Is this likely to get called off ?

Assume tickets will be on sale this week ? 

3 hours ago, worthy10 said:

Yet again, not 1 opposing player would get in our team. Yet again, we dominate for 10 minutes, miss chances and Yet again they score with their only shot on target.

So disappointing, expect more from the manager. 

The standard of football in this league is as bad as its been and we are looking mid table.

I'd dispute that and say their right back (Elite?) looked strong (although only against Cissoko) but Webster looked like exactly the kind of more attacking midfielder we are missing to switch to a 433

1 hour ago, Stig said:

Not read through yet so may be repeating points made already but thought Dalby seemed very unlucky to me to not score at the start. Did everything right and I actually thought their goalie should have come out to stop the chance initially.

The second miss I didn't see very well, but some fans took that as an opportunity to jump on his back about everything.

He'd been playing well for me, and what is the point in abusing your own players? 

On the misses there was some similarity at the moment of the actual miss.

For both he did some OK work, but then just delayed & let a defender challenge. It should have already been in. If you can bring yourself to re-watch do so with that point in mind & you'll see it.

That's why he has so few goals on his CV.

38 minutes ago, Lt. Aldo Raine said:

 

Not working with this keeper. Gave him the benefit of doubt for the first 10 games. Not quite at Billy crellin levels for shitness, but he needs swapping out so we can see if the other keepers up to it. 

1 hour ago, worthy10 said:

Cissoko, as someone previously said today, was an experiment. That hasn't worked. In his brain he is R7, but in reality, he is fortunate to be considered good enough to play for us. He may look better when playing at a lower standard, but it is obviously a failure of the recruitment system, Fergal?

It's a real shame I thought he looked quite tricky against Barnsley , albeit against 10 men.

3 hours ago, freds dad said:

Why didn’t Forss start?

He's been poor previous 2 games, hardly involved.  And Dalby can win headers.  The fact that we don't give him the chance to win headers with zero crosses is a separate issue, but its not a given that Forss will offer more than Dalby on a given day.  As I've mentioned before, who knows who's turn it is to have a decent game from one game to the next?  Its a throw of the dice with this squad it really is.  

3 hours ago, Dr. Feelgood said:

Well it has to have been coz we were fckg shite against the better teams.

Exactly.  I was a bit confused by the question TBH, we've never had a problem getting our fair share of wins against the mid table and below teams, until this season.

4 minutes ago, Johnnyrotten said:

He's been poor previous 2 games, hardly involved.  And Dalby can win headers.  The fact that we don't give him the chance to win headers with zero crosses is a separate issue, but its not a given that Forss will offer more than Dalby on a given day.  As I've mentioned before, who knows who's turn it is to have a decent game from one game to the next?  Its a throw of the dice with this squad it really is.  

Forss scored 2 goals 2 games ago. He’s quality at this level… different position to Dalby but I’ll not be saying Dalbys  quality any time soon. 

1 hour ago, dusan nikolic said:

I think part of Conways performance ( first half) was the total lack of support from Cissoko , either attacking or defending . At one point Conway was attacking and Cissoko was 20 feet behind him and on another attack Cissoko was on the other side of the pitch . 

I get the idea if Gale injured to put Cissoko in if sticking strictly to shape but that sort of opposition and game really wasn't for him and he ended up being neither use nor ornament to Conway, who had a pretty torrid half.

You'd think there'd come a point, away from home, where Taylor plays LB and Conway LW, to give more structure, solidity and some left footed crosses to attack. 

7 minutes ago, Johnnyrotten said:

He's been poor previous 2 games, hardly involved.  And Dalby can win headers.  The fact that we don't give him the chance to win headers with zero crosses is a separate issue, but its not a given that Forss will offer more than Dalby on a given day.  As I've mentioned before, who knows who's turn it is to have a decent game from one game to the next?  Its a throw of the dice with this squad it really is.  

 

Forss has played 142 games in the Championship and scored a goal every five games. Dalby has played 0 games in the Championship, 59 games in L1/L2 and scored twice (so a goal every 30 games).

