Leicester City 2 - 0 Peterborough - post match

[chris_lcfc_85]

Whilst there may be some truth in what you say, it still struck me as a dour, conservative performance typical of City under NFP this time around.

I am not completely 'gung ho' and had no problem with the way we set up initially but when the limit of 'Boro's ambitions became clear we really needed to be more expansive, but the inflexibility of our game plan did not appear to allow that.

It worked out well enough against a pretty weak 'Boro side but I thought we conceded far too much first half and a better side would have taken advantage and punished us.

Aint you a clever chap!!? Win 2-0 and you spout all this.

Peterboro had one shot in the first half, Kaspar could of had his deck chair out. Your moaning about the first 45 mins of the season, give the lads chance to settle down and wipe away any nerves etc.

I know people give their opinions but sometimes you need to draw the line

[marty78]

How does anything we did last season have any bearing at all on what we do this season? This is different team now and last season is precisely that - last season. It has nothing to do with this season, we've got a clean slate now and you can see the improvement in fitness, work-rate and attitude from the players when compared to the start of last season, there's no swagger there any more - there's just hard work which is what we all want to see. There were 8 players who played on Saturday who were not in the team at the start of last season, 4 of which were brought in over the summer. You can't judge this side by last season's performances - it's a different team.

You've obviously got an axe to grind or you've got some kind of vendetta against NP, but there was very little wrong with the performance on Saturday. The first half wasn't fantastic but our energy and work off the ball restricted Peterborough to keeping posession via sideways passing in their defence. They created nothing because we didn't let them.

I'm not naive enough to believe we won't have to be better than that against better opposition, but you can only beat what's in front of you and as we saw so often last season, we up our game against the better teams. Our main problem last season was seeing off weaker teams like Peterborough - Saturday's game looks to be an improvement in that department.

[Babylon]

How does anything we did last season have any bearing at all on what we do this season? This is different team now and last season is precisely that - last season. It has nothing to do with this season, we've got a clean slate now and you can see the improvement in fitness, work-rate and attitude from the players when compared to the start of last season, there's no swagger there any more - there's just hard work which is what we all want to see. There were 8 players who played on Saturday who were not in the team at the start of last season, 4 of which were brought in over the summer. You can't judge this side by last season's performances - it's a different team.

You've obviously got an axe to grind or you've got some kind of vendetta against NP, but there was very little wrong with the performance on Saturday. The first half wasn't fantastic but our energy and work off the ball restricted Peterborough to keeping posession via sideways passing in their defence. They created nothing because we didn't let them.

I'm not naive enough to believe we won't have to be better than that against better opposition, but you can only beat what's in front of you and as we saw so often last season, we up our game against the better teams. Our main problem last season was seeing off weaker teams like Peterborough - Saturday's game looks to be an improvement in that department.

Well if we are going to judge Sven and Pearson equally then last season and this season need to be considered. The Thais said they took into account the end of Svens first season as well as his start.

[marbelladave]

How does anything we did last season have any bearing at all on what we do this season? This is different team now and last season is precisely that - last season. It has nothing to do with this season, we've got a clean slate now and you can see the improvement in fitness, work-rate and attitude from the players when compared to the start of last season, there's no swagger there any more - there's just hard work which is what we all want to see. There were 8 players who played on Saturday who were not in the team at the start of last season, 4 of which were brought in over the summer. You can't judge this side by last season's performances - it's a different team.

You've obviously got an axe to grind or you've got some kind of vendetta against NP, but there was very little wrong with the performance on Saturday. The first half wasn't fantastic but our energy and work off the ball restricted Peterborough to keeping posession via sideways passing in their defence. They created nothing because we didn't let them.

I'm not naive enough to believe we won't have to be better than that against better opposition, but you can only beat what's in front of you and as we saw so often last season, we up our game against the better teams. Our main problem last season was seeing off weaker teams like Peterborough - Saturday's game looks to be an improvement in that department.

You see, that is exactly where I take issue. We may have new players but they are being asked to play pretty much the same style as we played last season.

The parallels are there for all to see, the central midfield weakness is still there, sure we setup slightly differently with the central pair deeper than last season, that may have made us more solid but it offered little support to our strikers, so once again we looked powderpuff in attack.

Our most creative player is marginalised on the flank and his influence on the game was minimal and as usual we played with 2 men up yet failed to get the ball too them often enough that neither really loked likely to score.

New faces sure, but tactically it was the same old, same old......

