Taylor back. Iwata on the bench.
HART
RALSTON
WELSH
SCALES
TAYLOR
McGREGOR (c)
O’RILEY
PALMA
MAEDA
IDAH
KYOGO
BAIN, KÜHN, YANG, NAWROCKI, OH, TOMOKI, BERNABEI, BERNARDO, KELLY
Kkkkkkkyyyyooooooggggggooooooo
Kyyyyyoooogggggooooooo
Ralston has a good few assists for Kyogo over the last few seasons.
Good save by Hart from a header from a corner. We remain very weak at defensive set pieces. Welsh then a little rash & nearly gave away a penalty.
Those introvert one twos not quite coming off. Wise words from Hartson.
Probably a slightly better performance than recent weeks. Think we’ve created a few other half chances besides the goal but ball hasn’t quite fallen for us. Idah, Palma and O’Riley have all had a chance to get a shot off but just snuffed out. Palma should have done better with his, though Hartson’s “three or four guys waiting for a tap in” is not a fair analysis.
And yet we still look open at the back. One chance from a corner and then Welsh a bit reckless from the resulting play and no need to dive in there. Scales was nearly caught in possession too. I think having Taylor back has helped the variety in our build up play but we definitely rely on going back to the keeper and between the centre backs much more than we should. We’re slow at feeding the wingers. I have some sympathy for Palma because we need him to beat his man every time the ball is worked out to him. Maeda hasn’t really been on it at all.
Idah and Kyogo have linked very well though and was a lovely goal after a spell of decent attacking possession.
Jesus. Pathetic
Fuck sake.
That was inevitable. The Celtic back five, including Hart, wouldn’t look out of place in a bottom 6 team. Who does the rebuild in the summer? Clearly not Rodgers. Moyes?
That was abysmal.
No to control at all in midfield. Bernardo coming on did nothing to help there. O’Riley and McGregor weren’t any better.
Centre backs aren’t good enough or close to it.
Bernabei was beyond useless when he came on. We immediately got far worse. And he was dreadful for their goal. Ralston had a nice cross for Kyogo’s goal but was poor as well on their equaliser. He needs to make much more of an effort than just jogging over with his hands behind his back.
Not sure we had a single performer who deserved pass marks.
A complete lack of composure to see that game out. Even McGregor had a wild, almost fresh air, hack at a ball late on when he was in acres & could have taken the ball & kept it. There was no control in midfield to take the sting out of the game & I’m not at all sure about Kyogo playing off Idah, albeit it was a nice goal today. I know they stuck a centre back upfront late on & he flicked on the initial long ball out wide & they scored from the cross. But we only had a back 4 (& Ralston dragged infield) to compete with 5 attackers. Bernabei was weak & got eased out of the way for the goal but you’d think some of the midfielders would have been back competing for the first long ball or at least getting in position to make it awkward for them. Too many unproven &/or not good enough players, making poor decisions & wilting under pressure.
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I’m unsure on how much I blame Rodgers. Certainly a large chunk of it. I remember in his first spell being frustrated at his ability to change things - when we started games poorly we continued that way, and when we had a slump of form it persisted for a while. He doesn’t seem to be able to ignite the players at all at the moment.
The squad is patently not good enough. I think this is a really really poor Hun team. They’ve had decent results lately but they’re not a brilliant team by any means. And they have a great chance of winning the league because we’re not much better.
I can’t believe Nawrocki can be worse than both Scales and Welsh. Maybe he is, and it’s just more damning for the recruitment team if he is, but at least he can move the ball a bit quicker than those. Scales sometimes takes responsibility to bring the ball forward purposefully so he gets credit for that, but his quality on the ball is very mixed. He and Welsh spent most of the game seeing who could pass the ball further behind the other one.
Taylor was bright enough when he was on to be fair to him and kept the ball moving well but he gets exposed defensively. Ralston is similar but just less capable on the ball, though he had one good cross clearly. But he gets caught out of position an awful lot and doesn’t challenge wingers at the right times.
Midfield is broken. Bernardo’s spell around Christmas looks like a complete blip, as opposed to him just taking time to come to the ball. We are badly missing Hatate. Iwata really needs to come in now if he’s fit and play McGregor a little further forward. The three at the moment with or without Kyogo in there doesn’t have enough control.
Idah was lively today but doesn’t look like he’s going to score much. Maeda has been poor since returning and was brutal today. Palma was very wasteful too.
Anyway - lots of improving to be done. There are players who can improve form (Kyogo, O’Riley, McGregor, Johnston, Maeda) and hopefully that doesn’t require a change of manager. Hatate and CCV coming back will help. There are players who can do a job (Taylor, Oh(?), Palma, Scales) but are borderline first-team quality. A handful of unproven players (Yang, Holm, Idah, Kuhn). But we don’t have much more than half a good team at the moment.
This is all on lawell
I wouldnt blame BR if he left
Rodgers is phoning it in hoping for the sack.