Also denied a pretty stonewall penalty which could have completely changed the outcome. Always surprised how inept the refs are in this league.
Oh and Kone reeks. Valerien has gone to him a few times now so must see something in him but he's not even close to being better than Kayembe, worrying sign. He does basically nothing?
We did look slightly better when Chak came on for Louza who was anonymous, although we were chasing the game by then. Sema looked more lively on the left, even if most of his crosses were poor, I hope the experiment of putting him on the right will come to an end soon (we may well see him on the left next week, forcibly!). I feel we'll be saying Martins was unlucky to come off a lot, we do seem to have a lot more strength in depth in the wide areas than anywhere else! As for a plan B, I can't say I've seen much evidence of Ismael having much of one in his previous jobs in England...
We’ve lost one game and let in one goal in 3 games (and arguably been the better team in all 3 games) and the usual suspects have all appeared saying we’re relegation fodder
Apparently denied a penalty? Probably would have missed . Sounded like it was a very average game settled by one goal. Definitely need a couple of strikers now .
Guess what we need …. A striker and a midfielder - who knew !!! Get an F’ing move on Watford and sign some players !!!! Too many players not good enough
We’ve been gash on the road for seven months now. Under Bilic, under Wilder and now we’ve started this campaign frustratingly too. We might have played better in the second half today, but that’s four successive matches now where we’ve not scored after half-time. A very frustrating and miserable day. No use pretending otherwise. My over-riding thought tonight is if we are going to do what we are doing (and I quite like a lot about our new approach and direction this summer) then for goodness sake do it properly and adequately and give everybody the maximum opportunity to succeed. Right now, it’s starting to feel half-hearted and cheapskate. Not good.
Stream was laggy, Hive Live didn't seem to think much of it, but I thought it could easily have been given. Shouldn't detract from how poor we were though
A pretty even game overall that was generally low in quality. However, they had an attacker who seems sharp and clinical right now and gobbled up the one chance he got - whereas we don't seem to have any players fitting such a description. People are crying out for a new CF, but that wouldn't have made much of a difference today as we struggled to really create anything. As I said after the Plymouth game, our lack of goal threat from wide areas is as much of, or maybe even more of, a problem. Martins has looked allergic to shooting in the last couple of games. Asprilla generally seems allergic to scoring. Sema has never been prolific and playing RW doesn't suit him - he actually looked a better player at LB when he can beat his man on the outside which is his favoured move. I'd been vaguely hoping Ince could be the goalscoring wide player we've been lacking, but his cameo today demonstrated why he's not featured yet as he was woeful - looked lacking in agility and got beaten in a few duels. Another major problem today was Andrews - his passing was absolutely atrocious. So, so bad. He basically killed every attack that came to him. And when he wasn't passing it straight to the opponent's central midfielders, he was either taking too long to get a shot away when he had a good opportunity to do so, or taking too long to take a shot when he was in a poor position to be taking a shot from in the first place. I generally like him as a prospect but that was a garbage performance. I can't believe it's managed to make me want Ngakia back. We'd seemed relatively unflustered when having to defend for the most part, and Hoedt was very good again, but I don't know what the heck happened to our defensive line for their goal to leave their most dangerous player unmarked at the back post?! We didn't even really have any problems with our passing it out of defence with Bachmann today, except for one sloppy moment late on. Which makes the way in which we seemed to lose shape or concentration for their goal all the more annoying. It was also annoying that the goal caught us off guard when we'd actually started the second half playing more the kind of flowing football we'd been demonstrating in our two previous league games. TDB was anonymous in the first half and rightfully subbed. Kone seemed livelier when he came on and helped us a bit more initially, albeit it was an idiotic tackle for his booking, Chakvetadze looked a rare bright spark when he came on in the second half and seemed capable of making things happen. Albeit he also seems adverse to shooting. I'm not sure what Ismael was thinking in shifting Asprilla to the LW though. It doesn't suit him at all. I can only hope he was trying that out as an option to see if it works (it doesn't) before we decide to sign someone else for that position to compete with Martins. Still, I'd have thought it would have made more sense when Ince came on to put Chakvetadze LW and put Asprilla back to CM. A few tweaks still needed if we're going to rise above a mediocre season I think.
Yeah definite dive. Thought the ref was excellent today actually. Although the injury time thing is still confusing as hell. Although it could be argued he did us all a favour with only 5 minutes.
