| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 09:35 - Dec 10 with 4451 views | Antti_Heinola |
Another depressing day at the office as a decent first half gives way to a crushing second. A long, cold winter ahead... I'll try and start with some positives.
1. CHAIR: Well, he looked extremely comfortable on the ball. Busy, tidy, with a couple of nice through balls during the first half. There's definitely a bit of hope there. But overall, he was lost in the maelstrom of four central midfielders trying to play together and was then withdrawn probably too early.
2. RETURNEES: It was great to see Ned and Hall come back - that is big news. Although, obviously, we conceded three at home regardless. First half, apart from one customary mistake, I thought Ned was fine. He may have tired a bit in the second, which would be understandable. Hall looked fine too, so maybe some hope lies ahead. We desperately, desperately need to find a way to keep some clean sheets. Allowing Kemar Roofe, who Leeds fans have basically written off as their version of Washington, a hat trick is a real indictment of our defence.
3. PAWEL: One bright spot was Pav. Probably wasted at right back, it was nevertheless good to see him get a whole game. I thought he got forward well, twice getting to the byeline to play decent balls across without reward. One was on the end of a genuinely brilliant move that cut Leeds apart right through the heart of their team, and would have been goal of the season had Freeman managed to tuck away the cross. And then he scored a fortunate goal at the end, thanks to yet more comedy goalkeeping at LR. Of the last five goals we've now scored at home, three are down to catastrophic goalie errors, which says a lot about our 'fire power'.
4. OSAYI-SAMUEL: I saw plenty to like from Bright. He looks strong, has a bit of pace, decent on the ball. But he didn't really get much of a chance. He came on and seemed to be inexplicably asked to tuck inside rather than offer us a genuine wide option. Then he was bizarrely switched to what looked like full back. Then possibly wing back. And towards the end he did finally play a bit further forward. What chance did he have with that kind of muddled thinking? Four positions in 25 minutes. Poor kid.
5. RELEGATION: Well, I'm ready to join the pessimists I'm afraid. I had some hope after the Brentford comeback that it might spark something, and maybe it would have without the Mackie sending off. Instead, we've lost another two. Six games, one point, scoring just four goals. I feel for the players, because there's no lack of effort and at times yesterday, particularly the first half, we looked ok, without ever really looking threatening. But we can't keep clean sheets and we can't score goals. The early season gung-ho attitude that saw us raining in shots all day (even if they didn't yield much) has now gone. Yesterday I don't think we managed a shot on target - because I'm not counting our goal as a shot. Because it wasn't.
Yesterday we were up against a truly awful keeper, who Leeds fans are terrified of. We had Smith up front. The plan was surely to properly test him. We didn't. In fact, we did, right at the end, with a harmless chip, and he missed it. So here was a lame duck goalie with a recent history of clangers, and he barely had a thing to do. Smith was dominated by their centre backs, but when he did win flick-ons, as usual Washington was nowhere near them (to be fair, Washington was nowhere near the ball all afternoon). We have a striker who thrives on crossed balls into the box, but no wingers and no width - even when we brought on a winger he didn't play on the wing. So Leeds strolled away with three easy points that they fully deserved.
This is now serious. And unlike last time Ollie was in this position in our second season back in League One, there are no magical Lee Cooks on the horizon. He has to make do with what we have and what we have is just too easy to play against at the moment. We're miles away from those Sheffield and Wolves results. What's happened?
6. HOLLOWAY: It's like deja vu. Spending loads of time defending him, saying we should stick with him, that we can't keep changing managers when the same problems remain. It's the noughties all over again. A new manager still won't have any strikers (although he might at least start Sylla every game and give the guy some confidence), and he'll still have defensive injuries, but you start to wonder.
I like Ollie, i think he's brought out some decent performances in this team and he's made solid signings. But, hypothetically, how much longer can this go on? I think the stat was we had only lost six in a row once in our entire history up until December last year. Now, had it not been for an extremely fortunate (if immensely enjoyable) comeback against Brentford, we would have lost six in a row three times in under 12 months - and we weren't even playing for three of those months. We haven't won away since January. Our home form, so solid early on, has collapsed. At the moment, I'm hoping there are three worse teams than us this season, and banking on the fight this team undoubtedly has to keep us up, but a loss to hapless Birmingham next week and we are right in the mix, if we're not already.
A Birmingham loss would make six out of seven. A loss to rampant Bristol City the following week looks pretty nailed on. So that's seven out of eight. It's hypothetical and I don't want a change of manager, but how many can you go without falling on your sword? Perhaps more importantly for Ollie, how long can this go on before the Twitterati convince Fernandes that his trigger finger needs its annual scratch?
