7 hours ago, Scott Harris said:

Even before we got Pochettino, so many were painting him as something he wasn't.

"He's the best around to get the most out of these youngsters"

Everybody was calling him a serial bottler not so long ago. 

This formation he is playing every game doesn't surprise me, he was doing the same at Tottenham, something a lot of fans seem to have forgot. I remember the likes of Walker, Trippier and Rose playing wing back with Dembele and Eriksen in the midfield. I can remember him failing with it before Conte embarrassed him one season in and actually won a title playing that way.

I'm sick of coaches being so scared to play attacking football at this club, and as much as I like Tuchel, it annoyed me a lot when he did it too. Pochettino has already set us back massively with his formation. He's already put it into the players head that he doesn't trust them as attackers, but also doesn't trust them to cope without an extra man in defense. We don't see this from Klopp, we don't see this from Guardiola. I know those two are extreme examples because they are the best around, but we need coaches that will put faith in young players. The last thing young players need is for a coach to doubt them, and he's already done it with his tactics and formations.

Klopp and Guardiola aren't playing with 3 of their back 4 being new to the team/league. Klopp and Guardiola have the luxury of potent attacks that can mitigate defensive frailties.

The formation is fine, it's what we saw in preseason and what we should expect to see. Now you can disagree with playing Levi at LB and Chilwell at LW and that's fine, but I don't really see an issue with him not trusting Mudryk or Cucurella. And with the injuries, Palmer just arriving, his options are limited.

Anyone calling him a serial bottler is a moron. He did fantastic work at SH and Spurs, playing some brilliant stuff along the way. Poch and his choices are far from being the determining factor in our current form. And seeing complaints after our young team shows expected inconsistencies will get tiring super quickly.

3 minutes ago, axman2526 said:

After the Forest performance I am now fearing our season to be similar to last season.

Lord that was wretched to watch.

Yup... we need to find a way to fight this low block

For me, watching Chelsea is like watching a decent striker fight a savvy grappler on UFC:

We want a night clean stand-up fight but the majority of teams playing us are simply going to do what West Ham/Forest did to us... smother us with the low block in the middle and use their muscle/height to deal with the odd threat or two that comes in from the wing.

Of course we used to have Hazard to get us out of that... he was that good.

Sterling is trying and he's looking better and better this year.... but yesterday, Jackson let us down.

Think we have to use the pace we've got more intelligently and draw the foul for the free kick if we're not able to get through on goal.

Too many times yesterday we saw Yates et al doing the dirty on our pacey players and getting away with it.

I am very confused with people who say we play back 5. It was 4231 same as pre season. 

The only difference was Chiwell as lb, Nkunku as lw and carney as am. 

 

Why Enzo as a 10? We didn't have any other player who is more of linkup 10(now we do with Palmer)

Why Chilwell as lw instead of Madueke/murdyk? Chilwell is playing as winger not wb not attacking fb, winger. This is actually not about poch, it is more about Madueke n murdyk. 

Edited September 3, 20232 yr by Bob stark

Will "pleased with the progress" be Pochettinos answer to "the lads gave everything"?

 

Paul Merson is bang on here when talking to Sky Sports:

"If you play 10 men behind the ball against Chelsea, they find it so difficult to break them down," he said on Soccer Saturday.

"It's so slow and mundane. It's never constant pressure, they never pin teams in. They never looked like scoring. This has been an issue for a couple of years now."

45 minutes ago, Bob stark said:

I am very confused with people who say we play back 5. It was 4231 same as pre season. 

The only difference was Chiwell as lb, Nkunku as lw and carney as am. 

 

Why Enzo as a 10? We didn't have any other player who is more of linkup 10(now we do with Palmer)

Why Chilwell as lw instead of Madueke/murdyk? Chilwell is playing as winger not wb not attacking fb, winger. This is actually not about poch, it is more about Madueke n murdyk. 

I agree we've been so toothless at the left ever since chuku got injured, not sure why Poch isn't playing wingers at the left and pushing Chilwell back.

