aweebluesoandso 290 Posted August 24, 2016 Share Posted August 24, 2016 honestly if we where at home first game i would say we will win, since we are away first game i''l go for the draw. there's not much in it at this stage of the season, home advantage could be crucial, we will just have to wait a few months till both teams are at their strongest to see who has jelled the best. 0 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big Jaws 570 Posted August 25, 2016 Share Posted August 25, 2016 I've not posted for a wee while whats all this palaver with password having a timer? Unlike those who refuse to watch any of this teams games I wanted to see for myself what exactly it was that these world beaters the MSM were bombarding me with that I should be worried about. The blurb from pretty much all sources was that Forrest was like a new player playing out of his skin, Broonie is back to his old and best self now that he's concentrating only on the Parkhead club, Grifiths is on fire scoring goals for a laugh and Ted Rodgers has done a wonderful astute bit of business in signing 3-2-1 Mil man Sinclair. Here's what I seen. Brown was a week off the pace chasing shadows. Forrest was virtually anonymous hiding behind a blade of grass I suspect. Grifiths was contained by no one in particular to an odd shot from 20-30 yards outside the box. Sinclair for me was the only one mentioned by the press that looked as though he could do some damage however he was reduced to defensive duties most of the time as the HBS right back (who I thought had a great game) stretched both Sinclair and Tierney. On the other side of the park Janko was getting roasted by anyone who took the ball anywhere near him. Lustig hadn't a clue what he was doing when facing his own goals so much so that his defensive partner Toure (who appears a decent stopper if they can keep him fit) looked completely bemused about it through out the game. Late in the game they brought on Dembele up front to partner Sinclair. Now this partnership looked more dangerous than the Sinclair, Grifiths combo however both Dembele and Sinclair like to occupy more or less the same space which has good and bad connotations for us facing them if Rodgers goes with that pairing. Effectively they would be doubling up on Tav and he would need to be on his mettle to deal with both of them at the same time however I think he could eat either of them, individually, for breakfast. HBS played against a flooded midfield with two touch, quick passing, moving, switching play down the flanks and penetrative runs into the box to mix it up, pretty much how we are set up to play but as yet havent quite got up to speed with all the new boys. They exposed the midfield area as an overly complicated congestion of the spine of the park from Toure to Grifiths. They used the above to good effect and bypassed that congestion by playing around them. The result being that I cant even remember who was playing in midfield for the team from the Eastend they were that non existent. I'll add more thoughts to the post, re: Rossiter/Barton/Holt?Halliday/Windass etc if the discussion develops. 0 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
AM89 0 Posted August 25, 2016 Share Posted August 25, 2016 It's difficult to tell. They've looked impressive going forward in the league, scoring plenty of goals, but questions remain over their defence and they weren't exactly brilliant away to Hapoel. As for us, we haven't exactly hit the ground running. As MW said in his press conference, we're still trying to find the right combinations. I think this is especially applicable to midfield which hasn't been as slick or dynamic as last year. Barton / Rossiter together in the same midfield looked questionable vs Motherwell. We're definitely missing a Jason Holt or Harry Forrester in there to provide the energy and forward runs between the lines. Once we hopefully sort that things should click into place. Once that happens, let's see just how good this team is. Plenty of potential. 0 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big Jaws 570 Posted August 25, 2016 Share Posted August 25, 2016 It's difficult to tell. They've looked impressive going forward in the league, scoring plenty of goals, but questions remain over their defence and they weren't exactly brilliant away to Hapoel. As for us, we haven't exactly hit the ground running. As MW said in his press conference, we're still trying to find the right combinations. I think this is especially applicable to midfield which hasn't been as slick or dynamic as last year. Barton / Rossiter together in the same midfield looked questionable vs Motherwell. We're definitely missing a Jason Holt or Harry Forrester in there to provide the energy and forward runs between the lines. Once we hopefully sort that things should click into place. Once that happens, let's see just how good this team is. Plenty of potential. As I said they stack/overload the midfield and stifle teams creativity breaking quickly from any play that breaks down. Its a tactic if you can get a away with it and of course they will in the Scottish league. I don't want to say teams don't try against them because I think they do but they seem intimidated by this overloading tactic that they use. They'll win most of their games in our league with it but when it comes to the CL it'll be exposed for exactly what it is, lacking constructive control of the ball feeding off scraps or missed passes from the opposition. They can be dangerous breaking through in those final two thirds but I think they'll be lucky to finish third in their group because other than that they have nothing. Actually Barton and Rossiter from my perspective looked fine against Motherwell. Rossiter is going to be a cracker as far as I'm concerned. I suspect MW's thinking behind the way he plays them is that Barton is more composed and can deliver a neater pass into the forward areas where as I personally think like HF last season Barton has been surprised just how fast our game is up here, coupled with his age he hasn't quite managed to be up to speed with where he should be in those areas and therefore sometimes looks out of position and cant cover the ground he needs to (only games can get his sharpness up to spec). From having now seen the lad play it's possible that Rossiter could do that job better than Barton. Having Barton as the holding role would free the lad to use that tenacity of his further up the field. I think we could break down the oppositions play much quicker with him promoted further forward although the jury is still out for me whether moving Barton to that deeper position would help Joey. 0 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anchorman 0 Posted August 25, 2016 Author Share Posted August 25, 2016 I also can't see Rodgers bringing in any more big buys. If you were in charge of the coffers would you hand him money to try to make an impact in the CL? Barca and Man City? Then there is the small matter of Borussia M who battered BSC Young Boys 9-2 in aggregate. This is the same Young Boys who knocked out Shaktar Donetsk in the previous round. I think Rodgers will be told the spending is over for now. 0 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
colinstein 294 Posted August 25, 2016 Share Posted August 25, 2016 It's the best draw they could have hoped for they were never going to get out of the group stage anyway 0 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bearman 9 Posted August 25, 2016 Share Posted August 25, 2016 It's the best draw they could have hoped forthey were never going to get out of the group stage anyway They wanted Real Madrid Ronaldo Bale and the exposure, Sporting Lisbon were in that group too, Liewell was sitting over there crossing himself a million times to be pulled into that group, we'd have got maximum tim coverage over that regardless of results. Thank feck Liewell's hail mary's fell on deaf ears. 0 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
colinstein 294 Posted August 25, 2016 Share Posted August 25, 2016 City, Barca and Munchen are much bigger draws than Sporting 0 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
compo 6,141 Posted August 26, 2016 Share Posted August 26, 2016 Everything takes time if you think back to our glory day's we always had a strong defence a couple of centre halfs and full backs that played an average of 35 plus games together per season we have to get into that type of set up again and the only way is get his best defence get a leader and play for each other every game 0 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frankie 8,151 Posted August 26, 2016 Share Posted August 26, 2016 I've not posted for a wee while whats all this palaver with password having a timer? Good to have you back... Password security is important so best we maintain these regularly. 0 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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