[Babylon]

The parallels are there for all to see, the central midfield weakness is still there

Really, did anyone else see this because we seemed more than comfortable throughout the whole game. Peterborough had the ball in their own half not ours, they not once looked like they were bossing midfield.

sure we setup slightly differently with the central pair deeper than last season, that may have made us more solid but it offered little support to our strikers, so once again we looked powderpuff in attack.

I presume again you are only focusing on the first half here rather than the second. Similarly how your main focus was on 20 minutes in the cup.

So far we've had an average 20 minutes in the cup, an average 45 minutes in the league (whilst still looking more than comfortable). Yet the 115 minutes we've been by some distance the better team seems to get completely over looked in almost every comment you make.

[Foxhateram]

You see, that is exactly where I take issue. We may have new players but they are being asked to play pretty much the same style as we played last season.

The parallels are there for all to see, the central midfield weakness is still there, sure we setup slightly differently with the central pair deeper than last season, that may have made us more solid but it offered little support to our strikers, so once again we looked powderpuff in attack.

Our most creative player is marginalised on the flank and his influence on the game was minimal and as usual we played with 2 men up yet failed to get the ball too them often enough that neither really loked likely to score.

New faces sure, but tactically it was the same old, same old......

Despite winning two nil in a game where the oppo decided to put 11 men behind the ball for most of the game. We have kept two clean sheets in two games and scored 6 goals. Seriously are you really going to question our attacking intent?

We may be playing the same system as last season but we now have players who have the ability to pull it off. The way we have set up allows us to soak up pressure and press with a strong high ish line and then counter down the flanks with v quick and skilful wingers. That is why the strikers won't touch the ball as often because they are looking for a ball in from the flanks.

We have exposed the weaknesses of both opposition teams in the last two games, finding the weaker flank and using it and switching wingers to confuse players as much as possible. We are starting to think technically ando using that key to unlock defences rather than last season where we tried to pass the ball to death allow the opposition to back up behind the ball and get ridiculous possession but no width or penetration.

I am impressed so far this season Nigel has plugged the holes from last season and the system is working very well. He has started to get best out of players like kingy again and has signed some gems in knocky, vardy and James. We will do well this season. I honestly think we will be off to a flying start. Coyb.

[indierich06]

New faces sure, but tactically it was the same old, same old......

I see what you're getting at, but I think that if you improve the quality of players in any given system, you'll see better results. A bit of an extreme example, but if you stuck Barcelona's players in NP's formation and used his tactics, they'd still piss over the entire Championship.

I don't believe our problems were tactical last season, I just don't think we had the quality in our squad to make a sustained challenge for promotion. What I took issue with last season was our inconsistency, not our tactics, because they have been shown to work, it's just the players in that system that let it down on so many occasions last year.

I'm a firm believer that you don't need to be a tactical genius to get out of the Championship, you need a settled and consistent first team, a very strong squad and those few players (like Marshall, maybe Knockaert) who give you that little bit of quality over and above the other teams in the league. While tactics do matter, they're really not the most important thing in getting promoted from this league.

[MGLCFC]

I think we had the quality in the squad, but not the desire or passion to play foe Leicester. The squad we have this year look far more hungry for success.

[marbelladave]

Aint you a clever chap!!? Win 2-0 and you spout all this.

Peterboro had one shot in the first half, Kaspar could of had his deck chair out. Your moaning about the first 45 mins of the season, give the lads chance to settle down and wipe away any nerves etc.

I know people give their opinions but sometimes you need to draw the line

You said it yourself, we were totally in control first half, 'Boro showed no inclination to get forward and we did nothing whatsoever to get after them! That, to me, was pretty poor.

I know it is early days so I have not criticised any of our players in any way, in fact in other posts I have said pretty clearly that I thought they all played well.

What I am concerned about is how we utilise the talent we undoubtably have and so far it looks like we are still trying to play the same style as last year, if we do I think we are in for a frustrating season.

With all due respect, anyone can pick up on the problems when we get outplayed and well beaten, the trick is to see it coming and do something about it which I very much hope NFP does.......

[marty78]

Well if we are going to judge Sven and Pearson equally then last season and this season need to be considered. The Thais said they took into account the end of Svens first season as well as his start.

I personally think he should be judged on his ability to get his current squad promoted and it should be that success/failure which should seal his fate. If the owners are going to take last season into account then anything less than an early title challenge may see yet another manager in place some time in October. At some stage in the not too distant future it would decent of us to give a manager a fair crack at the job. Pearson being in his second spell (after a successful first one) deserves to be judged less harshly than Sven as he has shown, to me at least, a better understanding of this level of football.

