Saints Vs Brighton - Post Match Discussion

[Huntingdon]

Like Schneiderlin, I think Lallana is a far better player in 4-5-1

 

This way he can cut inside and join Lambert up front, and when we are defending he has 3 central midfielders to cover him if he gets caught out of position

 

In a 4-4-2 he has to be more disciplined as a left midfielder & this clearly doesn't suit him. I thought he showed nice touches on the ball, but had a very poor game because he left Harding in masses of trouble at times

[Whitey Grandad]

James was out of position because we were 3 at the back and stretched. However, when he got back and challenged the winger, he did awful - that much I'll grant you

 

Tbh I don't know who was supposed to be marking their scorer - but I did notice Lallana desperately trying to catch him...

I forced myself to skip through the recording late last night and Lallana was daydreaming. If Crofts could see that the lay-off was going to come across then Lallana should also have been alert to it. He just reacted a second after Crofts, but that's all it took.

[Lazlo78]

I forced myself to skip through the recording late last night and Lallana was daydreaming. If Crofts could see that the lay-off was going to come across then Lallana should also have been alert to it. He just reacted a second after Crofts, but that's all it took.

 

Ok fair enough. Not having seen the replay I was cautious in blaming Lallana. He could have been trying to cover someone else's mistake. But as it wasn't the case - booo

 

I am just surprised that Lallana was supposed to be covering someone that close to our box considering that he was AMC at the time...

[Professor]

The 'if only' approach doesn't really account for a 3-1 thrashing at home. The defence is suspect as shown by failure to keep a clean sheet since Yeovil in September. Murty coming back might help, but good as Jaidi is in the air, at his age he is slowing down which leaves him vulnerable on the deck. Obviously Preston don't see a place for Trotman in their team, which suggests he just isn't good enough. Up front there were enough chances to score at least one goal from open play, and sometimes the odds don't work out, but the penalty would have been enough if Saints had been more assured at the back. Pardew has brought in some good players but it looks like he needs one or two more.

[Smirking_Saint]

Totally agree.

 

Their 1st was due to a misunderstanding between Harding and Lallana (and Trotman or Jaidi). The defense was stretched (and the central defenders + James should have pushed to the left quicker as a unit to close the gap) and Harding came forward. He and Lallana both went for the winger, Cox, and left their central midfielder unmarked. When Cox played the 1-2 with the midfielder, he exposed Harding for pace and took advantage of the fact that no central defender was backing up Harding. Small individual mistakes led to the goal...

 

2nd was a lapse of concentration by Trotman. What on earth was he thinking about staying on the wrong side of his man casually strolling behind him?

 

3rd goal was a result of us trying to push forward in a 3-4-1-2. Brighton kept their cool and exposed our defense. Much as we can criticise the team for conceding we can applaud Pardew for switching to a hitherto unknown Plan C. I hate it when managers don't try their hardest to avoid a defeat...

 

Maybe I'm too easily impressed, but as I wrote earlier I think James' delivery was excellent. Kingsland Red: Deep crosses swinging away from the keeper may be a tad more difficult for the striker but they're also much more difficult to defend as you often can't get behind the ball. Brighton were sitting a bit too deep for this to really show, but if he had hit those early crosses on a defense trying to get back, he would have caused all sorts of problems for them. So I'd say not so QED on the crossing issue.

 

Oh and while I'm at it - what is the issue with sideways passing on this board? I've seen it mentioned numerous times after a game that "we did too much of that useless sideways passing". But if we can't hoof the ball forwards and we can't pass it sideways - what's left? Watch a Barcelona match and make a derogatory comment about sideways passes again... When a team is expected to be in possession and dominate the match (as we often are) I would be very disappointed if the players were unable to shift the ball sideways - either by short or long passes - keep patience, and wait for the opportune moment to set the strikers up...

 

Completely agree with this 100% sense.

 

Fail to see why people are moaning at James for providing what looked like very dangerous crosses when everyone else on the team were playing the ball for five minutes, running out of ideas and hoofing it towards lambert.

 

Why oh why did we not notice that lambert was just not winning these hoof's ?? We looked far too one dimensional sunday.

