| Antti's 6 Knee Jerks - West Ham 13:16 - Apr 26 with 3587 views | Antti_Heinola |
A profoundly depressing and frankly baffling way to all but say goodbye to the Premier League.
1. Team Selection: In terms of the midfield, I can see Ramsey's thinking, even if I didn't agree with it. That midfield four had worked their little cotton socks off against Chelsea and you could certainly argue that keeping the midfield nice and compact gave us a solidity rarely glimpsed this season, so it was understandable that he kept that combination. I'll deal with that further in the next knee jerk, but for now let's look at the defence, where the changes were made.
If Ramsey's argument for keeping that midfield together was because of a strong performance against Chelsea, then I find it difficult to understand why you'd change the back four. I think Dunne is a good player - he looked finished during the second half of last season at times, but he's probably been our best centre half this season (not that that's saying a great deal), but picking him here looked like a bad call from the moment the team sheet was released. Unless Ramsey was convinced we'd be facing Carlton Cole with Nolan just behind him, I can't really see the thinking behind breaking up the Onuoha-Caulker partnership which was finally starting to bear fruit - not least because taking Onuoha's pace out of the centre causes us problems beyond just having someone who might have been able to keep up with Valencia - it means a deeper defence, a slower defence and more ground for our one-paced midfield to cover.
Then you have the issue of Isla. If we're being loyal to Karl Henry, why drop Isla after he did such a tremendous job v Hazard and Chelsea? Was he dropped because he was facing the wrong way when Green ballooned his kick straight to Hazard? If you're dropping him for that, then why not drop Green too? Not playing Isla meant Phillips only had Onuoha to support him, who's not in Isla's class when it comes to passing, movement, vision or attacking ability. I could have understood Onuoha at right back v Chelsea, to do a job on Hazard, but here, in a game we had to take to the opposition, it seemed perverse.
Still, Ramsey has earned some faith, so let's say before the game he perhaps wanted to keep things very tight, with the idea of stepping on the accelerator and taking some risks late on if we needed a goal. A bit cautious to my mind, but fair enough.
2. Substitutions. You see, the thing is, if the above *was* Ramsey's intention, then it makes his use of subs utterly unfathomable. I honestly cannot understand what happened yesterday after 70 minutes. We all knew - and Ramsey knew because he said it in his press conference - that this was a game we had to win (barring an unlikely miracle at Anfield or the Etihad). So even if he planned to make sure we were in a position to win with 20 minutes left, where was the final push? Why was Taarabt left sitting on the bench? Why did he, Isla and SWP fail to even warm up after half time? It made absolutely no sense at all.
The way we were set up, as with Chelsea, made it very clear that we had two outlets: the long ball to Zamora, or a pass to Phillips. That's it. Everything - *everything* - that wasn't pumped to Bobby went down our right side - not ideal when Cresswell had such a good game against our most dangerous player. Let's just accept that line up for a moment - but then come the 55th minute, come the 60th minute, come the 70th minute, for Christ's sake come the 80th sodding minute, surely we had to sling on someone from the bench to play on the left who might offer some kind of threat and some diversity and unpredictability to our attacks? And this is not a dig at Henry, who played well, but he is not and never will be a 'danger' to any team. That's why he didn't play much last season: teams defended against us in numbers and his brand of steady, controlling midfield play was rendered obsolete. We often didn't really need a holding midfielder; we needed someone to create chances.
Had this game been two weeks ago I would have had sympathy for Ramsey because he had no choices, but on Saturday he did. He had several choices in fact - the prime one being the unpredictable maverick with a good record against West Ham who will, given even 10 minutes, be guaranteed to create something.
We *had* to win this game. We had to. A draw was never going to be enough. So we might as well have gone down attacking than whimpering off clutching what will almost definitely be a useless point. After 70 minutes, Henry was offering nothing in terms of what we actually needed. Indeed, he drifted so far into the centre that the left side of the pitch was almost empty. Ramsey did try to address that by bringing on Yun, but again it was the wrong substitution. With Yun at left back and Henry playing almost in the centre, he couldn't maraud because he had no cover. Had he come on for Henry (or Sandro, with Henry going inside), and played left midfield with Clint sweeping up behind him, that might have made more sense, but as it was, the change really changed nothing at all. Worse: within 10 minutes it was obvious it wasn't changing anything and yet still Ramsey sat on his hands.
