Guest blog from long time reader Finn
If the last three performances were nourishment we’d be bloody starving.
I simply don’t get the tactic of when a team counter attacks and is stretched a bit we seem hell bent on slowing the ball down and waiting for them to regroup. Am I missing something?
We appeared to be playing for a draw from the second minute onwards; no inkling of desperation to score…. no idea of how to.
It took 20 minutes to warm up by which time Bournemouth were pissing all over us. We conceded cards because we were slack, poor control, lack of concentration and ego leading to hacking a bloke down because he’d nut-megged you – leave that shit to the wonker Ronaldo!
On the subject of which what the hell is Ali doing? He appears to want to be the team clown more interested in tricks than doing his job.
He’s scored a few goals but most of the time he’s beaten for speed and doesn’t seem to have a clue about the relationship between excellence and consistency.
Team selection was mystifying; like WBA last week, we must surely know what to expect from the opposition and to forego the muscle of Janssen flies in the face of reason and is just self-destructive.
Is Poch so worried by the fixture congestion he can’t see that a lack of positives is just a negative on crutches: we have dropped 4 very winnable points in the league and two in the CL.
Jack Charlton’s Middlesborough were the most dull, boring side ever: 0-0 each week and finished mid table. I want a manager and a team who aspire for more; whose version of “being in control of the game” is being two or three up after 50 minutes, not stroking it for 90 – (pun intended).
We need creativity, particularly from Eriksson. We need an on-field leader to up the pace and dictate the game; as it is we play the ball around with everyone being happy to pass the hot potato and no-one prepared to have a go – “to dare”.
This could all implode, there are signs from some players that they are fed up with seeing no end result; it’s in the body language and the head that may not yet go down but dips a bit when yet another spell of possession is fruitless.
I watched last night (my time) and just kept seeing AVB tactics all over again.
