BFTG - Preston

[John Smith]

Why do you say we look a team destined for relegation and then say Clement will get it right and we will stay up?

Which is it?

I said that at this moment we look like a side destined for the drop. Because of the indecision in our play and not a clear and perfected method of play that is efficient and will bring results.

However, I predict that we won't carry on being so poor. I think Clement will improve this side and will get more and more out of the team. Give him 3 years and he will build a side that is challenging at the top of the table. For now he just has to keep us in the division and buy himself a couple more transfer windows.

You're still continuing to contradict yourself. I don't think you really were at Deepdale because if you were you'd have seen what I saw and not come to such ridiculous conclusions which frankly only suggest to me that your head is in the sand. And there's no sand at Deepdale.

[Brum Royal]

I was also at Deepdale on Saturday.

It was nice to come away with the 3 points, and also have a little bit of fortune going our way, but equally working hard to make the most of the good fortune and not being behind when perhaps we should have been at half time.

I like the look of Walker, made some good saves and dealt fairly comfortably with everything thrown at him.

Both sides looked a threat when they got it wide and attacked the flanks. All four fullbacks had a tough afternoon defensively, but I thought Yiadom managed to keep his winger quietest. Gunter allowed too much space and Preston's main first half chances (and their goal) came from his side.

Illori and Moore look to be building a decent partnership, but I think the main problem for them is that they're not getting enough protection from the holding midfielder, on Saturday's case Bacuna was leaving too much space in the first half, but gave them better protection in the second half.

Meite and Aluko frustrated, both had times of doing good things but then a miscontrol or a poor cross wasted their previous good work. Meite got into good positions on several occasions but then put a cross into the stand.

Swift and Kelly both looked much improved from previous performances. Swift seemed to relish the free role, popping up all over the place and was generally at the heart of much of our attacking play. Kelly I thought was much more like his old self, and probably should have scored when he made a good break into the box.

Baldock put himself about a lot, chased and harried, took his goal well and played the role of the loan striker pretty well I thought.

[NewCorkSeth]

Illori and Moore look to be building a decent partnership, but I think the main problem for them is that they're not getting enough protection from the holding midfielder, on Saturday's case Bacuna was leaving too much space in the first half, but gave them better protection in the second half.

On this: Bacuna appears to be playing a water carrier role which is very difficult. In the second half he did it very well.

I don't think he alone is to blame for the defensive exposure. If I'm not mistake we played a 4-2-3-1 with Swift playing as our number 10 (he roamed back quite a bit but I think that was the formation) which means Kelly was there to be available for the second ball (like our third goal) and he has a terrible habit of standing a little too far away from his man.

Unsurprisingly Preston attacked though the centre quite a bit choosing to bring it up the middle and play it out to their left where Aluko and Gunter were supposed to be defending. It worked. This will only be countered if Kelly or whoever plays beside Bacuna sticks his man to make it harder to move around in front of our box.

[Hendo]

Why do you say we look a team destined for relegation and then say Clement will get it right and we will stay up?

Which is it?

I said that at this moment we look like a side destined for the drop. Because of the indecision in our play and not a clear and perfected method of play that is efficient and will bring results.

However, I predict that we won't carry on being so poor. I think Clement will improve this side and will get more and more out of the team. Give him 3 years and he will build a side that is challenging at the top of the table. For now he just has to keep us in the division and buy himself a couple more transfer windows.

I was at Deepdale and it was a great feeling to finally win a game in the league this season. But the truth was we look a side destined for relegation come May.

We won because we have some talented attacking players on the pitch and also because Preston are poor at the back which helped us.

The fact is that we have a talented group of players, but they are wasting their huge potential at the moment.

I don't think the issue is the work rate or character of the side. They showed plenty of character to keep coming again and eventually deal Preston the knock out blow. I think the team are confused in their identity at the moment. They keep thinking to play the Stam way and come out from the back. Only now our formation and system has changed and maybe players aren't in the right shape to come out efficiently. We keep making mistakes and look shaky trying to play in the wrong areas.

What I do think though is that Clement is a top coach and will get this team eventually playing the right way. They just need to forget everything that Stam ever taught them and forge a new Reading way under Clement.

They need to be more efficient and clinical in their play making the right moves and right passes and runs. It will come. There will be an improvement and we will stay up. Clement needs our patience and trust. He will get it right. That I am sure.

No, no you didn't.

[Snowflake Royal]

Why do you say we look a team destined for relegation and then say Clement will get it right and we will stay up?

Which is it?

I said that at this moment we look like a side destined for the drop. Because of the indecision in our play and not a clear and perfected method of play that is efficient and will bring results.

However, I predict that we won't carry on being so poor. I think Clement will improve this side and will get more and more out of the team. Give him 3 years and he will build a side that is challenging at the top of the table. For now he just has to keep us in the division and buy himself a couple more transfer windows.

You're still continuing to contradict yourself. I don't think you really were at Deepdale because if you were you'd have seen what I saw and not come to such ridiculous conclusions which frankly only suggest to me that your head is in the sand. And there's no sand at Deepdale.