Yesterday wasn't a terrible performance, but the second half was a bit nothingy. We were probably better than them before the break, but they came out hungrier, possibly switched one or two things around, and scored three despite not having a recognised striker on the pitch. The answers Ollie had were muddled, with Osayi-Samuel being shunted around and Sylla thrown on to no real effect because of a lack of service from wide areas. I appreciate if we play two wingers we look vulnerable through the midfield, but he needs to find some way to sort this and quickly, because at the moment it's simply too easy for teams to beat us and we're sinking very fast. |  |
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| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 16:26 - Dec 10 with 1366 views | Lblock |
Quality, quality jerks
Agree 100% |  |
| Cherish and enjoy life.... this ain't no dress rehearsal |
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| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 17:09 - Dec 10 with 1307 views | Rangersw12 |
Starting to worry for Olly and think the axe will fall soon
I would like us to play a settled side and formation
433 for Birmingham
Ned RB
Baptiste CB
Robinson CB
Bidwell LB
Scowen CM
Luongo CM
Freeman CM
Pav RW
Bright LW
Sylla C.F
Would give us some width and we would be able to counter at pace |  | | |
| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 17:26 - Dec 10 with 1295 views | PinnerPaul |
| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 12:19 - Dec 10 by oldmisery |
I agree with much of your analysis but think that, despite the dearth of defenders, The Chief is probably 3-4 games away from the degree of match fitness needed to make his inclusion safe from a re-occurring injury and I don't think Hall was in action for long enough to make much of an assessment of his particular condition.
Pawel seemed a bit out of sorts to me. He clearly isn't comfortable at right back and his situation wasn't helped by our Defensive Coach screaming at him for much of the first half.
At the moment I don't see what BOS brings to the table, despite clearly receiving contradictory 'orders' from the bench. He looks rather like an alien life form who has never seen a football before and appears both clumsy and uncoordinated. He was supposed to be, 'one for the future', so why is he in favour ahead of Wheeler? Just what does our intellectual friend have to do in order to start a game in his natural position, I wonder?
But clearly the major problem is goals - both scoring and conceding them. Before yesterday only four teams in the division had scored fewer goals than us and we don't seem able to keep a clean sheet. One of Channel 5's pundits said that in his experience the best way to get out of the Championship was to have an excellent defence and two very good strikers. This made me think of our current side with an excellent midfield section, poor defence and abysmal strikers - so perhaps we will be getting out of the Championship albeit in the wrong direction! |
What a genius the 'Channel 5 pundit' is!  | | | |
| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 17:29 - Dec 10 with 1290 views | PinnerPaul |
| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 13:28 - Dec 10 by sexton |
I thought Chair was subbed at about the right time after fading a bit. But that was true of Freeman as well. Luongo and Scowen were below their best as well.
I don't see the point of playing 4 ball-playing midfielders and Smith upfront. The midfielders are looking for the forwards to make runs and they just aren't happening, because Smith waddles around like a duck and Washington just isn't good enough. |
I thought Luongo was awful.
Gave the ball away constantly, by passed in midfield, too slow and didn't always track back - a very poor day for him, topped off by a needless yellow card.
How in earth you get booked for dissent in that game with that ref, who knows?! | | | |
| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 17:32 - Dec 10 with 1281 views | terryb |
| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 17:29 - Dec 10 by PinnerPaul |
I thought Luongo was awful.
Gave the ball away constantly, by passed in midfield, too slow and didn't always track back - a very poor day for him, topped off by a needless yellow card.
How in earth you get booked for dissent in that game with that ref, who knows?! |
The caution wasn't for dissent. It was for trying to halt a Leeds player breaking down our right. Advantage was played & the caution was issued at the first time play stoped.
Yes Luongo was poor yesterday, but I thought he was still better than Scowen of Freeman. | | | |
| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 17:35 - Dec 10 with 1272 views | PinnerPaul |
| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 17:32 - Dec 10 by terryb |
The caution wasn't for dissent. It was for trying to halt a Leeds player breaking down our right. Advantage was played & the caution was issued at the first time play stoped.
Yes Luongo was poor yesterday, but I thought he was still better than Scowen of Freeman. |
Cheers Terry, I missed that.
Can't agree he was worse than the other two though! | | | |
| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 19:02 - Dec 10 with 1180 views | francisbowles |
| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 17:35 - Dec 10 by PinnerPaul |
Cheers Terry, I missed that.
Can't agree he was worse than the other two though! |
It was several minutes after the offence as the ball stayed in play a long time.
I thought Luongo was impressive most of the first half but after a strong blocking challenge he made on the halfway line, he was hurt and never seemed to recover. It was as if he ran out of steam and this was perfectly illustrated by the wild challenge that led to his yellow card. I also thought that Scowen's passing was off, along with a few others, he kept leaving them short.