[MGLCFC]

You said it yourself, we were totally in control first half, 'Boro showed no inclination to get forward and we did nothing whatsoever to get after them! That, to me, was pretty poor.

I know it is early days so I have not criticised any of our players in any way, in fact in other posts I have said pretty clearly that I thought they all played well.

What I am concerned about is how we utilise the talent we undoubtably have and so far it looks like we are still trying to play the same style as last year, if we do I think we are in for a frustrating season.

With all due respect, anyone can pick up on the problems when we get outplayed and well beaten, the trick is to see it coming and do something about it which I very much hope NFP does.......

I personally thought it was pretty sensible in that heat and humidity not to go chasing after them early doors. We were patient, took our chances when they came and won comfortably. Remember, this is a team that took 4 points from us last season and had we conceded a goal through being impatient it could have been the same old frustrating scoreline that happened so many times last season against lower opposition.

[Guest Col city fan]

Morning Dave..

You bang on about 'tactics' as though they are going out of fashion mate.

Tactics are not the be all and end all of what wins football matches. Footballers win football matches.

I tried to say to you last season, though it fell on deaf ears, that our lack of success was mainly because we didn't have a very good team. Tactics aside, our players were nothing special.

This season, I think DeLaet is better than Peltier, Drinky is better than Wellens, Vardy looks useful, and Marshall continues to impress.

I think we have a better general ability in the team Dave. Which matters...

MON's success, for example, was built around good tactics AND signing some bloody good players. You need both and I think Pearson has improved the general ability of the squad.

If James is injured, for instance, Dannsy will come in. Last season it was fat Johnno or Yuki.

Stop banging on totally about tactics and start looking at the players we've signed.

[davieG]

I didn't notice any big difference in how we started the 2nd half from the 1st, sure we were more efficient with our passing and ball retention but tactically we looked the same.

I do wonder how we would have progressed if we hadn't scored from the corner forcing Peterboro' to open up?

[Babylon]

I didn't notice any big difference in how we started the 2nd half from the 1st, sure we were more efficient with our passing and ball retention but tactically we looked the same.

Well it seemed to me like we were pressing them much higher up the pitch and chasing them down more than we were first half, making them surrendering possession much sooner and in more advanced areas for us. Where as first half we were happy to let them have the ball and wait for a mistake or wait for them to come into our half before putting any pressure on.

That and it seemed to me we were willing to commit a bit more in support than the first half, where at times Vardy and Beckford had nobody particularly close to them. Meaning we surrendered our attacks too quickly.

[marbelladave]

Really, did anyone else see this because we seemed more than comfortable throughout the whole game. Peterborough had the ball in their own half not ours, they not once looked like they were bossing midfield.

I presume again you are only focusing on the first half here rather than the second. Similarly how your main focus was on 20 minutes in the cup.

So far we've had an average 20 minutes in the cup, an average 45 minutes in the league (whilst still looking more than comfortable). Yet the 115 minutes we've been by some distance the better team seems to get completely over looked in almost every comment you make.

We sat 2 men in front of our back 4 and allowed 'Boro to play in front of us, so yes we were pretty comfortable. But we offered little going forward and we had no one supporting the front 2 to produce the 'creative spark'.

Indisputably we have been much the better side in our games so far but against a League 2 outfit and a Championship side who finished 7th from bottom last time out that is barely par.

As I have said elsewhere, there were some pretty encouraging signs in our performance on saturday, but there were some negative ones as well.

Forgive me for pointing this out amongst all the euphoria over a decent win against a mediocre side.

[Babylon]

We sat 2 men in front of our back 4 and allowed 'Boro to play in front of us, so yes we were pretty comfortable. But we offered little going forward and we had no one supporting the front 2 to produce the 'creative spark'.

And yet we were also still comfortable second half when we committed more men forward... so we controlled the midfield when we had little of the ball and when we had lots of the ball..... remind me of the negative there?

As I have said elsewhere, there were some pretty encouraging signs in our performance on saturday, but there were some negative ones as well.

Yes you have made a couple of positive comments, but the the content and tone of almost all your posts has been one of negativity.

What euphoria? Most people have just said it was a decent encouraging performance, which it was.

[marbelladave]

I didn't notice any big difference in how we started the 2nd half from the 1st, sure we were more efficient with our passing and ball retention but tactically we looked the same.

I do wonder how we would have progressed if we hadn't scored from the corner forcing Peterboro' to open up?

