funkyrobot

The left back bombing forward didn’t happen against Preston. JJ was the attacking fullback on the right and Thomas made up the back 3 (probably after he failed in the attacking role against Wednesday and Huddersfield.) Despite staying deeper, the gap between him and Vestergaard was way too big and tbh he was out paced and outfought a few times when Preston played long balls into his channel.

Out of interest, when was the last time you actually regularly went to games? I always get the impression that people that moan at those of us who still watch the team at the stadium, never consistently went to watch or if they did, haven’t been for ages. Fair enough if you don’t want to go don’t go but don’t moan at those of us who go with to watch. Often it’s with friends and family. There’s a massive social aspect to going to games.

We have great options on the wing for this level, and that’s about it. We have one good experienced fullback in Ricardo who’s very injury prone and 3 weak links in JJ, Thomas and VK - and a utility player in Hamza who looked way off it against Huddersfield .

The point is, Cifuentes has only got one experienced midfielder to select that we can reasonably expect to compete at the top end of this league. Winks is our one creative midfielder who is quality (but who lacks physicality) and then after that he’s only got Soumare and Skipp. Wtf can Marti do with that?? At the same time in The Championship 2 years ago Enzo had Winks, Ndidi, KDH, Praet, Casadei with a fit Ricardo to offer support. Every one of those players is better than Soumare and Skipp. Soumare should be good enough but lacks the mentality and concentration to have the level of consistency that a top player needs. Skipp just hasn’t got it based on his 1st 12 months here. His one season in the sun was 5 years ago at a Covid crowdless Norwich!!

He didn’t stink out the place today, he was one of our better players. The only bit of guile and creativity coming from our central midfield. Page is excellent but he’s a very different player and he’s very young.

Would love to know when he was this winger tbh. Under 12’s? Absolutely nothing about him would surly indicate an attacking winger when he close to adult years. Your story does seem a bit illogical- surely when a stand in fullback was needed in first team training, the academy would’ve provided a fullback rather than a winger?

He didn’t invert, he played as the non attacking fullback in Cifuentes 5 back 5 forward attack when on the ball with Justin playing the attacking fullback role on the right. Despite his deeper position he was continually caught out by a long ball played into his channel.

Is everyone sure Winks hadn’t come over previously before the video was shot? Either way plenty of other players have walked straight off. It’s not great form but he might’ve been ready to blow his top with a teammate as he does usually applaud the fans. From a football perspective he still has to start for me whatever - we have no one in centre mid able to play creatively, and play those incisive passes forwards. Winks put some cracking passes through, today including a fabulous one to Ayew. Until there are better solutions available, removing him from the squad will make us significantly worse than we even are now

The problem is, there’s no alternative. Cifuentes likes 2 in the centre rather than Enzo’s single pivot. With Ndidi gone there’s no one else. Skipp isn’t as good as Soumare which isn’t saying much and with Ndidi gone there’s nothing else. Even Enzo would struggle to play his system with this team. We are desperately weak in central midfield. Only Winks is good enough at this level but he needs a player with some physicality next to him.

Tbf he had had a very average 1st half.

Tbf Small is having a great game against him, our play is very reliant on wing play and when they get bullied it does highlight our limitations elsewhere. IMO Fatawu needs to cut inside more against Small who has the pace and physicality to block Fatawu running down the outside. Cifuentes’ system relies on a fullback becoming a number 8 instead of inverting the fullback into midfield. This should help the attack. Today it’s the right back in Justin performing that role and it’s clear that neither him or Thomas are particularly capable of offering the threat that Enzo’s system had when he could deploy KDH and Ndidi in those advanced 8 roles. I do think Justin is better at it than Thomas but it’s a very low bar. It might be different when Ricardo is back as he’s much better than the other two in an attacking role. Only problem is he’s only fit for 15 games a season. El Khanouss needs to step it up too.

I don’t remember Thomas ever being an out and out winger. He’s been a fullback for the last 5 years at least and a defensive one at that.

Justin’s better on the left for me than he has ever been on the right, that’s where he was playing when he was capped by England and where he was playing at his peak for us. I know he can’t use his left foot but the left back in this system is expected at times to be inside of the winger and very advanced, his right footedness encourages this cutting in. Don’t get me wrong, he’s far from ideal but from an attacking perspective he is better than Thomas. As we expect to be more on the front foot I’d favour the attacking attributes of JJ over the defensive attributes of Thomas.

But the point is Cifuentes isn’t leaving the creativity to those players. His system currently utilises the left back to create a 5 man attack when in possession. He expects the centre backs, right back and 2 centre mids to be in the 5 more deeper defensive positions.

Only problem with Dennis was that he was made out of balsa wood.

As a defensive fullback Thomas is fine at this level, but as the fifth attacker expected to combine and create opportunities high up the pitch he’s just not got the attributes. He isn’t going to run past someone, isn’t going to dribble past someone, not likely to assist/score. As I’ve said before, his whole body shape, and unusual kicking style is predisposed to hooking the ball backwards to a spare centre back.

I’m saying that Justin would be better at playing the role on the left that Thomas played last night.

I genuinely think he was affected by what looked like a very slow surface last night. The ball got stuck under his feet. He put a couple of passes in that didn’t have enough pace to get to where they needed to go and he wasn’t the only one. It put him and the rest of the team of their game and I wouldn’t be surprised if it wasn’t a Terriers tactic to over water the pitch. Whatever, he had a poor game but that happens. He looked quality for us last time in The Championship and Oxford fans rated his loan last season so he will come good.

I think this is exactly it with Soumare, he can switch multiple times in one game from looking like he’s finally clicked, winning the ball aggressively and playing with pace and physicality to a lazy, passive, irresponsible liability. That’s exactly what happened last night. I guess that wild inconsistency is why he’s still with us and why we are where we are. It’s increasingly clear that the loss of Ndidi, despite his increasing flaws is a big loss. It means we are reliant on Soumare who in theory has all the attributes but has little of the mentality of a top level midfielder and Skipp who just doesn’t have the ability even at this level. We have one quality midfielder in Winks with little sign that there is going to be any additions.

I actually think Justin might be a better option than him on the left tbh. Obviously with Ricardo out that would potentially force us to play Hamza on the right, who had a shocker tonight. With the left back expected to offer attacking support in this set up, and Justin showing some ability in the past being able to cut in from the left inside the winger, it might be worth the risk.

It’s not so much that he was the problem, it’s that his role is meant to offer an attacking solution and I just don’t see the creativity in his game that will ever see us benefit from his presence in what would’ve been the KDH position when attacking. He’s not a dribbler and his body position/kicking style seems to be innately set up to hook balls inside and backwards.

Just can’t see Thomas working in this attacking fullback role that Cifuentes demands. He’s not got the pace, the skill or the creativity I think it needs. Same with VK tbh.

Cifuentes needs more quality at fullback, central midfield and in the centre forward role. The latter two areas are well discussed. From the fullback perspective, Thomas is not equipped to offer the creativity Cifuentes’ (Cucurella style) left back role requires, nor is VK. Ricardo is our best right back but it’s never fit, JJ might be better on the left but struggles on the right despite being very right footed. Hamza it has to be said was very poor today other than a fabulous goal.

A great goal cannot mask a scruffy, shoddy performance by Hamza. He was the main reason we conceded both goals.

Encroachment, goal should’ve been disallowed. Player was inside the D before the lad had taken the pen.