Walsall Post Match Thread

[Thracian]

Sorry to be pedantic, but we're third. :sweating:

[ASH17LCFC]

Think about what you are saying. Has our season really fallen apart already?

We look like the team of last season at home tonight and we are 3rd ... 1st is 1st and 3rd is last.

[Samilktray]

We look like the team of last season at home tonight and we are 3rd ... 1st is 1st and 3rd is last.

1st is 1st.

3rd is 3rd.

[Munzie]

We look like the team of last season at home tonight and we are 3rd ... 1st is 1st and 3rd is last.

I would love to know how you draw your comparisions!

If someone offered me 3rd place in the league, 2 points from the top, with a game in hand, on the 21st November at the start of the season, I would have bitten their hand off.

[ASH17LCFC]

1st is 1st.

3rd is 3rd.

That kinda of thinking gets you nowhere in this game.

[Ultra]

Fooking dreadful, i felt gutted walking out because our home form seems to be always a problem and this season looks no different. I felt like leaving at half time, the marking was schoolboys stuff and who missed that header first half from about 7 yards .. Was it king or Howard because it was shocking.

Pearson needs to give them a boot up the arse because we were crap.

Agree completely. This was the FOURTH poor home performance on the trot. At this level, there can be no excuse whatsoever for that.

The central midfield is now a definite weak link. Neither King nor Oakley can make a tackle between them, let alone win one. Pearson's continued faith in them is completely misplaced.

By the way, the miss was by Howard.

[ozleicester]

Disapointing..nevertheless a come from behind draw...isnt the worst outcome.

I have not seen a mention of Lord Dyer tonight... a poor game? (or have i not read properly)...I am beginning to think he is the key to winning games?

[Bellend Sebastian]

What the hell are you talking about? 10 or 15 years ago we wern't in the 3rd division ffs!

And how is this the fault of most of the team that played last night and the coaching staff? And as was so often the case last season, booing the team hardly made them rise to the occasion did it?

[Guest]

I'm going to give some praise to Ricketts. Great target man play. Much better than Howard tonight.

Micheal Ricketts was class.

I hate to see his name on the opposition team sheet; he nearly always scores against us.

And how is this the fault of most of the team that played last night and the coaching staff? And as was so often the case last season, booing the team hardly made them rise to the occasion did it?

I think this "I've paid my money, and I'll boo the team if I want" attitude falls flat on its face when I think about how the Walsall fans started to take the piss and join in.

As for Chelsea Dagger ....

[Asha]

That kinda of thinking gets you nowhere in this game.

So Arsenal are last then?

[colbo68]

Thought their number 9 was awesome too. Chased everything and gave the defenders no time on the ball what-so-ever.

i agree - thought their number nine (name i aint heard of) looked class tonight - I dont think he gave the ball away once

Agree completely. This was the FOURTH poor home performance on the trot. At this level, there can be no excuse whatsoever for that.

The central midfield is now a definite weak link. Neither King nor Oakley can make a tackle between them, let alone win one. Pearson's continued faith in them is completely misplaced.

By the way, the miss was by Howard.

yes it was Howard - fook knows how he missed!

[DB11]

Told ya Martin is abysmal. When he gets the ball he always gave it out to Hobbs instead of releasing it quickly to one of the full backs.

For their first goal he should have dived at their feet not bleedin jumped up and let the ball go under him!

And their second goal all he bleedin did was fall on the ground it looked like he even got a hand to it as well therefore he should have got a stronger touch.

And Fryatt reminded me of Hume tonight. He was chasing everything down as you could tell he wanted to score against Walsall, but he can't read where Howard is going to head it down to.

[SamL]

First half was awful. Second half we looked better. Dyer and king stood out in a very poor performance.

Stewards managed to spoil my night by constantly telling me to sit on the top row! And even telling these young lads off for picking up their confetti!

Weird, I stood on the back row of SK1 and didn't get told to sit down.

I don't think anybody was expecting us to play as poorly as we did last night. The only positive out of the game is that we played poorly but still got something out of it.

There's no time to dwell on it though, Satuday will soon be upon us. Come on Leicester!

[chesterfox]

http://www.lcfc.premiumtv.co.uk/page/Lates...1428043,00.html

hee hee that 's the reason they didnt win - they dropped two pints!!!!

btw stop moaning we'll win on Saturday and all of a sudden they'll be world beaters - patience they're young and still in a formative stage. Now behave!!!!

