Romared Match Thoughts Barnsley v Mansfield Town

[animallittle3]

We have been shocking at the back since Wembley and we have had numerous coaches come and gone since then, when you had Cadden, Thomas, Anderson, Kitchen and Williams as your defence and let them all go and replace them with non league and players of limited ability then it doesn"t matter who is coaching them as they are simply not up to it and not good enough, I have read one or two laying the blame on Keogh when the blame should be firmly laid on the amatuers running the club , Keogh was highly rated at Blackpool but the old saying of silk purse and cows ears comes to mind , its the players for me , they are simply not up to it.

They are responsible in my opinion Shad for the pyssing around at the back , that comes from Keogh and Hourihane , I'm not suggesting we hoof it down the field because that won't work either with the way we set up offensively but none the less some common sense has to be attatched to this .

The approach has to be making sure we become difficult to beat and we are the polar opposite of that , it's imperative we start becoming more defensively minded even at the cost of becoming not that great to watch , there's enough talent up top to nick a goal or two but expecting them to score four goals every week just to beat Exeter or Mansfield is a ludicrous way of playing and doomed to fail .

I'm firmly behind Hourihane but I can't defend this forever , losing games to better teams is one thing but irresponsibility , naivety and not learning is quite another , it's got a shelf life .

[Shadrack the Red]

They are responsible in my opinion Shad for the pyssing around at the back , that comes from Keogh and Hourihane , I'm not suggesting we hoof it down the field because that won't work either with the way we set up offensively but none the less some common sense has to be attatched to this .

The approach has to be making sure we become difficult to beat and we are the polar opposite of that , it's imperative we start becoming more defensively minded even at the cost of becoming not that great to watch , there's enough talent up top to nick a goal or two but expecting them to score four goals every week just to beat Exeter or Mansfield is a ludicrous way of playing and doomed to fail .

I'm firmly behind Hourihane but I can't defend this forever , losing games to better teams is one thing but irresponsibility , naivety and not learning is quite another , it's got a shelf life .

I agree with you about playing about at the back it really winds me up but I will make my point again, we have not replaced the quality we had when we played at Wembley , our defence has been shocking since , if Bobby Moore was alive and coaching this lot he would get nowhere , they are lower league/none league recruits who are not up to it and when you consider Lopata, Cotter and Okeefe were also in this group it shows you how bad the recruitment has been in the defensive dept .

[animallittle3]

I agree with you about playing about at the back it really winds me up but I will make my point again, we have not replaced the quality we had when we played at Wembley , our defence has been shocking since , if Bobby Moore was alive and coaching this lot he would get nowhere , they are lower league/none league recruits who are not up to it and when you consider Lopata, Cotter and Okeefe were also in this group it shows you how bad the recruitment has been in the defensive dept .

It's classic style over substance Shad and it's inviting criticism of Hourihane and it's going to get difficult to defend .

My major concern is that Hourihane as a young HC and finding his feet hasn't actually got any ideas of his own , he's simply rehashing the game at PL level with this nonsense at the back and I noticed this afternoon he had Bland moving in to midfield from his right back role and this inverted full back nonsense , perfectly fine if you are Pep with the players he has at his disposal but not so good if you have a young kid trying to find his way at league one level .

What goes on in the PL is irrelevant at this level and when you haven't a pot to pyss in it's imperative you play to the strengths you do possess and work from there , something Val did in the covid season .

Don't get me wrong Hourihane needs time to develop but he's got to help himself too and today I came away thinking that there are things he needs to move away from and sharpish too .