Match Thread: Lincoln City v Oxford United | Page 26 | Vital Football

Match Thread: Lincoln City v Oxford United

Brendan Bradley said:
And yet not one of the six goals yesterday, or the one at Rochdale, or the incident that led to Bristol Rovers penalty came as a result of any City player being pressed.

So that is not the problem. If anything the other teams are adopting a low block.

There is a tactical issue that makes the team vulnerable, which is the same as it was last season but which was generally hidden by the fact that we could dominate games.

If you can bear to look again at the highlights from yesterday, Oxford's 3rd and 5th goals illustrate this glaringly, and the second goal is also part of the problem. The other goals they scored are also symptoms of the same thing.

And I don't even bother studying tactics, but it's that obvious.
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Agreed none of the goals came directly as a result of it but when a team is playing a tactic that doesn't work it causes heads to drop and the knock on effect speaks for itself. I agree that there is way too much space between defence and midfield which makes the 'playing out' tactic even more ineffective and frustrating.
 
Before a match was played this season, no one really knew what a good target was - most said survival was okay...

Then the season started... Early wild optimism...

...has been replaced with wild pessimism.

We conceded a couple of goals and then chased the game yesterday which certainly back fired.

Let’s reset our target back to the one DC had of 50 points. 13 after 10 games means we are well ahead of target. 23 after 20 games will mean we are still on target coming up to January. Three 1-0 wins will be about enough.

Let’s roll up our sleeves and get back to being hard to beat.

The squad is unbalanced but has good players in it...

Good enough to achieve 50 points.

This was the reality most were happy to sign up to.

It went “L1 will be hard, we will be happy to finish out of the relegation places, then if we begin to bring through the likes of Chapman, Bradley and JAS in future years and trade well we can eventually develop into a serious contender in future seasons”.

We are at the start of that... and living it is not as comfortable as saying it...
but that’s where we are ... uncomfortably on track.
 
elkimp said:
A massive part lacking from the players yesterday was the right mentality. Pride, focus, togetherness, aggression, desire all non existent. Where did that come from?
Okay, your leader leaves. So roll your sleeves up and take responsibility.
This poor attitude added to a bizarre summer transfer window, including an insistence on signing small ball playing midfielders and ignoring the qualities that got us here led to this result.
I've always been an advocate of Gilks. Should have been signed. O'Hara. Great attitude, ball winner and imposing. Should have been signed.
A Nother centre forward should 100% have been signed. So obvious it stinks.
A young, fast centre back should have been signed. Shackell and Bossie clearly will not last the season and pace is a problem in this area.
Like it or not Eardley is getting targeted by the opposition. He will need resting, for a younger, faster full back (Lewis).
Turning the clock back and thinking the budget is spent, I'd have moved Vickers on; not signed Connolly or Coker and controversially or Payne.
Something for MA to look at in January.
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Still think we can get a tune out of Payne,so i see him as a positive,currently our process does not get the best out of him and that line could be applied to a few more players i.e.Walker,Akinde.
Roll on the new messiah.
Footnote:met an oxford fan at Newark and when asked about Appleton his reply was(,bearing in mind they had just thumped us.)

I would swap managers in an instant and
take Appleton back tomorrow!
 
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Can anyone remember the last time we won a second ball?

I rewatched our goals and the lack of pace in our defence is a problem.
 
The saving grace this year for us is

Bury being removed from the league
Bolton being deducted points
Southend being worse then us.

So there are really only 1/2 relegation spots.

I can see us comfortably mid table this year.

The fishy cods can laugh all they like at our 6:0 yesterday but I am confident we will still be a division higher then them (and the stags) this time next year
 
Davidimp said:
Couple of things others have mentioned that I spotted too, the lack of urgency from the players when they had the ball, no clue who to pass to.
We used to get Anderson and Andrade to swap wings this has stopped why?
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Primarily because last season the Anderson/Eardley and Andrade/Toffolo combinations worked so well there was no point. Yesterday, moving Bruno to the right wing took our best attacking option out of the game.
 
imps_joe said:
Can anyone remember the last time we won a second ball?

I rewatched our goals and the lack of pace in our defence is a problem.
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I wondered about this. I love managers who "build from the back" but I think the defence was neglected over the summer. Shackell is now, what, 35? Bostwick in his 30s and never the fastest and Eardley - who is a legend - is definitely starting to lack pace. In L2 that didn't matter so much as experience can help a great deal. But the step-up in quality and pace in L1 is exposing weaknesses, I think.
 
