Incredibly frustrating to watch. Hazard can’t do it all himself, he’s going to have off nights and tonight was one of them.

Willian coming off has hurt us, RLC looked out of place on the wing.

Lets take positives out of the game, the board must be thinking the team isn’t good enough, need a couple of signings.

Always going to struggle without a proper centre forward. I thought it was one of Morata's better games in recent weeks tonight and he's still so far off the mark. 

RLC has to start when fit, he's better than Barkley for CM and he's been better than Pedro/Willian on the wing recently.

When Hazard has an off game, we struggle to do anything. Far too reliant on him.

Kante is looking much better in this role, knew it wouldn't take him long to adapt.

Alonso needs to realise he ain't prime Lamps with his long range shooting. Wasted so much time for us towards the end of the game banging them into row Z.

Majority of the team on auto-pilot now; the lack of goals and lack of confidence is spreading through the squad like a virus. We really need a physical presence up front again - someone who will keep the centre-backs occupied while our midfielders exploit the space. This attempt to pull defences apart by going side-to-side and back again is mind numbing.

Will a striker solve this ? As we are hardly doing anything in the box.

3 minutes ago, General said:

Its not really fair to pick on individual players for that performance, its a team sport although that sounds cliched its reality

the manager picked the same players for all 4 Xmas fixtures (well nearly all the same- injuries forced his hand but rotation for freshness NO)

the manager continues with his untouchable 4-3-3 formation with Jorginho in holding position, in the last few weeks he's been a liability mainly 

the board or whomever recruits has let CFC be in a position where there is not ONE decent striker

unless Hazard is on fire form wise this team has struggled to score in the last 2 months

Add all those issues together with opposition teams that park the bus and the outcome is predictably the same - Frustration by all but the most patient of us.

 

 

Yes it was a sh*t performance but things would have been a lot different had that wrongly disallowed goal stood, Southampton would have had to come out of that 10 behind the ball and we could have picked them off. 

We surely have to be in the market again soon yet another injury with Willian.

Fabregas was good when came on seemed the only one willing to take risks and create anything rather than this stupid tippy tappy nonsense.

 

The board are going to have to bring a couple of news players in January otherwise we will struggle to make top 4. I understand it’s a busy period and the players may be tired but it’s been the same all season. There’s just no goals in this team and the squad looks creatively tired. 

I would get Higuain and through some cash at Fekir. I know it’s not football manger but they are 2 realistic signings we could make that would help us. 

6 minutes ago, EdinburghBlue said:

f**king hell is this what it’s comes to  how the hell is it Moratas fault? Giroud was woeful last time out bar the two offside goals.

 

I’m by no means saying Morata is the answer or world class but anyone who thinks replacing him will solve all our problems is delusional. The problem runs much deeper than that.

Morata was surrounded by 3 CBs, I'm not sure what else he was supposed to do. Ultimately it's Sarri that needs to wise up, he played RLC out wide when his physicality could have been used in the centre. It's just so f**king naive.

Edited January 2, 20197 yr by the special one

4 minutes ago, Londonisblue said:

Lyon are playing in the UCL so we might actually have a chance then

For real? My bad mate.

I am not on a windup, this is a genuine question: what was the master plan for this game (or the games before)? I could not see any tactical moves, it just seemed the players were kicking the ball at random to the first team mate they saw.  I am trying to figure out what is so fundamentally wrong with our current play - is it formation? individual performances? why our players show complete lack of preparedness for team mates' actions as if they never train together? 

What i find most frustrating is that this isn't Sarriball, not from what i have seen. His previous team played lots of short passes, true, but there was a buzz, a lot of movement off the ball, fast, one touch football and direct fast running at the opposition. Not here. I don't see any difference between this and the previous manager's performances. Our football wasn't bad under Conte, it was just boring and aimless, until we ultimately fcked up and conceded. The only difference here is that we have Rudi and Luiz at the back so there are less fck ups and we just draw more games instead of losing.

This is nothing like the football Sarri was previously playing.

Thought the first half we looked good. Initially we were moving the ball fast, movement was good, pressing was there, but then Willian went off and we had to play Ruben on the RW which is not a good position for him. I think Sarri would have gone false 9 in this game if not the injuries. Poor decision/s from officials cost us at least the 1-0. VAR cannot come soon enough. We are in desperate need of a striker, and we could use another attacking forward, maybe even Fekir (?) to give us that option of a left footed goal threat. The board needs to bring in at least two more attacking players this window because relying on what we have up top won't be good enough I don't think. I no longer have faith in our strikers. 

A striker wouldnt do Jack sh*t......its the way we play that is the issue. Sure it might work a bit if its a quality one.........but its our attitude, urgency, a will to go at it that is the issue. Not only that we absolutely must persist with 433......with the same players all game......the same tactics. This team can do better, of course it can.

2 minutes ago, Jezq8 said:

Will a striker solve this ? As we are hardly doing anything in the box.

