Just back  (merged)

Quoted from diehardmariner

Really good insight, Chris.  I'm not a huge fan of overloads in the middle all the time, as you've pointed out, it exposes you in other areas.  I think Hurst likes it though and is in a lot of his thinking when he looks at how to set-up.  As you've highlighted, overloading from wide (especially if you can switch play quickly) can be very effective but it needs pace to do so.  We don't have any.  Even last night we had occasions of switching play from one side to the other and back very, very quickly.  But we had no pace to attack the created space.  Early on in the season I did think we would do so with our fullbacks on the overlap but they're definitely sitting a bit deeper at the minute.

At this level pace is king.  Wilson aside we've got none.

I'll add to your point about having no pace to attack the created space...playing one up all the time adds to this because there's no bodies already up there or holding the ball up.

I really struggle to see why we play Rose on his own when we're asking him to compete in the air but there's nobody to get on to the flicks and touches he does get. We're giving the ball back to their defence.

At Swindon we looked a completely different team when PH brought 3 on and we basically went 433 - we caused Swindon all sorts of problems. They looked panicked by us.

Quoted from Maringer

I think the issue for me is mainly that Hurst has his heart set on this 4-1-4-1 formation, but we don't really seems to have signed the players capable of playing in it. Notably, we're very one-paced throughout the team. Other than a good burst of pace by Eisa early on last night, I don't remember any of our players ever running away from their team. In comparison, they had a few players who we struggled to keep up with. With two quick wide players and more pace at full-back, it might work out better, but we don't have that.

For what it's worth, I understand why Efete was played at left-back last night. Their No. 21 was both quick and pretty strong in the air and Efete is our quickest defender who is also decent aerially. I'm not convinced that Glennon (too slow) or Amos (not great in the air) would have coped with him. I hate to see right-sided defenders on the left unless absolutely necessary, but I can understand it last night.

That said, it doesn't speak well of either of the left-backs that they aren't currently trusted to do their jobs. I'd have Amos in myself, although I'd also be looking for somebody else in January as Glennon has been so disappointing.

All good points but I'm not sure PH is as tied to 4141 as you suggest. But...

All good managers will tell you that you buy players to play your system or you play a system that suits the players you've got. we don't seem to do either at the moment.

Quoted from BobbyCummingsTackle

I really struggle to see why we play Rose on his own when we're asking him to compete in the air but there's nobody to get on to the flicks and touches he does get. We're giving the ball back to their defence.

For a while he was our only fit striker, then by the time Pyke was fit enough to start, Rose got inured, and Wilson has been out for a long time. I'm sure we will start to see two up top incorporated.

But as PH said in his interview...usually if you play two up top these days, you play wing backs, so where does our top scorer Eisa play? And if you go 442 you'll likely get overrun in midfield.

Who'd be a manager eh.

Quoted from sam gy

For a while he was our only fit striker, then by the time Pyke was fit enough to start, Rose got inured, and Wilson has been out for a long time. I'm sure we will start to see two up top incorporated.

But as PH said in his interview...usually if you play two up top these days, you play wing backs, so where does our top scorer Eisa play? And if you go 442 you'll likely get overrun in midfield.

Who'd be a manager eh.

Yep, all true but we have to get someone closer to Rose to get on to those flick ons whether it's one up front or 2.

I've seen enough from Wilson to think that him and Rose playing together could be a good partnership for exactly this reason.

Yeah, i'd love to see them play together - the rest can figure itself out, but having them both on the pitch at the same time massively improves our chances of scoring goals.

I think the issue is that we're just not that dangerous in any form. I like both of Wilson and Rose and really feel for Rose having spent a quarter of the season so isolated. He's shown that given good deliveries he will score but he just needs some help. Wilson looks very willing and actually has some pace which we're sorely missing. So perhaps two up front would give other teams a lot more to think about. You would then have the issue of having no depth at all because the less said about Pyke the better but I'd trust him about as  much as I trusted Junior Mendes to have a positive impact for us.

However, other than Conteh I don't think any of our other midfielders are good enough to play in a central two when they'll more often than not be outnumbered. They're either physically capable like Clifton and Holohan but severely lacking both on the ball and creatively or they're a bit better on the ball like Andrews and Hunt but would get very easily over run.

