Barnsley v Swans | Vital Football

Barnsley v Swans

K

keith margam

Vital Football Legend
This Saturday we make a welcome return to league action after completing yet another two week International break.
We don’t do International breaks very well and the last one started our poor run of form with a home loss to Forest, and culminating in losing at home to winless and bottom of the table Stoke.
A high press by Stoke, resulting in our creative play out of defence stifled, and our midfield outplayed by a team that wanted it more, especially by Joe Allen, who was on a mission to beat Swansea single handed, and there was going to be only one result.

Another potential booby trap awaits us, this time it’s the 508 miles round trip to Barnsley, who are 4th from bottom of the table. On the positive side we are a different team away from the Liberty, unbeaten on the road, with excellent wins at Leeds and Charlton.

The form table over the last 6 matches home and away:

Barnsley DLLLDL

Swans WLDDWL

........and home and away form respectively:

Barnsley last 6 home matches only W1 D2 L3 F7 A12 Pts5

Swans last 5 away matches only W3 D2 L0 F6 A2 Pts11


We may see some rotation of the squad with some players coming back tired after International duty, although away form and tactics are not the problem so far.
On the following Tuesday night we have Brentford at home and then the crunch match against Cardiff at home on Sunday morning. Both teams will be aware of our weakness at home to the high press and close marking, nullifying our playing the ball out from defence, and will be trying to exploit it to the full. As yet we haven’t found a way to counter this tactic.
 
Barnsley manager Daniel Stendel departed 9 days ago, Adam Murray appointed in a caretaker capacity. Hopefully there’ll be no new manager bounce until after our match with them.
 
Midfield were weak, we made Barnsley look good.
Every team knows how to beat us now.
Aggressive play, high press, no protection from poor Championship refs. Long and high balls into the box, long throw-ins to giant players and we are beaten.
Could have lost by three or four goals today but for poor finishing by Barnsley.
 
Score: Barnsley 1 - 1 Swans

Possession: 40% - 60%

Shots: 19 - 12

On Target: 5 - 8

Corners: 2 - 5

Fouls: 8 - 5

Cards 1Y - 1Y

Ref: Andy Woolmer 4/10

Att: 12,424 (732 Jacks)

Team:
Woodman, Naughton, Hoorn, Rodon (Wilmot 69’), Bidwell, Carroll, Grimes, Ayew, Byers (Garrick 84’), Celina, Surridge (Baston 77’)
Subs: Wilmot, Garrick, Baston, Peterson, Routledge, Roberts

Steve Cooper remains positive:
"I think having got through the first hour and then taken control of the game, to go 1-0 up and then concede as we did, we are obviously going to be quite frustrated at that.
A point from home is never the worse thing in the world, but we should have gone on and won the game.
We could have started the game better, but we played good football in the second half. We are disappointed to only score one goal.
Andre Ayew has got three goals in as many games and that is good for us. We are really happy with him."
 
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This was my view of the goals, from the away stand behind the goal and to the right side.

61’ Surridge miss (in front of away fans). Great through ball, defence splitting pass from Grimes, Surridge one on one shot straight at the keeper, should have buried it, chance went begging.

67’ Swansea goal ( in front of away fans). Lovely through ball from Ayew to Celina, his shot was saved and the ball fell to Ayew who headed the ball over the line before it was cleared to him again, his half shot went over the line for the second time before being cleared again, the linesman hesitated before giving the goal, he was right in line with the goal line.

70’ Barnsley goal. In the build up, first it was a foul on Surridge not given, then the ball went out of play and into touch, not given (linesman not looking, and right in line with my view). Carroll’s attempted block from Mowatt’s shot failed, it also went through Naughton behind him and Woodman failed to save.
 
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What was your view of the performance Keith? It wasn't very good from my point of view (TV watch). Looked disjointed, no real plan of attack and against the press we struggled again. We lack pace and some proper midfield presence and I felt surridge missed his chance to keep his place. Spends too much time on the floor falling over.
 
Dreadful first half. Same second half, we didn’t start playing until the last third of the match. We managed to score but allowed Barnsley to counter attack within minutes to equalise instead of consolidating. Regarding Surridge, the Barnsley centre-back had him in his pocket, too lightweight, easily bullied off the ball, I don’t think he won a header. Celina kept on losing possession out on the wing. Midfield is still our biggest problem and we were poor there again. Garrick came on too late and kept on falling over the few times he had the ball. Baston didn’t get much change from their defence when he came on
Carroll was good going forward, but we know he doesn’t tackle and he didn’t.
Rodon went off injured and Wilmot replaced him for the last 20 mins, He limped down the tunnel and I can’t see him being okay for Tuesday.
Jack Army were in shock at how bad we were, and there wasn’t much singing until we scored, but only three minutes later they were silenced again as the lead was thrown away.
 
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