This is the problem the ball just doesn't get into the danger area, our forwards no longer make the runs to the near post etc. As soon as we reach the 18 yd box its pass inwards across it and backwards again...re-rinse. We need to use width and whip the ball in quickly so defenders can't set themselves up. 

2 minutes ago, dan_cfc said:

S?outhampton? would???????? have had t?o come out? of that ?10 ?behi?nd th?e? b??a?l?l???

In fairness to them I thought for a side fighting to avoid the drop away from home they were pretty open and did venture up the park. It was far removed from Palace the other day.

I wonder what Sarri really thinks of the Premier League?  Does he believe he can find a way to use these players and be successful or does he only have one way of playing and he's been found out? 

I’m not a Jorginho basher on this forum and really appreciate what he brings to the team by helping other players out by always being available and in tight positions. 

However tonight I thought he was really really poor When he got the ball a saint always rushed in on him forcing him into a lot of mistakes. Also a lot of his attempts of a through ball were very easily cut out. For me that’s his worst game by far.

9 minutes ago, chiefBlueCFC said:

YEAH, BUT THE PASSES

And flicks were exquisite, my compliments to the chef.

2 minutes ago, charierre said:

34 mins till our first attempt,teams have a chance to get comfortable. We show no urgency at the start of games and wonder why we are then chasing them. 

It really pisses me off, you can't turn it on and off like we do and expect to get results from it. 

It's not even something new either, it's something that has been going on for years at this club now. It's even more frustrating when you see them react to it, get a positive result, and then the next game go back to showing a lack of urgency. 

I'm watching every game and looking at that clock go by and I'm getting more and more frustrated because the team hasn't created a single decent chance on goal. It's gotten so bad now that we are often getting one or two a game. I'm not asking for the team to be up 1-0 or 2-0 after 20 minutes, but a bit of urgency and a few testing shots at the keeper isn't asking much.

I don't think it's an issue with the managers at this club either, I can't believe that all of the managers we have had in the last 10 years want us to play like that. It's an issue with the players. Maybe Rudiger is right, maybe there is something wrong with the mentality of some of these players.

5 minutes ago, Jezq8 said:

Will a striker solve this ? As we are hardly doing anything in the box.

Yes. Having a legit goal threat and proficient striker will give our wide men more space to cause danger to the opposition. Right now opposition defences know that Morata and Giroud aren't going to be making the movement or making chances for themselves to give the defender/s trouble. We need someone who will make movement up top and be a constant headache for defenders, making it unpredictable to track our men. Once Hazard is marked, they know Morata/Giroud won't be causing much threat, and they don't even have to mark Morata for him to be ineffective, he does that himself. 

1 minute ago, charierre said:

This is the problem the ball just doesn't get into the danger area, our forwards no longer make the runs to the near post etc. As soon as we reach the 18 yd box its pass inwards across it and backwards again...re-rinse. We need to use width and whip the ball in quickly so defenders can't set themselves up. 

For me this is why Alonso was so bad, at least Azpi's crosses had method and tested Southampton's defence. Alonso is just too slow, physically and mentally.

sadly everything points to us getting spanked by Spurs next week - I hope that's not the case but it's not looking good

1 minute ago, carrickblue said:

I wonder what Sarri really thinks of the Premier League?  Does he believe he can find a way to use these players and be successful or does he only have one way of playing and he's been found out? 

So far its clear he is one dimensional.......and I dont see him as a motivator either. If you are a proper manager you are flexiable, you adapt. sh*t is not working You change it up.....is it a much faster and harder League? You make sure to do the same and counter it.......a player aint doing good for some time? You bench his ass and so on. So far he has nothing of that. Its 433 all the way, same players no matter what, no plan b, and lots of like for like subs.

I’m also gonna chuck out there that Morata plays with someone with a killer ball for a change (Fabregas) and boom - assist & goal within 20 minutes.

 

Someone posted a video in the Morata thread of his highlights before he signed for us and a lot of his goals / good bits of play came from getting the ball forward quickly or good crosses / early crosses.

 

what do we never do? Move the ball forward quickly or cross the ball well.

 

Don’t get me wrong I still think we need better but Morata is not the sole cause of all of the teams woes. His goal tonight was 120% onside. The quicker VAR is introduced the better.

Edited January 2, 20197 yr by EdinburghBlue

4 minutes ago, carrickblue said:

I wonder what Sarri really thinks of the Premier League?  Does he believe he can find a way to use these players and be successful or does he only have one way of playing and he's been found out? 

It takes time to adopt a new system. The only similar system is Pep's and his first season was rocky in patches too, just like ours. The city fans were also showing discontent with Pep during the season, but when it comes together it's great. The problem is, we are playing with 10 men because our striker/s are abysmal. Any coach would have issues with what we have up top. Man Utd have Martial and even Rashford who make good movement off the ball, City have Aguero/Jesus, Spurs have Kane, Liverpool have Firmino. We simply don't have good enough movement up top to cause a threat to opposition backlines.