[joffystevens]

Completely agree with this 100% sense.

 

Fail to see why people are moaning at James for providing what looked like very dangerous crosses when everyone else on the team were playing the ball for five minutes, running out of ideas and hoofing it towards lambert.

 

Why oh why did we not notice that lambert was just not winning these hoof's ?? We looked far too one dimensional sunday.

 

I agree with what your saying, if Lambert doesn't win the ball in the air then we our unable to create meaningful attacks.

 

I think a lot of the time we over rely on crosses from deep aimed at Lambert's head instead of getting it on the ground and passing it round them.

[The Cat]

Agreed. A few times when Lallana and Connolly combined around the edge of their box with quick passes on the deck we looked dangerous.

 

The crossing, while not necessarily bad, was far too predictable and their defence dealt with it easily.

[red&white56]

Agreed. A few times when Lallana and Connolly combined around the edge of their box with quick passes on the deck we looked dangerous.

 

The crossing, while not necessarily bad, was far too predictable and their defence dealt with it easily.

 

There was no plan B from Saints, all Brighton had to do in the 2nd H was defend well and hit us on the counter-attack, they did that perfectly.....

[alpine_saint]

There was no plan B from Saints

 

Jeez, if I had a quid for everytime I've read or thought that over the past few years......

[notnowcato]

The crossing, while not necessarily bad, was far too predictable and their defence dealt with it easily.

 

Not sure they dealt with the cross for the penna too easily.

 

Pardew has some interesting decisions to make this week. Will he drop Connelly to enable Wotton to return to the 4-5-1? I expect Thomas will be in for Trotts now.

[VectisSaint]

I beg to differ, I think you'll find he carried the ball to just over the half-way line and then hit a 30 yard diagonal ball into the box virtually every single time. That is pretty one-dimensional.

 

He wasn't the only one who struggled, let's be fair. I just hope it was a one-off game for whatever reason.

Sorry but I think your analysis is incorrect, although he did put in some excellent crosses bending away from the keeper, he also made some smart inside passes, and played some excellent balls for Antonio to attack. One-dimensional he was not, but he was given a plan and whenever he had a chance to execute that plan he did so, and created a couple of gilt-edged chances which if our strikers had been on form would have won the game for us. One mistake, and that when we were chasing and playing 3 at the back and the guy gets slated, jeez, it seems some have found their new anti-hero instead of recognising one of the most talented players to come through from our youth system and actually cement a place in the team.

[Scummer]

I beg to differ, I think you'll find he carried the ball to just over the half-way line and then hit a 30 yard diagonal ball into the box virtually every single time. That is pretty one-dimensional.

 

That happened very rarely. What was actually happening was the ball was getting played up to Antonio, who had two men on him every time. He didn't fancy taking them both on, so kept laying it back to James. Lloyd then couldn't carry the ball forward, as there were two Brighton players and Antonio in front of him. Therefore James had two options; either pass the ball inside (and by this stage most of our players were at the edge of Brighton's box), or cross it from where he was. If we had a left winger perhaps we could spread the ball to the other side occasionally, but we don't.

[Charlie Wayman]

So is Gus Poyet the Man?

[Whitey Grandad]

Sorry but I think your analysis is incorrect, although he did put in some excellent crosses bending away from the keeper, he also made some smart inside passes, and played some excellent balls for Antonio to attack. One-dimensional he was not, but he was given a plan and whenever he had a chance to execute that plan he did so, and created a couple of gilt-edged chances which if our strikers had been on form would have won the game for us. One mistake, and that when we were chasing and playing 3 at the back and the guy gets slated, jeez, it seems some have found their new anti-hero instead of recognising one of the most talented players to come through from our youth system and actually cement a place in the team.

I think you'll find it was a lot more than one mistake. Also most of his crosses were just lumped in from way too far back, were far too easy for their defence to deal with, and gave our attackers nothing to work with. As a full back, he is awful. As a right midfielder he may in time become a useful footballer. It's interesting that there are these two extreme views of James's performance. Some think he was our best player, others that he is a gaping hole in the defence.