Top Flight's got form for that, but in fairness, I can kinda see what he means.

[Snowflake Royal]

Illori and Moore look to be building a decent partnership, but I think the main problem for them is that they're not getting enough protection from the holding midfielder, on Saturday's case Bacuna was leaving too much space in the first half, but gave them better protection in the second half.

On this: Bacuna appears to be playing a water carrier role which is very difficult. In the second half he did it very well.

I don't think he alone is to blame for the defensive exposure. If I'm not mistake we played a 4-2-3-1 with Swift playing as our number 10 (he roamed back quite a bit but I think that was the formation) which means Kelly was there to be available for the second ball (like our third goal) and he has a terrible habit of standing a little too far away from his man.

Unsurprisingly Preston attacked though the centre quite a bit choosing to bring it up the middle and play it out to their left where Aluko and Gunter were supposed to be defending. It worked. This will only be countered if Kelly or whoever plays beside Bacuna sticks his man to make it harder to move around in front of our box.

It looked to me like Kelly and Swift were interchanging. Kelly spent a significant chunk of the second half in the No. 10 area whilst Swift was deeper. That's inevitably going to cause issues if the roles are fluid. I prefer Kelly to Swift, but Swift is obviously the attacking midfielder, whilst Kelly is more of the all rounder than Swift. Which is why I was so surprised to see Kelly so advanced so often.

[NewCorkSeth]

Illori and Moore look to be building a decent partnership, but I think the main problem for them is that they're not getting enough protection from the holding midfielder, on Saturday's case Bacuna was leaving too much space in the first half, but gave them better protection in the second half.

On this: Bacuna appears to be playing a water carrier role which is very difficult. In the second half he did it very well.

I don't think he alone is to blame for the defensive exposure. If I'm not mistake we played a 4-2-3-1 with Swift playing as our number 10 (he roamed back quite a bit but I think that was the formation) which means Kelly was there to be available for the second ball (like our third goal) and he has a terrible habit of standing a little too far away from his man.

Unsurprisingly Preston attacked though the centre quite a bit choosing to bring it up the middle and play it out to their left where Aluko and Gunter were supposed to be defending. It worked. This will only be countered if Kelly or whoever plays beside Bacuna sticks his man to make it harder to move around in front of our box.

It looked to me like Kelly and Swift were interchanging. Kelly spent a significant chunk of the second half in the No. 10 area whilst Swift was deeper. That's inevitably going to cause issues if the roles are fluid. I prefer Kelly to Swift, but Swift is obviously the attacking midfielder, whilst Kelly is more of the all rounder than Swift. Which is why I was so surprised to see Kelly so advanced so often.

Well you're exactly right. The swapping between the 2 of them made it really hard for me to tell whether we were playing a 4-1-2-3 or a 4-2-3-1.

However when Swift dropped back he stayed on the left hand side of the pitch and when Kelly roamed forward he stayed on the right hand side so I suspect it was deliberate creative freedom.

I still think Kelly was told to move forward ahead of Bacuna to be a sort of advanced playmaker and Swift was given a free roaming, enganche role.

I could be over analysing us again but I thought it was Bacunas job to bring the ball out, Kelly's job to find a pass and Swifts job to roam around positions that cause the defense trouble. It worked well in the second half.

[Tilehurstsouthbank]

I wrote a (fairly long) post about this here. He wasn't a good player at Fulham - he was an average performer in a very strong team when you look at it relatively. At 0.4 goals/assists per 90 mins playing time, he only ranked 9th best by that measure in Fulham's team. His season total of 8 goals + 10 assists was a huge outlier - that was the only season since 2012/13 where he scored more than the 3 he managed for us last season.

Last season his 0.21 goals+ assists per 90 also put him 9th in our squad, when ranked by that measure. I would assert that is is natural place at this level (as opposed to being a star performer), and given his age he is more likely to get worse than better any time soon. On top of that, he is being asked to play a different style, shown by the number of crosses he attempted going up 57% last season when compared with his final season with Fulham - that's a huge jump considering he went from an attacking team to a team in a relegation dogfight.

In one sentence; he is only performing badly against the perceptions that came with his hefty fee - it isn't his fault he is bang average.

Fair enough yet he was captain and a regular starter for them.

Was only made captain by the manager to send a message to the Fulham owners.

Was that message; "If we make Aluko Captain, some mug will come in and pay massively over the odds for him!"

[Old Man Andrews]

Fair enough yet he was captain and a regular starter for them.

Was only made captain by the manager to send a message to the Fulham owners.

Was that message; "If we make Aluko Captain, some mug will come in and pay massively over the odds for him!"

Believe the manager wasn't happy with the fact the owners were selling players without his permission so made him captain to prove a point to them.

It turned into your explanation though for sure.

[bcubed]

Gunter bashing is just tiresome.

That is all.

It's also tedious

You playing the synonym game?

Seems a better idea than watching this shit