Pav had a good game at right back, best I've seen him for a while. Think we should stick with him at rb or rwb and see if we can get his confidence going again. | | | |
| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 19:14 - Dec 10 with 1164 views | easthertsr |
Birmingham is a season defining match. Win then I think we will be OK, lose and Holloway will lose his job and we are right in the mix. | | | |
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| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 19:15 - Dec 10 with 1161 views | terryb |
Thanks Antti.
I'm another that is in agreement with nearly all of your Knee Jerks, especially thinking for the first time that relegation is a possibility, but I would add the following.
PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE do not attempt to play 4-4-2 again. Especially as we tried to yesterday with all 4 midfielders playing centrally. Our performances earlier in the season were based around Scowen playing at the base with Luongo & Freeman applying pressure in front of him.
Any variation of 4-4-2 does not allow this to happen. We can't adapt it to Freeman playing as a wide player as he does not have the discipline to stay in that position. More importantly, we need these three to re-discover their form & togetherness.
At least we will soon be in the position of being able to make choices in the defence & wide positions, irrespective of whether we play 3-5-2 or 4-5-1.
I would prefer the three defenders, but it may be that at present we need to take extra defensive insurance to achieve a few clean sheets. Select three from Baptiste, Ned, Hall & Robinson at the back, Pav or Furlong on the right & Bidwell or Robinson on the left with our first choices in the middle.
Who you play upfront can be drawn out of out tombola!
I didn't think Ollie was the correct choice when he was appointed & nothing has changed that view, but we SHOULD NOT be making a change mid-season. That rarely works for us, although Jago, Sexton, De Canio & Warnock come to mind as sucesses.
My biggest fear with Ollie is that throughout his managerial career his teams have hit long periods of losing runs ( I can't think of one club exempt from this) & it is rare that his teams recover from this. We did in 2003 & for a while last season, so let us hope we can one more time. | | | |
| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 19:16 - Dec 10 with 1157 views | Discodroids |
Patience with Washington finally snapped. I'd Rather Play Pat Coombs UpFront in her surgical stocking with her colostomy bag dragging on the floor behind her. |  |
| "...The monkey is never dead, Dealer. The monkey never dies. When you kick him off, he just hides in a corner, waiting his turn." |
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| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 20:39 - Dec 10 with 1053 views | oldmisery |
| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 17:26 - Dec 10 by PinnerPaul |
What a genius the 'Channel 5 pundit' is! |
What I think George Boateng was trying to get across is that to have a strong, effective defence and a clinical strike force is far more important than having neat, tidy and technically efficient midfielders who may be pleasing on the eye but do not win you games.
What I was trying to say is that our team currently comprises the exact opposite of his Championship winning formula. | | | |
| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 20:52 - Dec 10 with 1031 views | ozexile |
| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 20:39 - Dec 10 by oldmisery |
What I think George Boateng was trying to get across is that to have a strong, effective defence and a clinical strike force is far more important than having neat, tidy and technically efficient midfielders who may be pleasing on the eye but do not win you games.
What I was trying to say is that our team currently comprises the exact opposite of his Championship winning formula. |
Spot on. | | | |
| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 21:27 - Dec 10 with 991 views | enfieldargh |
| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 20:39 - Dec 10 by oldmisery |
What I think George Boateng was trying to get across is that to have a strong, effective defence and a clinical strike force is far more important than having neat, tidy and technically efficient midfielders who may be pleasing on the eye but do not win you games.
What I was trying to say is that our team currently comprises the exact opposite of his Championship winning formula. |
pleasing on the eye but virtualy non-productive....sadly |  |
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| Antti's Six Knee Jerks: QPR 1 Leeds 3 on 04:18 - Dec 11 with 880 views | Dixie_CT |
Just watched highlights.
Slightly more possession and more shots although less on target.
A better or more confident striker than Washington scores his chance in the first half (rushed it when he could of taken a touch inside and place it either side of keeper), Freeman buries that other first half chance (the one time he doesn’t take a touch but should have still hit the target from there).
Second half, Smithes comes and takes all for the first goal, Ned smashes it higher up the pitch for the second or Chair takes a tactical foul (I swear the 2nd was an OG?) and I thought Smithies could have done better with the third goal although he was very unsighted.
Last goal was a sickner as it gave those idiotic Leeds fans extra pomp to their ceremony but one plus was the amount of R’s back trying to stop it in a game that had probably gone with Syllas chance. That would demonstrate the heart and desire is still there.
Fine margins but ultimately the buck stops with the manager. |  | | |
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