I personally think a lot of our problems stem from the centre of midfield and the full back positions. Our movement from the middle of the pitch is either non-existent or just poor. Very few times last night were any of the central midfielders showing for the ball from defence or from out wide. And I include Conteh in that who had before last night generally been quite good at positioning correctly and acting as a pivot. For whatever reason he did it very few times last night. Then if we do manage to get towards the attacking third all our central midfielders do is run straight forward, invariably not into any space that's been created or beyond a player receiving it, just literally straight forward which usually results in actually clogging things up and making it congested and more difficult. When they don't get the ball, they then just stand there, often not even in a position to receive it short from the player on the ball. Nobody has the intelligence of when to make these runs or to recognise when space has or will open up and once the initial run has been made and not come off they then don't have the intelligence to move again. Either to vacate the space or just to move the opposition around. Holohan was particularly bad at this last night in the first half. The amount of times everything just stalled on the right was ridiculous and it must have been so easy to defend against.

Which brings us to the full backs. If you're trying to spread the ball out wide, it's useful if you've got either wingers that can successfully go past their man such as Eisa or full backs willing to bomb on past, either to create space or to actually receive the ball. Efete is the only full back who regularly gets past the winger and even then his delivery is often very poor. He's not alone in that, all of the deliveries from all of the full backs is generally very easy to defend with Mullarkey putting in quite a few terrible crosses in the first half last night. I don't think Mullarkey offers enough going forward meaning our right side is often just not remotely threatening as we haven't got someone like Eisa on that side. And on the left side we've got no chance of that because we've got two left backs who are both deemed not good enough (which I think is probably correct) and although I think Efete did alright last night, he has no left foot so is never going to give Eisa the option of an overlap and it slows us down when he has to cut inside.

So in conclusion, we're left with virtually nothing. Nothing obvious drilled in to them in terms of game plan and pattern of play. Isolated strikers who are good enough but get precious little service and support. A central midfield which is either physically lacking (Hunt and Andrews) or lacks the creativity, movement and ability on the ball to play a high tempo passing game. Full backs that offer little threat going forward or certainly not a consistent enough threat. We're generally not quick enough on the ball or smart enough with it to successfully pass it through teams. And we have no pace or power to allow us to stretch the opposition and be more direct. And we have precious little in the way of depth to change things for the better during a game. Eisa is our threat generally and it's no surprise that most of our goals have come from the left side. The biggest disappointment is how it looks like they've not been coached very well and the comparison to Barrow last night was stark. But I feel that may be because Hurst has formed a squad that is neither really one thing or another and he doesn't know how to get the best out of them.

Quoted from mariner91

Offers absolutely nothing when he comes on. Wasn't even closing down or harrying them particularly. I really think Hurst has dropped a clanger if we've only got three strikers and Pyke is one of them. I get that we've been slightly unfortunate with the injury to Wilson, who I'm impressed by, but it's so frustrating that our squad is let down so much by the lack of striking options.

If Pyke signing was a result of data analytics and research we need to go back to throwing darts at a dart board

Quoted from sam gy

It's old ground now the Hunt debate, but he just doesn't seem to be imposing himself on games. Hunt has started more games than Andrews, but can anyone honestly say he's been as good??

Andrews was really good last night, i know he's not our player, but doesn't mean he cant be in the future..

The truth is we never added that high calibre attacking/creative  midfield player in the summer that we desperately needed so are left with the bits and pieces of : Gav,Clifton,Hunt, Green ,Andrews and a gamble in Ainley

All Ok to good on their day but are going to be debated consistently as they are pretty inconsistent in the main and have fairly evident flaws one way or another . Andrews might be decent in a year or 2 but he's not the finished article is he , hence being here .

Quoted from Mappers

The truth is we never added that high calibre attacking/creative  midfield player in the summer that we desperately needed so are left with the bits and pieces of : Gav,Clifton,Hunt, Green ,Andrews and a gamble in Ainley

All Ok to good on their day but are going to be debated consistently as they are pretty inconsistent in the main and have fairly evident flaws one way or another . Andrews might be decent in a year or 2 but he's not the finished article is he , hence being here .