1 hour ago, Bob stark said:

I am very confused with people who say we play back 5. It was 4231 same as pre season. 

The only difference was Chiwell as lb, Nkunku as lw and carney as am. 

 

Why Enzo as a 10? We didn't have any other player who is more of linkup 10(now we do with Palmer)

Why Chilwell as lw instead of Madueke/murdyk? Chilwell is playing as winger not wb not attacking fb, winger. This is actually not about poch, it is more about Madueke n murdyk. 

Formation does not matter of you don't pick players to fit it.

Colwill is not a LB. Chilwell is not a LW. Enzo is not a 10.

If you say you want to play a 4-4-2 and you pick 6 defenders and 4 strikers are you really playing a 4-4-2?

Bottom line is Pochettino is playing 3 players out of the natural best positions and starting home matches against Flippin Luton and Forest with 3 CB, 2 FB, 1 DM, 1 DLP, 1 Box to Box, 1 winger and 1 forward. 2 attackers out of 10. At home....to Forest....and Luton.

It is shameful, no "big club" acts this way.

Edited September 3, 20232 yr by axman2526

16 minutes ago, Frankie8Lampard said:

I agree we've been so toothless at the left ever since chuku got injured, not sure why Poch isn't playing wingers at the left and pushing Chilwell back.

😬😬

I think it is quite obvious why. 

3 minutes ago, axman2526 said:

Formation does not matter of you don't pick players to fit it.

Colwill is not a LB. Chilwell is not a LW. Enzo is not a 10.

If you say you want to play a 4-4-2 and you pick 6 defenders and 4 strikers are you really playing a 4-4-2?

Bottom line is Pochettino is playing 3 players out of the natural best positions and starting home matches against Flippin Luton and Forest with 3 CB, 2 FB, 1 DM, 1 DLP, 1 Box to Box, 1 winger and 1 forward. 2 attackers out of 10. At home....to Forest....and Luton.

It is shameful, no "big club" acts this way.

OK, so who should play as a 10? 

4 minutes ago, Bob stark said:

OK, so who should play as a 10? 

If you don't have a 10, don't play a formation that needs a 10. Is the old square peg in round holes thing again.

Is not like a Goalkeeper where you have to have one even if it results in JT putting on Carlos shirt and gloves.

One for you @Valerie ;)

43 minutes ago, axman2526 said:

If you don't have a 10, don't play a formation that needs a 10. Is the old square peg in round holes thing again.

Is not like a Goalkeeper where you have to have one even if it results in JT putting on Carlos shirt and gloves.

One for you @Valerie 😉

A 10 here mean more of between the line player. 

 

2 hours ago, Bob stark said:

I am very confused with people who say we play back 5. It was 4231 same as pre season. 

The only difference was Chiwell as lb, Nkunku as lw and carney as am. 

 

Why Enzo as a 10? We didn't have any other player who is more of linkup 10(now we do with Palmer)

Why Chilwell as lw instead of Madueke/murdyk? Chilwell is playing as winger not wb not attacking fb, winger. This is actually not about poch, it is more about Madueke n murdyk. 

I can see why there is confusion and also why Chilwell doesn't look comfortable as LW is not his natural position. Maybe now we have Cole Palmer, Chilwell moves back into LB role, with one of the current CB's making way. And have Cole Palmer on LW? Or Maatsen? I agree that Mudryk currently isn't the answer. Madueke seems to be preferred on the right when he features.

Poch at the moment doesnt looks like he has answers:

- We are not yet a "system" team under him. Instead it looks like a collection of parts.

- We are still reliant on a piece of magic from one player to unlock a defence - rather than batter them down ala liverpool of 2 seasons ago, jose mk1 or city. Unfortunately we don't have the magic player to do this regularly.

- when things go wrong like they did against west ham and forest, poch's answer has been to throw on more attackers. Unfortunately this is done in a haphazard way, and we look pretty rough when he does that.

- Chilly isn't a winger. Enzo not a 10. Levi not a LB. Connor not a pivot player. FFS start playing players in their actual positions!