West Ham were awful - as awful as we were, and while we had some poor luck in terms of the disallowed goal (which, if we're honest, would get disallowed 19 times out of 20) and Charlie's miss, we never really looked like winning the game. They were absolutely there for the taking - a kinder opponent at this stage of the season we could barely have wished for.
And as this a knee jerk column and there should be some controversy sometimes, I'll say this: I was behind Ramsey. I was impressed. I felt it was difficult to judge him when he barely had a squad to choose from. But yesterday he did, and he blew it. He was cautious in the extreme. If you can't gamble in a game like that with 20 minutes left then I'm afraid you're not a manager. You're just not. Can you imagine Warnock in that situation? For the last 10 minutes we'd have been three (maybe two!) at the back, two holding midfielders and everyone else up front. Ramsey did nothing. And that, in my opinion, was unforgivable. He cannot have gone to bed last night thinking, 'Well, I did everything I could,' because he didn't. He froze, and we're down. And on Saturday alone, I wouldn't give him the job.
3. The Penalty. Not a brag, but a sad fact: I called this as soon as it was given. Since his opening day miss, Charlie has put every penalty hard and low down the middle. He was, in truth, lucky to have not missed another one since. With all the pressure of a crucial kick, he was always going to do the same and a save seemed to me very likely, and so it proved. Not sure what's happened there - last season he was smashing them in the corners, even the top corners, now he seems very nervy. Even worse, it clearly affected him badly, as his apologetic tweet confirmed afterwards. I felt, he hid a bit after the penalty - twice in the second half he loitered at the back post instead of attacking the middle or the front post as he would normally, when fully confident, and so great crosses went untouched. Still, without him we'd be 14th in the Championship right now - all I have is gratitude for what he's done for this club.
4. The Atmosphere: I don't think the fans were nervous. I think we all expected us to go out there and give it a real go - like against Chelsea, but with a bit more attacking intent. But it was clear from very early on that perhaps that late Fabregas goal had more effect on the players than we realised. With one or two exceptions, we looked nervy, worried, cautious and a bit unsure of how to attack the game. This quickly translated to the stands and while the fans did their best, they turned up expecting thunder and got damp drizzle. A frustrating game to watch that only became more so as it dragged on to its inevitable conclusion.
5. Footwear. Amateurish, really. A QPR player slipped over at least eight times in this game, and I'm tempted to say it was 10. Many of those slips were from Green, who looked absolutely petrified every time the ball came near his feet. Within 20 minutes four kicks had been messed up. I love Greeno, but he looked in no state to play on Saturday. Good save from the free kick, mind, and did well to come out to the onrushing Downing (although had he continued to run instead of dithering it would have been a much easier clearance). He wasn't the only one, though. Sandro, Dunne, Caulker and Barton all slipped too. What's going on here? No West Ham player slipped in the game that I can recall. Is it bad choice of footwear? How can we not know our own pitch? And why, when our players spent the first half looking like they were playing on an ice rink, did we water the pitch even more at half time?
6. Sandro. Still not looking anything like a £10m player, this was at least a vastly improved performance from him and he looked immensely fitter, too. Made some great challenges, almost scored, looked faster and stronger. Good display alongside the tireless Barton, who had another super game.
Next season looks terrifying, doesn't it? |  |
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| Antti's 6 Knee Jerks - West Ham on 11:35 - Apr 29 with 822 views | Neil_SI |
| Antti's 6 Knee Jerks - West Ham on 11:25 - Apr 29 by daveB |
I'm not really judging Ramsey on one game, I think overall he's been disappointing, he's got a lot more out of Phillips but Austin hasn't looked anywhere near as effective since he took over.
The main reason I'd go for a Kenny Jackett or possibly Warburton in the summer is that this club needs a complete new team and they have proved to be very good at putting those together |
You're not the first person to say that about Austin, which I'm a little surprised about. To me, Austin looks exactly the same as he has for much of the campaign. His improvement came about in terms of his overall game because of the one to one work with Glen Hoddle and he's carried that through and still scored a reasonable amount under Ramsey with four goals that should have been five with the penalty miss on Saturday.
Austin also missed out on the England squad, so there would have been some disappointment there and just prior to that he was running around the entire pitch, making defensive goal line clearances, and so on, clearly trying his best to impress.