Given that Hunt and Conteh are on longer term deals, aren’t we a little hamstrung? There seems to have been a lot of recruitment activity with not a lot of planning how the jigsaw will fit together. There’s no mystery about Alex Hunt, he was with us in the first half of our promotion season and surely we knew what we were getting when we gave him a three year deal hence it seems like we have changed how we want to play if a known quantity on a long deal can’t even make the bench.

Regarding Pyke, I really don’t know who watched his showreel but he seems to lack the bare minimum of a Paul Hurst player ie effort.

Quoted from mariner91

I think the issue is that we're just not that dangerous in any form. I like both of Wilson and Rose and really feel for Rose having spent a quarter of the season so isolated. He's shown that given good deliveries he will score but he just needs some help. Wilson looks very willing and actually has some pace which we're sorely missing. So perhaps two up front would give other teams a lot more to think about. You would then have the issue of having no depth at all because the less said about Pyke the better but I'd trust him about as  much as I trusted Junior Mendes to have a positive impact for us.

However, other than Conteh I don't think any of our other midfielders are good enough to play in a central two when they'll more often than not be outnumbered. They're either physically capable like Clifton and Holohan but severely lacking both on the ball and creatively or they're a bit better on the ball like Andrews and Hunt but would get very easily over run.

I personally think a lot of our problems stem from the centre of midfield and the full back positions. Our movement from the middle of the pitch is either non-existent or just poor. Very few times last night were any of the central midfielders showing for the ball from defence or from out wide. And I include Conteh in that who had before last night generally been quite good at positioning correctly and acting as a pivot. For whatever reason he did it very few times last night. Then if we do manage to get towards the attacking third all our central midfielders do is run straight forward, invariably not into any space that's been created or beyond a player receiving it, just literally straight forward which usually results in actually clogging things up and making it congested and more difficult. When they don't get the ball, they then just stand there, often not even in a position to receive it short from the player on the ball. Nobody has the intelligence of when to make these runs or to recognise when space has or will open up and once the initial run has been made and not come off they then don't have the intelligence to move again. Either to vacate the space or just to move the opposition around. Holohan was particularly bad at this last night in the first half. The amount of times everything just stalled on the right was ridiculous and it must have been so easy to defend against.

Which brings us to the full backs. If you're trying to spread the ball out wide, it's useful if you've got either wingers that can successfully go past their man such as Eisa or full backs willing to bomb on past, either to create space or to actually receive the ball. Efete is the only full back who regularly gets past the winger and even then his delivery is often very poor. He's not alone in that, all of the deliveries from all of the full backs is generally very easy to defend with Mullarkey putting in quite a few terrible crosses in the first half last night. I don't think Mullarkey offers enough going forward meaning our right side is often just not remotely threatening as we haven't got someone like Eisa on that side. And on the left side we've got no chance of that because we've got two left backs who are both deemed not good enough (which I think is probably correct) and although I think Efete did alright last night, he has no left foot so is never going to give Eisa the option of an overlap and it slows us down when he has to cut inside.

So in conclusion, we're left with virtually nothing. Nothing obvious drilled in to them game plan and pattern of play. Isolated strikers who are good enough but get precious little service and support. A central midfield which is either physically lacking (Hunt and Andrews) or lacks the creativity, movement and ability on the ball to play a high tempo passing game. Full backs that offer little threat going forward or certainly not a consistent enough threat. We're generally not quick enough on the ball or smart enough with it to successfully pass it through teams. And we have no pace or power to allow us to stretch the opposition and be more direct. And we have precious little in the way of depth to change things for the better during a game. Eisa is our threat generally and it's no surprise that most of our goals have come from the left side. The biggest disappointment is how it looks like they've not been coached very well and the comparison to Barrow last night was stark. But I feel that may be because Hurst has formed a squad that is neither really one thing or another and he doesn't know how to get the best out of them.

What a fantastic post, which eloquently puts the details of what some of us feel in a more composed way.

I was so staggered by last night's ineptitude I am still irritated big style but I agree with all of that analysis.