fantastic passes but the urgency this Season has been lost, but between him and Doucoure I would have Capoue as he is a better tackler and passer currently. One, if two of Quina, Hughes and Chalobah must be given a chance alongside Cleverley who is at least able to put himself about and make himself a nuiscance. Our attack is suffering from a lack of confidence and an over reliance on them having to take what chances we make. We've missed two open goals this Season and a number of high quality chances most other teams have taken around us. For all of Sheffield's possession we ended up with an XG of 1.44 vs Sheffield's 0.35. https://understat.com/match/11719 namely from Gray's open goal miss, Welbeck's saved 1-1 and Dawson's header in the 92nd minute. We've been making chances most games this Season but we simply cannot finish them, which I'm sure is a mental block as much as anything else now. Our luck is simply out right now, in a sport where you make your own luck. It's frustrating to draw games where we could and should have won, but it's an improvement over losing game we should have drawn and won but the defence letting you down time and time again because we gamble on the attack and not properly manage the defence.
To win a game of football, there are two ways of doing it:- firstly you have to make sure you don’t concede, secondly you have to score a goal we managed the first step but not the second. Second way is to score more goals than the opposition! That’s the bit we are lacking!