NottyImp said:
I wondered about this. I love managers who "build from the back" but I think the defence was neglected over the summer. Shackell is now, what, 35? Bostwick in his 30s and never the fastest and Eardley - who is a legend - is definitely starting to lack pace. In L2 that didn't matter so much as experience can help a great deal. But the step-up in quality and pace in L1 is exposing weaknesses, I think.
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We should give lewis a go and eardley a rest. Bostwick and Bolger look good.

I would keep shackle in the bench and use him for matches against weaker opposition to give Bostwick a rest
 
imps_joe said:
Can anyone remember the last time we won a second ball?
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Rochdale, second half - the difference to the first half there when they werent winning them was stark, and made yesterday so frustrating in replicating the worst of the previous match for 90 minutes, not the best.
 
Brendan Bradley said:
That's not really it either. I think we had 46% possession yesterday. Sheffield United has 30% at Everton and won 2-0. Norwich scored three to beat Man City with 30% possession.

The problem, defensively, has been evident for over a year and that is that it if you pick the ball up when City have been attacking you can waltz through our central midfield as it's an open pasture there.

It doesn't matter if those two players are Morrell and Connolly or if it was O'Connor and Pett or Frecklington last season, the result is the same because we are wide open to the counter attack. Last season few teams were able to exploit that.

It's a problem because our experienced, but slow, defence cannot push up for fear of the ball over the top, consequently you could drive a flock of sheep through the middle. Watch the goals we conceded again, and look at the depth of our defence and the space that is available to run into.

To corrrect this - and I don't claim any credentials as a tactician, we need to be re-invented as a counter-attacking team defending more deeply and breaking quickly, and for which we definitely have the players available to do that.
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From what I have heard, that is very much Appleton's style, or was at Oxford.
 
clanfordimp said:
Could you just talk me through your tactical reasons for dropping our top scorer.
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Because at the moment we're creating nothing so Walker is wasted.

He's a much better finisher than Akinde, regularly in a better position and much more confident in putting it away.

But Walker is only a poacher and a finisher. Akinde's defensive work, pressing etc. and link up play, in my eyes is much stronger and may allow Andrade and Payne to get back to their best games. Akinde can also hold the ball up much better which would hopefully help us plug the huge gap between midfield and attack by giving players more time to get up the pitch. Akinde may even get the confidence back to get his scoring game, which he does have, back on track. Plus Akinde is massive which is always a help at set pieces.

If this works, and it is a big if as my management credentials are limited to Football Manager (although I am really good at the game) which may hint at I don't have a clue about real life, and we manage to get teams on the back foot then you can look at how to integrate Walker into the match either with Akinde or to replace him depending upon how the match has gone.

Unfortunately I don't think playing 2 up front from the start is an option with the players we have at the moment. We don't have the pace at the back to play 3 at the back and we're getting overrun as it is with 3 CM's (inc. Payne) so reducing that to 2 for a 442 is going to cause havoc. If we can get an element of control on the game though I think it is plausible to play 2 strikers.

So basically, playing Akinde may let us play further up the pitch allowing other players to play their game, and we may just create more than 1 half hearted shot on target.
 
NottyImp said:
I wondered about this. I love managers who "build from the back" but I think the defence was neglected over the summer. Shackell is now, what, 35? Bostwick in his 30s and never the fastest and Eardley - who is a legend - is definitely starting to lack pace. In L2 that didn't matter so much as experience can help a great deal. But the step-up in quality and pace in L1 is exposing weaknesses, I think.
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Unfortunately now, the best available external option at CB would be Tommie Hoban. A 25 year old who has played around 100 games in his career because he's had 2 or 3 really bad injuries. Good player if you can get him on the pitch for longer than 20 minutes though.

So unless Connolly is dropping back (where he used to play) when Pett is back we have to deal with what we have for 4 months.
 
Chesterimp said:
Rochdale, second half - the difference to the first half there when they werent winning them was stark, and made yesterday so frustrating in replicating the worst of the previous match for 90 minutes, not the best.
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I actually think the Rochdale first half was worse than the Oxford first half. But as soon as the goal went in just after half time everything crumbled.
 
This bitter fan has lumped on Huddersfield getting relegated and will be watching the match today at noon...?
 
DonnyImp said:
Jeez! Dont start them off on that old news again!!
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Haha, I really don’t care... busy day today, with F1, Wentworth (Golf) and a bit of footie in the middle of the sandwich. I’ll be there for every home game this season - come what may.
 
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