On the balance of their careers, and their Bolton careers to date, I'd be backing Forss to offer more on most days. And I've zero doubt he'll be starting ahead of Dalby on Thursday.

13 minutes ago, Johnnyrotten said:

He's been poor previous 2 games, hardly involved.  And Dalby can win headers.  The fact that we don't give him the chance to win headers with zero crosses is a separate issue, but its not a given that Forss will offer more than Dalby on a given day.  As I've mentioned before, who knows who's turn it is to have a decent game from one game to the next?  Its a throw of the dice with this squad it really is.  

Forss is comfortably the most technically gifted striker we have. He should be in the starting 11 every week possible, he’d of finished both of the Dalby chances.

14 minutes ago, Johnnyrotten said:

He's been poor previous 2 games, hardly involved.  And Dalby can win headers.  The fact that we don't give him the chance to win headers with zero crosses is a separate issue, but its not a given that Forss will offer more than Dalby on a given day.  As I've mentioned before, who knows who's turn it is to have a decent game from one game to the next?  Its a throw of the dice with this squad it really is.  

And today was the day when not one or maybe two but at least half a dozen threw a stinker in. You don't beat anybody like that. 

As lame a showing as a few of those at the fag end of last season, when the excuses was it was Evatt's lot who'd downed tools

5 minutes ago, ianofcleveleys said:

I get the idea if Gale injured to put Cissoko in if sticking strictly to shape but that sort of opposition and game really wasn't for him and he ended up being neither use nor ornament to Conway, who had a pretty torrid half.

You'd think there'd come a point, away from home, where Taylor plays LB and Conway LW, to give more structure, solidity and some left footed crosses to attack. 

Absolutely,  hopefully today's shambles on the left isn't repeated anytime soon.

42 minutes ago, Zico said:

I'm at the point now I'd start Miller next game

I was actually stood behind the warm up shots pre-match today and thought he looked excellent. Added to that his attitude was top notch coming over for selfies with loads of kids.

First time I've paid any attention to him but he seemed much more dynamic than TSL. I wouldn't be against a swap.

24 minutes ago, Johnnyrotten said:

He's been poor previous 2 games, hardly involved.  And Dalby can win headers.  The fact that we don't give him the chance to win headers with zero crosses is a separate issue, but its not a given that Forss will offer more than Dalby on a given day.  As I've mentioned before, who knows who's turn it is to have a decent game from one game to the next?  Its a throw of the dice with this squad it really is.  

Maybe so, but it meant Burstow in the ‘10’.

He’s the league’s top scorer, he shouldn’t be moved. If that means Dalby sits on the bench until he has bad run of form or gets injured then so be it.

If he wanted Forss out of the team then it should have been Randall in to at least add slightly more in the midfield, not a striker in to move you current centre forward backwards. Poor from SS.

3 hours ago, bwfc4ife said:

We need to rip out the weakness, clearly Johnston, Cissoko, Morley & Dalby shouldn’t be anywhere near the starting line up. Taylor needs to be given a go at centre half and more importantly than anything, we must must get the ball forward quicker and get fucking crosses into the box. We’ve been saying that all season and it’s still not right.

Just playing devil's advocate, because I genuinely don't care who gets picked from 1 game to the next, but if those 4 shouldn't play in any game, which players should play?  I'm talking about away games as we're obviously talking about aways.  I'm struggling with who starts any away game based on what they've shown.  I'll name one, Forino.  I'm interested who the other 9 outfield players are.

What worries me is that teams below have a game in hand and we have some games coming up that I can't see us getting many points from, not sure how this team would fare in a relegation scrap so hopefully SS can work a miracle and get this team sorted 

3 hours ago, DaveTheRave said:

Awful performance and result. Worst we've played all season. In the other games we've lost I've still felt we played alright. Today was terrible though. We had a few decent chances but overall we were shit and got what we deserved. Don't think any player played well and the manager got the tactics wrong.

