Kewell our or relegation

[sinophile]

Amongst all the hysteria calling for Kewell to be sacked, I have not seen anyone suggest what else he could do. Without Stead and Hemmings there were no credible attacking options. We know how fragile the midfield is, so it was, on paper at least, sensible to play Thomas and Baldwjn as wide midfielders. The problem was that Milsom had an appalling game, Hewitt ran around like a headless chicken, and moving Turley to right back, with Brisley in the centre of defence, left things wide open.

But what else was there he could do? Nolan has bequeathed such an imbalanced squad, that cannot withstand any injuries or suspensions. Kewell clearly has nous, as was demonstrated by bringing Duffy on. It stemmed the flow towards the defence and gave some steel. What was probably not evident on tv was that Duffy acted like a captain and communicated and organised the defence.

Whether or not Dennis should have been kept on is debatable. He did absolutely nothing, but got no service. Something had to give and I think Kewell got the substitution absolutely spot on. Notts could have gone on to win as the Oldham threat was nullified. I expect Duffy to be a first choice and to be captain.

[LaxtonLad]

Amongst all the hysteria calling for Kewell to be sacked, I have not seen anyone suggest what else he could do. Without Stead and Hemmings there were no credible attacking options. We know how fragile the midfield is, so it was, on paper at least, sensible to play Thomas and Baldwjn as wide midfielders. The problem was that Milsom had an appalling game, Hewitt ran around like a headless chicken, and moving Turley to right back, with Brisley in the centre of defence, left things wide open.

But what else was there he could do? Nolan has bequeathed such an imbalanced squad, that cannot withstand any injuries or suspensions. Kewell clearly has nous, as was demonstrated by bringing Duffy on. It stemmed the flow towards the defence and gave some steel. What was probably not evident on tv was that Duffy acted like a captain and communicated and organised the defence.

Whether or not Dennis should have been kept on is debatable. He did absolutely nothing, but got no service. Something had to give and I think Kewell got the substitution absolutely spot on. Notts could have gone on to win as the Oldham threat was nullified. I expect Duffy to be a first choice and to be captain.

I agree almost totally with this post except Turley did quite a good job at RB.

If anyone was watching Duffy off the ball they would have seen, if not heard, how vocal he was.

The subbing of Dennis for Duffy surprised most of the supporters but I don't think it deserved the boos and it must have had them thinking again when we saw an improvement. Not really fair on Dennis, he was a lone striker and is as good at that as Hewitt is at RB. The shifting of Brisley forward into midfield-ish while Duffy took his regular position in defence actually seemed to work as Boldeweijn was given more service than Dennis had and looked more threatening directly on goal than on the wing.

A thumbs up from me for HK reading the game correctly this time.

[matt_magpie]

I agree almost totally with this post except Turley did quite a good job at RB.

If anyone was watching Duffy off the ball they would have seen, if not heard, how vocal he was.

The subbing of Dennis for Duffy surprised most of the supporters but I don't think it deserved the boos and it must have had them thinking again when we saw an improvement. Not really fair on Dennis, he was a lone striker and is as good at that as Hewitt is at RB. The shifting of Brisley forward into midfield-ish while Duffy took his regular position in defence actually seemed to work as Boldeweijn was given more service than Dennis had and looked more threatening directly on goal than on the wing.

A thumbs up from me for HK reading the game correctly this time.

Agree no one would can argue the starting 11 or in my mind with Enzio going up front, it actually nearly worked in getting a goal and he did a lot better than Dennis. As for any of the other midfielders at the club I don't think anyone would have backed any of them going into that game at that point. I thought Duffy played well bar his one off theatrics. The problem is the squad is awful, 4 or so midfielders not in the squad because on the face of it their not good enough or suited at this level for and unfortunately Hewitt cannot consistently perform, we needed a left back in the summer, toots is struggling this season and to top it off Duffy and Hall have been injured, Dennis missed pre season, its just been a shambles for many reasons and Kewell has been left to sort it out, his choice but I don't think he realised how bad it was.