[soarvalleybowler]

Dont seem to have a lot in midfield......first instinct seems to be to get rid of the ball at all costs and let someone else have the responsibility..this results in poor distribution or a tame pass backwards...dare I say that perhaps Clemence might help...How far is he from Fitness? anybody Know?...On the plus side Kisnorbo did well and should be in for Saturday. PS Walsall came to do a job,and did it well

[Asha]

Dont seem to have a lot in midfield......first instinct seems to be to get rid of the ball at all costs and let someone else have the responsibility..this results in poor distribution or a tame pass backwards...dare I say that perhaps Clemence might help...How far is he from Fitness? anybody Know?...On the plus side Kisnorbo did well and should be in for Saturday. PS Walsall came to do a job,and did it well

to the forum.

Apparently Clem's still a long while off.

[Durnerz]

Made a rare appearance tonight and wasn't impressed.

Walsall were there for the taking early on, we had huge gaps to exploit but no one used the initiative to run into the space to cause them problems suggesting a lack of urgency. Even when we bagged the second we couldn't shift it up a gear to kill them off as they were clearly intent on a draw (running the ball into the corner with 10mins left!)

The Midfield were like last season, crab like, could only pass backwards and to the side, King being a massive culprit in acres of room he'd knock it back and just stand still, Oakley is the new Gareth Williams, goes missing for half the game, not an inspiring captain.

Just a general lack of interest and willpower to win the game I thought tonight from the lads and some disgraceful actions from the fans when the going got tough booing the players, because we all know that always helps doesn't it?

Still, no panic, if we can play that badly and still come out with points then im relatively unconcerned.

[Frazy85]

Hey there everyone, Walsall fan here

I thought when we attacked we really caused leicester problems, the first goal seemed to be a defensive error from your defender hobbs? However we then sat back, let leicester come at us and desperately try to defend, our two centre backs were on top form or we would never have got out of that game with a point.

Your second goal was a huge error from Ince (our keeper) , unfortunately he sometimes is way too over confident, came out and completely missed it and gave you lot a empty net , but i think the general feeling in the walsall fans is we could have held onto the win if ince had not come out, as leicester just couldnt create enough good chances. Lloyd Dyer was causing our right midfielder deeney and right back palmer problems all game, i was surprised to see him go off myself. Fryatt was non existent most of the match, howard missed a sitter, and yet we still feel like we should have got all 3 points.

Its a difference of opinion, some of us think our manager was right to just sit as deep as possible at 2-2, some wanted us to attack and get the 3 points, at least play two upfront (instead of playing ricketts in defence!!).

For the people who have noticed him on here, our number 9 is Jabo Ibhere, signed from Leyton Orient in the summer, hes arguably been the best player so far this season, and as far as im aware, has won man of the match at every home game apart from one so far this season! Ricketts has certain class but unfortunately it just depends if its his day or not, if its not, he gives up, cant be bothered, wont challenge, and is pointless being on the pitch.

Overall though, i think it was a good game, at least from our point of view, stadium was nice (first time at the walkers), despite the fact we were all made to sit right in the very corner in one tiny stand, but it was a good night out, and were off to elland road next

[Sniffer-Clarke]

Yes i agree with most it was a pretty poor performance last night, the thing that worries me most is we are making chances but we are not putting them in the back of the net. I am not certain whether Fryatt/Howard is the right strike combination, i think if we want to get promoted this season and i would think there is alot of pressure from MM to achieve this we do need a natural goalscorer with pace.Does anyone know what the problem with DJC /NA is.

[davieG]

Stats according to LCFC

Goals : 2 2

Possession : 55% 45%

Shots On Target : 10 1

Shots Off Target : 7 1

Corners : 6 2

Fouls : 14 13

Most Fouls : Howard (5) Ibehre (4)

Yellow Cards : 1 0

Red Cards : 0 0

Scorers : King 34 Tunchev 73 Nicholls 11 Ricketts 47

[Sooper Steve's shin]

Central midfield seemed to be a big problem. I cannot see the benefits of King. Every time he got the ball, he quickly released it backwards or sideways. Neither King nor Oakley made much effort to make themselves available and they don't seem to play as a pair (despite having played most of the season together so far).

Gradel gets frustrated very quickly. He has lots of skill and pace, but no left foot at all. They also seemed to read what he was going to do after a while - and where are the goals we saw at Bournemouth!

Gilbert was arguably at fault for both goals, certainly they both came from the right-back area - but why bring on Kisnorbo to push Hobbs out there. Why bring on Mattock for Powell (who was playing fine) or the defensive Berner for the potentially dangerous Dyer.