I thought we played "OK" at Stockport and Blackpool.  Poor at Barnsley until the sending off, then OK.  Poor at Orient.  Dreadful last 2.  That's a bad run in anyone's book, we've had relegation seasons when we've looked really good once out of 6 aways, and/or won a game or kept a clean sheet.  Absolutely nothing to hang onto about our away form.  Not even taken the lead or scored a 1st half goal yet, its scandalous really bearing in mind the money spent and we keep getting told not one player on the opposition would get into our team 😀

2 in midfield isn’t working especially away from home and it never worked for IE can SS not see this.

6 minutes ago, Eddie said:

Maybe so, but it meant Burstow in the ‘10’.

He’s the league’s top scorer, he shouldn’t be moved. If that means Dalby sits on the bench until he has bad run of form or gets injured then so be it.

If he wanted Forss out of the team then it should have been Randall in to at least add slightly more in the midfield, not a striker in to move you current centre forward backwards. Poor from SS.

If there's one good thing about today it's that I don't think he'll repeat that. Dalby was ok imo but you don't move the league top scorer to support striker to accommodate him.

Forss had a couple of off games but I still expected him to start as the drop off to Randall and McAtee is stark.

The issue is we don't have an attacking midfielder option yet for a 433, but hoping Dempsey can solve that in the near future

Just listened to SS post match interview. Starting to sound very ground hog day. "We can't keep doing x and not doing y. We knew what to expect from their style of play and the slow bobbly pitch"

Heard this repeatedly but seen little evidence that we can rectify or combat these problems.

Actions speak louder than repeated words.

Questions SS ability to manage his players, repeatedly....

2 hours ago, superkev said:

Central defence needs ripping apart. Start Toal and Taylor next game. Surely can’t be any worse

Don’t bet on that.

3 hours ago, gonzo said:

He can blame Dalby all he wants. He shouldn't have been on the pitch.

Today was Dalby's first start.  Which away game have we taken our chances in?  It was a continuation, if we think its because this player starts or that player doesn't, we're kidding ourselves.  Supposedly we lost at Northampton because Sheehan played and EE didn't.  Its never because the team isn't good enough, its because one player out of a squad of 20 either didn't play or did play.

I may be the lone voice here, but I thought the decision to play Dalby and Burstow made sense, and I don't think too many were kicking off about it pre-game.

The idea was to go longer to beat Burton's press. In fairness, I thought both won plenty of the ball up top, and we should have been a couple ahead before their pen.

But, yes, feels like groundhog day, and once we went behind I never really felt we'd win it (or, if I'm honest, score).

Too many off it today, and surprised Simons seems to be largely avoiding any flak - stunk the gaff out today. Baffling how different he is home vs away.

I've enjoyed most of this campaign, but at point I was expecting us to kick on we've turned in probably our three worst performances of the season.

Good run of games coming up to (hopefully) turn things around though.

5 minutes ago, Johnnyrotten said:

Supposedly we lost at Northampton because Sheehan played and EE didn't. 

I dread to think of the stick Sheehan would get if he turned in a performance like Simons' today.

1 minute ago, Johnnyrotten said:

Today was Dalby's first start.  Which away game have we taken our chances in?  It was a continuation, if we think its because this player starts or that player doesn't, we're kidding ourselves.  Supposedly we lost at Northampton because Sheehan played and EE didn't.  Its never because the team isn't good enough, its because one player out of a squad of 20 either didn't play or did play.

Very fair point. I agree that we didn’t lose today because one player was or wasn’t in the 11. We lost because we were collectively shit.

There are however parts of it that you can look at and point to as potentially not giving us the best shot. I’m not against Dalby, I think he’ll be useful, but as I said before I just cannot see how you can move the league’s top scorer away from the forward line.

Having said that - our left hand side is so weak compared to the right (GJ, Conway, Cissoko, possibly Morley as the left of the centre mids), that surely it’s time to see what Taylor can do. I’m not sure whether you put him in instead of GJ or Conway, arguments for either, but I think he has to come in (and hopefully Tutu is fit enough to start on the left).