Personally I think Phillips, Zamora and Barton have all had their best spells of their whole QPR careers to date under Ramsey. Had he had a bit more time and luck with one or two others who suffered injuries, then we may well be saying the same for people like Fer, Vargas and Sandro. |  | | |
| Antti's 6 Knee Jerks - West Ham on 12:05 - Apr 29 with 802 views | daveB |
He's a good coach, no doubt about it and he hasn't been terrible. I Just think for the job that needs doing this summer that doesn't appear to be where his strengths are. I hope I'm wrong. |  | | |
| Antti's 6 Knee Jerks - West Ham on 12:16 - Apr 29 with 775 views | simmo |
Exactly as I saw it, Antti. Was so disappointed at the final whistle - was angry for a few hours after the game and now I have returned to apathy. We won;t get many clearer opportunities to get 3 points and althoguh it may still not have mattered, we have all but guaranteed relegation with a whimper rather than going down swinging, and that's a shame.
Still like Ramsey, still want him permanently, but we fckd it on Saturday - your first 2 points explain why. |  |
| ask Beavis I get nothing Butthead |
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| Antti's 6 Knee Jerks - West Ham on 12:43 - Apr 29 with 761 views | JonDoeman |
| Antti's 6 Knee Jerks - West Ham on 11:25 - Apr 29 by daveB |
I'm not really judging Ramsey on one game, I think overall he's been disappointing, he's got a lot more out of Phillips but Austin hasn't looked anywhere near as effective since he took over.
The main reason I'd go for a Kenny Jackett or possibly Warburton in the summer is that this club needs a complete new team and they have proved to be very good at putting those together |
Got Phillips firing & then put him out on the left, when he should've been the first name on the team sheet on the right! Alarm bells went then . |  |
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| Antti's 6 Knee Jerks - West Ham on 14:19 - Apr 29 with 721 views | Antti_Heinola |
| Antti's 6 Knee Jerks - West Ham on 11:21 - Apr 29 by Neil_SI |
While I understand a lot of the views here, we do have to allow a little bit of patience and allow people like Ramsey the room to breathe and grow into the role. Sometimes you need to give people the time and space to find their feet and express themselves properly if you want to reap the potential rewards.
Ramsey has had enough matches, but a lot of people felt we were down way back then anyway and we could have said the same about Ian Holloway in the year he took us down to League One from the Championship, but that didn't work out too badly in the end.
There are people here happy to judge on 20 minutes of football alone, which to me, is crazy. It's what we don't want to do as a club, it's the same mentality that's been set about on the players, who have constantly been signed as the next flavour of the month and then quickly written off and sold. We really need to rid of this mindset if we're going to function as a healthy football club.
It's always a massive summer ahead at Rangers, and what we need is for the owners and people running the football club to act responsibly whatever division we're in. That we're worse off for two spells in the Premier League says everything you need to know about the poor running of the football club.
I'm also a little bit surprised by just how many people are in "down tools" mode. There are still four matches to play and we can take something from each of them if we work hard enough, so it's not over yet, even if the outcome of relegation is highly likely.
We would criticise the players and the club if they put the cue on the rack, so we certainly shouldn't be in negative defeatist mode yet.
Games like the one at West Ham happen, where the pressure is so intense that you can't perform the way you want to, but in a perverse fashion, this may actually help us in the end. Why? Because there will be disappointment, there will be some regret, there will be some realisation that they didn't need to be as fearful as they were.
Sometimes you need that lull to rise again, and maybe they can, maybe the timing was just about right for them to go and play with freedom now until the end. Had they got right to the death, needing a result and then falling under the pressure, you'd feel even worse about it, and that yo-yoing can still happen, for better or worse.
To finish on a more positive note, perhaps that we have three out of four matches away from home is an advantage, given the way our results and performances have gone lately. You never know. |
Agree with you over your other post about Austin, Neil, but still have no patience for excuses about Saturday. Not sure how much clearer I can be about it, really. You don't need to 'grow into' anything when your penultimate home game is 0-0 and your team is desperate for a goal and you have a defensive midfielder playing left wing. A 10 year old could make that change. Even Redknapp would have seen it. I totally concur about the performance - that happens and was understandable to an extent. The failure to try and shake things up as our season drained away is inexplicable. | |
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| Antti's 6 Knee Jerks - West Ham on 17:00 - Apr 29 with 681 views | Mvpeter |
| Antti's 6 Knee Jerks - West Ham on 09:16 - Apr 29 by fakekerby |
I think Ramsey is a great guy to have coaching your team, but he's certainly not a manager yet.
I just hope we don't repeat the same mistake in the summer and get Clement in, it'll end the same way. McLaren (even though Derby are whimpering over the line) would probably get my vote. |
How would it be the same mistake? |  |
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