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City vs. Adelaide, Sunday 29th January, AAMI Park, K.O. 3.00 p.m.


jw1739
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That was a disappointing game for many reasons apart from the injuries. It's a game that we should have won, based on the number of good chances we had

Positives:

We rescued a dire situation.

We are still playing well.

We created plenty of chances: more than enough to win the game.

 

 

Negatives:

It was a dire situation we should never have put ourselves into

There are an increasing number of mistakes creeping into our game

Our conversion efficiency is well below what it was in previous seasons.

We are too reliant on Jamie Maclaren being in good form

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Very disappointing result, but as @belaguttman says, at least these days we seem to be able to rescue a match by coming from two goals down. That's one positive that I could find, the other being that we're still five points clear at the top of the table with the Derby replay in hand.

We are becoming painfully predictable in team selection and pattern of play. It's agonising to watch this tippy-tappy crap where we knock the ball around sideways and backwards before losing it. Contrast Adelaide who took 2-3 passes to move from one end of the field to the other. There's a growing tendency for our players to dwell on the ball and telegraph their passes, and we are also woefully shot-shy.

Rado needs to show some balls and be prepared to be innovative. No point in naming a squad with Rafa and Sulemani if ultimately they don't even get into the match-day squad let alone on the pitch. Why he thinks that Nabbout and Berenguer are impact subs is beyond me, because neither is.

Attendance: 6,337

Edited by jw1739
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1 hour ago, jw1739 said:

Contrast Adelaide who took 2-3 passes to move from one end of the field to the other. There's a growing tendency for our players to dwell on the ball and telegraph their passes, and we are also woefully shot-shy.

Rado needs to show some balls and be prepared to be innovative. No point in naming a squad with Rafa and Sulemani if ultimately they don't even get into the match-day squad let alone on the pitch. Why he thinks that Nabbout and Berenguer are impact subs is beyond me, because neither are.

 

Also, contrast it to Man City who also plays more vertical passes at times. One other thing that they do better than us (among many things) is to vary the pace off the game: that's also something for us to improve on.

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2 hours ago, NewConvert said:

Is Leckie getting more man handled than usual or is it something that I just noticed?

Also, was that Bos' second hospital pass that resulted in the opposition scoring?

And for the record three of the six goals were the results of the yoof squad mistakes: Tilio, Bos and Popovic.

No not at all, that’s his style of play. Rather than having a book full of tricks, he looks for the defenders and tries to roll himself pass them.

Yes Bos had something similar against Adelaide last season but you might be thinking of Jenkinson last season at home - for some reason we have these big errors always against Adelaide.

Leckies goal was also a goalkeeper error, that ball should have never gone in.

Edited by Mr MO
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11 hours ago, jw1739 said:

We are becoming painfully predictable in team selection and pattern of play. It's agonising to watch this tippy-tappy crap where we knock the ball around sideways and backwards before losing it. Contrast Adelaide who took 2-3 passes to move from one end of the field to the other. There's a growing tendency for our players to dwell on the ball and telegraph their passes, and we are also woefully shot-shy.

Yep very frustrating what does my head in is when we break get to the box and stop....3 passes later its good and lam passing it around between them allowing the other team to get everyone behind funny how leckie shoots and gets a goal keeper mistake but still can cause chaos 

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1 hour ago, NewConvert said:

Also, was that Bos' second hospital pass that resulted in the opposition scoring?

Yes. It was. But the other defender involved (Good?) was flatfooted. But it's more than just individuals. If you keep playing our style, with so many sideways and backwards passes, eventually one of them is going to miss their target. Then you are in trouble.

That is why I say that unless we change the style, or at least vary  it, we are going to get these "mistakes."

And in attack we spend so many passes trying to line up the perfect scoring opportunity that the defence moves up, we then have a couple of players offside, so we have to pass backwards to try to set up the opportunity again. Adelaide played this tactic very well yesterday.