Well that was pretty pathetic even by our own low standards. Did we actually try to score today? Stoke were equally as inept but at least they did the one thing we haven't done for over 200+ minutes of League football, SCORE A GOAL. Let alone score one, create a chance would be nice. I have never been on the Bayo hate wagon but he was poor today. Healy sat on the bench, Collins on the bench (unproven but still) I mean if VI is going to be this stubborn and not change things early when we are not playing well then he is only going to go one way. We were so lethargic today it was unreal. Are the players' burnt out already? Or have we lost faith in VI Ball on match day three? I know the bar for this season is not high but I was expecting a bit of effort today at least. That was a wakeup call for VI that he needs to be ruthless and use the players he has got, to change things up. Goal was coming a mile off and it was obvious to anyone whoever scored first won that game. We could play till midnight tonight and still not score a goal. Something needs to change, and I know it's early days but the warning signs are already there. It doesn't get any easier now, with Coventry and Blackburn up next (not in that order). I don't know what the plan was today, but whatever it was, it went out the window pretty early. Oh yeah, and a THIRD injury already? Wow... not overly sure how bad Morris's injury is, but knowing our medical team he can be seen next May. That was poor today, and I feel most sorry for the fans' who travelled all the way up north to watch that mess of a performance. I hope they all have a safe journey back. Thankfully we do not have a midweek game, so seven days to work on what went wrong and how we can actually create goal scoring chances. Was the QPR win a flash in the pan against a poor side? Looking very likely isn't it. We must do better even with our limited squad and resources, because if we do not at least compete in games we are going to lose a lot more than we win.
Fairly even game imo between two average teams. Disappointing result but not the end of the world. I thought we'd all realigned expectations.
We don't have the players to preform to such a high intensity week in week out. It's nice have such an attacking style, but when we cannot even score simple chances we need to realign how we play. Which may even have to wait until we finally get a number nine.
Do you think there was a lack of motivation? I thought the effort was still there, we just couldn't get any patterns of play, and didn't seem to have a plan B
I don't honestly think it was a cardinal sin, I was more referring (tongue in cheek) to the idea that the quality was affected in that semi-mystical way it appears to be in cup competitions/friendlies by the players' internal mental lack of regard for it (as the argument and a decent amount of observation goes). I do think there is an element of it, though, in that we never really quite appeared to be hustling in the way Valball demands. We weren't stinking out the place visibly not giving a shyt, as per plenty of last season, no (to varying degrees), but we were slower to each ball, and made worse decisions, and didn't see them operating in that same 'two men to every loose ball/contest' way that high-energy teams like the one we are supposed to be do. I may not exempt Bayo from this - I thought he was very shyt, even for him, and his attitude was not good - in evidence early on from that inexplicable reaction to Morris' cross shot that, as Helen Ward pointed out on comms, he might well even have had an opportunity with, had he actually thrown himself at it as a fox-in-the-box-and-nowhere-fuccking-else-whatsoever striker might be expected to do. I certainly agree that the patterns of play thing is accurate, as it largely has been for many years, also, for sure.
The 1st half of was awful with no willing runners when we had the ball and stoke won every 2nd ball. At one point Sema was just lazily strolling forward with the ball with the defender backing off. He had no support and opted in the end to wait for Stoke to get back in postion and do a sideways nothing pass instead. The 2nd half was better and it showed that if we had actually taken the game to Stoke and attacked we might have won that game. It was a performance that reverted back to last season with no visible game plan. An honorable mention to Andrews today who was absolute garbage all game. He is not a 1st team player by far. We have not started the season badly, but i think we have now seen the true watford and we will be in a relegation battle. We have not improved the squad with new signings and bar playing a terrible QPR side, we don’t have a consistent source of goals. I like the CB pairing which i think will make losses a close affair, but attacking we are as dull as it gets, Bayo is a joke of striker.
First half both teams were sh1t, a dire 45 mins for all involved, indeed it was a stain on the canvas of the beautiful game. Second half was better but neither team deserved to win imho. Livermore is not a starter, best to come on after 60 mins so he can match the energy levels. We have to start with Kayembe, Chak and Louza in the middle with Martins and Asprilla on the wings, we definitely need a new number 9 by the look of it and maybe a DM. Bachmann needs to just work with his feet for the next week or two to build up some confidence and obviously improve that skill. Not a bad start to the season and I can see us doing well once the first 11 are right.
If we lose to Blackburn and put in a poor performance again with no real effort, Gino will be looking at his black book of "who's next". Personally I think/hope VI will be given more time and at least be properly judged after the Window closes.
The usual suspects like me didn’t even need to comment because it’s obvious to anyone who isn’t an idiot that Pozzo mismanagement has left us painfully thin all over the squad.
Think it's rich to claim there was no real effort today? There was also plenty of effort in the first two games. I can understand the gloom over the make up of the current squad but not their overall commitment in the first three games.
Asprilla and Andrews are way too desperate to score. But I suppose that's the trade off with playing young players.