Just now, nonotnowjim said:

We are still reliant on a piece of magic from one player to unlock a defence - rather than batter them down ala liverpool of 2 seasons ago, jose mk1 or city. Unfortunately we don't have the magic player to do this regularly.

 

There is no such thing as system to unlock defense. Jose mk-2 can't score against packed defense. Bring in fab n Costa, problem solved. 

Scoring is difficult. You can have the best game plan you can still score nothing. You can have wrong game plan but you have Messi, he beat two man, score from free kick, hatrrick and you are a genius. 

 

There is no system and the team was too defensive I don't care how you dress it up. You don't need Silva, Disasi and colwill in the back line along with Gusto and Chilwell. That's bull sh** against forest.

More to the point it was blindly obvious that we missed either a 10 with a goal threat or a proper left wing and all the attack was forced down the right. It didn't help that Jackson had a shocker when it really mattered.

It's more about attitude than anything else. Far better to lose 4:2 and be entertaining and the players have fun  than 1:0 in boring sterile possession based football. This is a young team but I do think either Silva or disasi should be dropped we only need two centre backs.

Then we have 3 in midfield caicedo enzo and either palmer or conor and 3 in attack, if sterling stays on the right then its mudryk. I'd be happy to give Mudryck some bloody game time instead of expecting him to win the game with 5 minutes left. 

Poch's subs by the end were terrible and ruined whatever plan we might have had. How the f*** can you have sterling, palmer, madueke, mudryck and jackson all on but no full backs. ah maybe maatsen whereever he was playing. Why put mudryck on the right why have maduke and sterling getting in each other's way.

I think my point is there was no clear plan other than just throw random players on the field for going 1 behind. Poch expected to win and didn't have a plan B. That's poor management.

I hate criticising the coach even one with that stupid wrist bangle lucky charm but in this case he deserves it.

There is plenty of talent in the squad and yes it's raw and will make mistakes. But for sure the way to take advantage is to embrace it. Young players want to attack. Pick a team that lets them do that. Enzo should play a bit deeper and help caicedo out and play palmer instead of conor. Drop either Disasi or silva, for me it's silva that gets dropped. He is probably still better than disasi but the team isn't going anywhere while he is still there. Then   make chillwel play deeper and use his pace to get forward occasionally. Its a system that will suit gusto better.

 

 

Edited September 3, 20232 yr by ozboy

2 hours ago, Bob stark said:

OK, so who should play as a 10? 

Why do we need to play with a 10?

Just play standard 4-3-3 and see how it goes.

--------------Sanchez----------

Gusto--Silva--Colwill--Chilwell

-------------Caicedo-----------

------Enzo-------Gallagher----

---Madueke-Jackson-Sterling-

3 at the back works fine if James is on the field and fully fit. As usual, as soon as James went down, 343 was pretty dead. Poch is in very similar situation as Potter last season, long term project with lots of investment on promising players, but when push does to shove he hasn't got key players he could depend on. We don't even have Kovacic or RLC who will be able to play it safe and not offering too much. Poch will do better than Potter, but anyone believes we could challenge top 4 needs a bit of reality check.

1 hour ago, icecoolguy22 said:

3 at the back works fine if James is on the field and fully fit. As usual, as soon as James went down, 343 was pretty dead. Poch is in very similar situation as Potter last season, long term project with lots of investment on promising players, but when push does to shove he hasn't got key players he could depend on. We don't even have Kovacic or RLC who will be able to play it safe and not offering too much. Poch will do better than Potter, but anyone believes we could challenge top 4 needs a bit of reality check.

Well the reality is if we can't even challenge for top 4 with the money spent, it will be a massive failure and utterly embarrassing. How the hell can you spend that amount and not improve???? That is absolutely crazy. 

We're playing like a club that is still on a transfer ban since Roman left. That would be an easy pill to swallow. Can't move forward if you don't spend. There are no excuses.

4 hours ago, axman2526 said:

If you don't have a 10, don't play a formation that needs a 10. Is the old square peg in round holes thing again.