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1 hour ago, Mr MO said:

No not at all, that’s his style of play. Rather than having a book full of tricks, he looks for the defenders and tries to roll himself pass them.

Absolutely. What we might call a "bullocking" style. I always feel that he's about to fall over the ball as well.

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1 hour ago, jw1739 said:

Absolutely. What we might call a "bullocking" style. I always feel that he's about to fall over the ball as well.

Yes I get that feeling too, when he first arrived I was like man “why is nearly tripping over with the ball” now I’m content with his style of play. But hey it works!

Edited by Mr MO
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10 minutes ago, Jovan said:

Interesting how people see the game differently.

Our entire game is based on moving the ball and therefore moving the opposition until we have an overload and ultimately it being at the back post 5 yards out. 

Does it always work? No, but we still had 5 or 6 big chances. Adelaide IMO created almost none, first goal was a terrible error by Tilio losing his feet and the ball in the first minute, he never recovered for the rest of his match. Bos played an atrocious waste high ball across the box that at no level is acceptable, and to his credit he got over it and saved the game. The other goal came from a set piece that we should really do better. 

Other than that what did they offer. We played them off the park. 

Should we be more direct, probably not, we try and play through teams and IMO successfully. 

I genuinely feel last 3 draws are anomalies and the next 3 games will prove so.

Full agree, I have no big issues with the way we play.

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1 hour ago, belaguttman said:

The problem isn't with our style of play; it's that we play it too predictably. We need to create different tactical problems for opponents that are more difficult for them to counter

Again I have no issues, we dominate and it’s much better to watch than under PK. Can’t win them all and certain the way we are playing that we are victorious come seasons end.

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Agree with most of what has been said here.

Barring the Brisbane game we have been the better team against wsw and Adelaide imo. Against wsw we just didn't convert our chances and Adelaide it was the same deal (combined with two of the worst defensive howlers I've seen for awhile). If you don't believe me go and have a look at the shots and we've comfortably won that stat both of those games

As spoken about a lot already,  we are getting a little bit predictable when moving up the pitch. To fix this I think it's time to start Frenchy over berisha. Frenchy will offer a little bit more imo as berisha has been underwhelming after a blistering start. Frenchy also has the touch and pace to recieve the ball in the middle of the field and be dangerous with it.

Edited by kingofhearts
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36 minutes ago, kingofhearts said:

Agree with most of what has been said here.

Barring the Brisbane game we have been the better team against wsw and Adelaide imo. Against wsw we just didn't convert our chances and Adelaide it was the same deal (combined with two of the worst defensive howlers I've seen for awhile). If you don't believe me go and have a look at the shots and we've comfortably won the stat both of those games

As spoken about a lot already,  we are the a little bit predictable as we are moving up the field. To fix this I think it's time to start Frenchy over berisha. Frenchy will offer a little bit more imo as berisha has been underwhelming after a blistering start. Frenchy also has the touch and pace to recieve the ball in the middle of the field and be dangerous with it.

But is Beringuer fit enough to start a game?

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9 hours ago, kingofhearts said:

He's only played 2 games since being back but I reckon 60 minutes of frenchy will offer us more than what berisha is giving us now.

Ooh. That's a bold statement. Not sure myself. IMO the issue is not so much the personnel but that we're too predictable. I agree that Berisha hasn't given the return that perhaps we expected, but as @Mr MO says, Berenguer doesn't offer much defensively.

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We are absolutely bossing teams ... and the only strategy teams have against us at the moment is the old bus ...

If Aiden O'Neil could shoot we'd have won the last 3, even with the errors against Adelaide. 

Set piece defending needs to be better, but Goodwin has a wicked kick on him, and that's hard for any team to defend ...

This flat spot of draws will turn around soon and I am hoping for some big number wins in the coming weeks.  

Thinking back to the Heart days when we hoped for a result, its awesome to support a team that is the benchmark

 

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20 minutes ago, Torn Asunder said:

We are absolutely bossing teams ... and the only strategy teams have against us at the moment is the old bus ...