Dyer again showed what skill and pace he has, but I don't think we used him enough. Howard was unlucky and not as bad as many make out, but should have scored at least one of his chances given his experience (and the transfer fee/wages we paid for him). Fryatt was just out of the game completely, we should have had more attacking options on the bench and used our only one (even if it was Barry Hayles!).

Agree with comments about the crowd, it has been increasingly a problem at the Walkers over the years. It's true that booing used to be reserved for a really bad performance, but these days it starts with one wrong pass. That's no way to support the team.

[harpendenfox]

Looks like we need some new tricks to spice up the team and stop us becoming predictable. The squad looks a little imbalanced at the moment. We are drowning in capable centre backs and left backs. We have wingers. We need an option up front (Dickov is due back soon, whilst there is complete radio silence on the Campbell front) and we need some variety in midfield. Weso and Kish are more of the same. On Saturday I'd like to see pretty much the only other option we have, Porter, on the bench and given a chance to run at the Cobblers defence and cause some panic.

The Berner, Mattock, Kisnorbo bench is strange. It would be unlike Pearson to choose his bench on the basis of keeping everyone happy, and I hope that isn't the case.

Meanwhile, our scouting network needs to be charged with finding two recruits: a striker who can stay fit, and a creative midfielder, ideally both will come from league one, two or below. I don't want people coming down to the Walkers to bide time until their pension kicks in.

[dandannieldanok]

Very disappointing and at times dire, the first half was simply dreadful on our part. The first goal was a complete shambles and would even look out of place in sunday league. All night Hobbs and Tunchev were outfought by, to put it bluntly, two big lumps who were in actual fact a lot more useful than Howard. The centre midfield pairing were a joke once again, King is simply too ponderous and so predictable and Oakley is struggling to find his level in League 1. The wingers were very hit and miss and the strikers really were a shadow of the pair that have caused trouble for so many defences already. If Howard cannot put those chances away then he must be dropped when Campbell and Dickov are fit. Overall I thought we were quite fortunate to get a point.

[leicesterseddon]

Fickle Leicestershire im afraid, were in the middle, Chilled up North slow paced miners life, Stressed London folk with their rat race life style.

Midlanders are really a weird bread! FACT

Cheese crust? Hovis best of both?

[CosbehFox]

On another note, it was a fairly low attendance again.

But it's still near Forest's and more than Coventry's in a higher division. Walsall would probably bring around 500 fans...it's a decent effort.

Lack of communication is what I blame, Start of the season I saw players shouting, talking, pointing, gesturing - Communicating, Something I haven't seen or noticed for years (It seems), Certainly something we lacked last season, However as games have passed, I have seen less of this communication, Perhaps we should start again.

Agreed. It appears we don't have a player who can roll his sleeves in and dig in when required. Like Hendrie did for a bit last season. Pearson needs to get this across, Oakley's disappeared again from captaincy. He's capable of it - he did well against Coventry at home and MK Dons at home talking to everyone.

Patience is not something that happends around The Walkers, i was getting so annoyed with fans shouting "get it forward", "attack" or "get rid of it" when we were keeping the ball around the half way line and then when the players listen to what the crowd say and hoof it, we lose the ball and it is met by groans. Some of the fans were awful tonight, we're second in the league, lost one game and every mis-placed pass is met by boos and groans. I don't think there was need for it, yes we weren't playing well but there's a few young lads out there who were feeling the pressure.

It's something I feared at the start of the season. At Stockport to be exact when Dyer mis-hit a shot wide. The current set of players are clearly a decent bunch but will struggle due to them being raw and young. They do not need booing, they need supporting. They will be hard times this season. Harder than this. There's bound to be situations where we are 2 goals down and struggling all over the shop. Man United have it when they win the league and West Brom for example lost 4-1 to us on their way to winning the league. It's how you deal with your bad days and what you can do to address the bad days in the 90 minutes. In retrospective, if this is one of our bad days we did well.

We need to be patient, it may take 3 years or so to get out of League One because the level of player won't lower himself to this division like he may have done in the Championship due to money. Instead we are restricted to signing young, raw products from the leagues below or equal, the academy and the current batch of previously failures. Who knows maybe some of them will realise this season there's an opportunity to become a hero? As us blokes know, you settle for something ropey when the goings tough.

It appears the strikers are too comfortable with no threat of being dropped, the midfield lacks some class and panache and the dropping of Morrison is Pearson's first error. We are leaking left, right and centre since Morro's been left out.