Is not like a Goalkeeper where you have to have one even if it results in JT putting on Carlos shirt and gloves.

One for you @Valerie 😉

To be fair to JT - who for all his JTness obviously couldn't fill the Carlo-shaped hole - he didn't concede a goal.

2 hours ago, Bob stark said:

There is no such thing as system to unlock defense. Jose mk-2 can't score against packed defense. Bring in fab n Costa, problem solved. 

Scoring is difficult. You can have the best game plan you can still score nothing. You can have wrong game plan but you have Messi, he beat two man, score from free kick, hatrrick and you are a genius. 

 

I don’t agree. 

High tempo, progressive football, that moves the ball forward with pace, creates overloads, and pulls defenders all over the place DOES break down a deep defence. Or at least, creates spaces for the more gifted places to exploit.

 

Our game yesterday, against west ham and for most of the last 5 years has been the opposite. Slow football with lots of sideways and backwards passes. We are a one trick pony, reliant on wing backs to create.  
 

Of course, your argument that Messi unlocks defence is also true….but we don’t have one of those players who can do it consistently in the EPL.

12 minutes ago, nonotnowjim said:

I don’t agree. 

High tempo, progressive football, that moves the ball forward with pace, creates overloads, and pulls defenders all over the place DOES break down a deep defence. Or at least, creates spaces for the more gifted places to exploit.

 

Our game yesterday, against west ham and for most of the last 5 years has been the opposite. Slow football with lots of sideways and backwards passes. We are a one trick pony, reliant on wing backs to create.  
 

Of course, your argument that Messi unlocks defence is also true….but we don’t have one of those players who can do it consistently in the EPL.

Agree, really thought with the signings we brought in we were going to be playing flowing attacking football, but we still do this tippy tappy sideways crap. It really is unwatchable and the results are going to be the same sadly.

To make it simple. We just need 4 competent attacking players on the pitch who have a real desire and hunger to score goals or at least improve their ability to do so. Currently one of our main attacking outlets in Chillwell would prefer to square it inside the box instead of shooting. That's how bad it is.

10 hours ago, Ernie_blue said:

Tbf Brighton also have the likes of Dunk, Veltman, Gross, March, Estupinan and with others like Lallana, Milner, Dahoud, Steele and Webster on the bench with Wellbeck also missing. I've seen people say about blending youth and experience and Brightons squad has plenty of experience.

Arsenal have a team under 25. I don't get these mental gymnastics people are doing. 

9 hours ago, WhiteWall said:

This.

It's why I grimace every time I see our possession stats from excess of 75%, because I know it's going to be a sh*t boring game with no shots by us and probably getting beat on a counter.

Until we, and other clubs, create players capable of shooting on target from 20 plus yards, this sterile, fruitless dirge will continue over and over again. With all of these millions, all of these analytical tools and products,  and all these superstar tactical gurus, why has nobody worked out how to teach these blokes to shoot at the bloody goal.

Just watched yesterday's highlights on match of the day and we had several good chances which went wide or high. We had 21 shots yesterday - just 2 on target, 6 off target and 13 blocked. Got to do better than that. I think we need to commit to having more bodies in the box to give us better options.

We are creating chances. We need to find a solution to convert those chances. As well as breaking down those stubborn defences like yesterday. I don't know the solution for that. 

58 minutes ago, KonaKai Blue said:

Well the reality is if we can't even challenge for top 4 with the money spent, it will be a massive failure and utterly embarrassing. How the hell can you spend that amount and not improve???? That is absolutely crazy. 

We're playing like a club that is still on a transfer ban since Roman left. That would be an easy pill to swallow. Can't move forward if you don't spend. There are no excuses.

Leave the money discussion for the twitter morons. What does matter to anyone how much we spent if we spend it on potential.  Expectations are not set by the money spent. If Brighton went and spent 500m on 18 year olds, it doesn't mean they should be challenging. Getting 5th is quite literally, an improvement for us.

We are the youngest team in the league, with a brand new squad, and a brand new manager. Those are your excuses, and they are valid!