If Aiden O'Neil could shoot we'd have won the last 3, even with the errors against Adelaide. 

Set piece defending needs to be better, but Goodwin has a wicked kick on him, and that's hard for any team to defend ...

This flat spot of draws will turn around soon and I am hoping for some big number wins in the coming weeks.  

Thinking back to the Heart days when we hoped for a result, its awesome to support a team that is the benchmark

 

Agree. Not to mention both Maclaren and VDV missing sitters in the box v Adelaide which they normally would have taken and Good's header and Nabbout's shot being very close. They were really gifted two goals from basic errors that normally would'nt occur. As Rado said in his comments mistakes happen. As long as you learn from them and don't repeat

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2 minutes ago, Le Hack said:

Agree. Not to mention both Maclaren and VDV missing sitters in the box v Adelaide which they normally would have taken and Good's header and Nabbout's shot being very close. They were really gifted two goals from basic errors that normally would'nt occur. As Rado said in his comments mistakes happen. As long as you learn from them and don't repeat

Yes, that's why it was a frustrating game: firstly, falling behind with 3 mistakes; secondly, we had more than enough chances to win the game. Our shot conversion rate has been poor the last two seasons

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1 hour ago, Torn Asunder said:

We are absolutely bossing teams ... and the only strategy teams have against us at the moment is the old bus ...

If Aiden O'Neil could shoot we'd have won the last 3, even with the errors against Adelaide. 

Set piece defending needs to be better, but Goodwin has a wicked kick on him, and that's hard for any team to defend ...

This flat spot of draws will turn around soon and I am hoping for some big number wins in the coming weeks.  

Thinking back to the Heart days when we hoped for a result, its awesome to support a team that is the benchmark

 

About the shooting, VDV, Berisha, Tilio and Nabbout are perhaps even poorer.

I know VDV was louded for his composure against WSW, he gets by far the most shots with very little on target.

1 hour ago, Le Hack said:

Agree. Not to mention both Maclaren and VDV missing sitters in the box v Adelaide which they normally would have taken and Good's header and Nabbout's shot being very close. They were really gifted two goals from basic errors that normally would'nt occur. As Rado said in his comments mistakes happen. As long as you learn from them and don't repeat

Nabbout was offside by the way.

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5 hours ago, jw1739 said:

Ooh. That's a bold statement. Not sure myself. IMO the issue is not so much the personnel but that we're too predictable. I agree that Berisha hasn't given the return that perhaps we expected, but as @Mr MO says, Berenguer doesn't offer much defensively.

I personally think it's a bit of an overreaction to suggest Berisha has not given us that return. 

I reckon his workrate and smarts have made him an important member of a midfield that is really balanced and humming atm. Perhaps he's guilty of trying too hard at times, but his passion can't be argued. 

I reckon he's doing exactly what the coaches have asked from him.

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38 minutes ago, malloy said:

IMO, to get the best out of Berisha we need an out and out number 9 who will look to collect the ball and lay it off.

The issue becomes how do you determine where the point is that you sacrifice one of your best players (JMac) for the overall good of the team. Its hard to ascertain how much the team would improve by replacing Jmac with a forward more suited to our desired style. Not to mention it would be very,very hard to justify to fans media etc.

We don't have enough matches to experiment, unlike many overseas clubs who have more league matches and also other competitions in which they participate.

But I don't think that any of this discussion can justify the wastage of the chances that we create.

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11 minutes ago, jw1739 said:

We don't have enough matches to experiment, unlike many overseas clubs who have more league matches and also other competitions in which they participate.

But I don't think that any of this discussion can justify the wastage of the chances that we create.

I think if we were going to sacrifice Jmac, it would have to be a bite the bullet decision to move him on, hence my comment regarding it being very hard to justify. You would likely need to move him on to free up his marquee spot.

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