Exactly.....

Well it seemed to me like we were pressing them much higher up the pitch and chasing them down more than we were first half, making them surrendering possession much sooner and in more advanced areas for us. Where as first half we were happy to let them have the ball and wait for a mistake or wait for them to come into our half before putting any pressure on.

That and it seemed to me we were willing to commit a bit more in support than the first half, where at times Vardy and Beckford had nobody particularly close to them. Meaning we surrendered our attacks too quickly.

I thought most of our improvement came after Morgans goal when 'Boro had to be a bit more aggressive. Once that went in I thought we played well.

The lack of support for Vardey and Beckford was as a result of our longstanding weakness in central midfield, on this occasion a lack of attacking intent.

Careful Babs, that is getting awfully close to agreeing with me, can't have that.....

[Corky]

Whilst there may be some truth in what you say, it still struck me as a dour, conservative performance typical of City under NFP this time around.

I am not completely 'gung ho' and had no problem with the way we set up initially but when the limit of 'Boro's ambitions became clear we really needed to be more expansive, but the inflexibility of our game plan did not appear to allow that.

It worked out well enough against a pretty weak 'Boro side but I thought we conceded far too much first half and a better side would have taken advantage and punished us.

How do you know we'll play like this against a better side? We can, and no doubt will, adapt to different situations. We'll see in the next home match against an attacking side with better players.

And there is little "euphoria", most of us are pleased we've started with a win and it's something to build on. The performance wasn't perfect but I didn't expect one.

[Julian Joachim Jr Shabadoo]

Do you not think that maybe we were trying not to play into Peterborough's hands? We stood off the ball quite a lot, and waited for them to make a mistake - like NP said we had to be patient. Had we have let them pass it around the back 4 and pressed too hard, they would have lumped it into the gap that we would have created for them.

It wasn't brilliant to watch admittedly, but tactically I think we got it spot on in the first half, as showed by the fact we won 2-0 at a canter and a good clean sheet with 5/6 really promising performances - new and old players.

Spot on. It doesn't matter that the first half was boring and that they had more possession. Peterborough weren't attacking, they weren't causing us any problems, and our squad were basically just weighing them up. As soon as the 2nd half started and we knew their style of play, we got up front and tore them to pieces. 2-0 well earned, and could have been more.

[KIRBYFOX93]

Firstly thought everyone played a part in the result no ba players all around... I liked the fact that danny and matt drilled the midfield area fantastically which was a major part of last seasons failure and very well done to mr vardy upfront showing how to defend from the front aswell...

However the most important thing was the back 4 playing well and not conceding a goal!!! Which was the main problem last season!!!!! Keep it up lads more perfomances like that and im sure were not far away fromthe prem..

[davieG]

Well it seemed to me like we were pressing them much higher up the pitch and chasing them down more than we were first half, making them surrendering possession much sooner and in more advanced areas for us. Where as first half we were happy to let them have the ball and wait for a mistake or wait for them to come into our half before putting any pressure on.

That and it seemed to me we were willing to commit a bit more in support than the first half, where at times Vardy and Beckford had nobody particularly close to them. Meaning we surrendered our attacks too quickly.

I only noticed that after we scored, the main difference for me was our ball retention and better passing which gave us greater possession, but I know we all see different things.

[Corky]

I only noticed that after we scored, the main difference for me was our ball retention and better passing which gave us greater possession, but I know we all see different things.

It was, we seemed to settle more.

And there appeared to be less HOOF than before, possibly because we had two genuine wingers on the pitch at all times as well as full-backs who were prepared to go over the halfway line. The midfield saw a lot more of the ball than previously.

[Ric Flair]

Correct me if i'm wrong but didn't we do fairly well against the better sides in this league last season? We struggled against the dross and especially away from home. So marbella if you're worried we haven't completely changed then you needn't worry about better teams punishing us as invariably we'll be ok against them. If we have mastered the art of combatting crap teams who sit back and defend against us then the futures bright.

[marbelladave]

And yet we were also still comfortable second half when we committed more men forward... so we controlled the midfield when we had little of the ball and when we had lots of the ball..... remind me of the negative there?

Yes you have made a couple of positive comments, but the the content and tone of almost all your posts has been one of negativity.

What euphoria? Most people have just said it was a decent encouraging performance, which it was.

We were clearly the better side even first half but made no attempt to capitalise on our superiority, put simply when it became clear that they had no interest in coming after us, we made no attempt to go after them, thats the negative.

After the goal 'Boro had to open up so it was a more even game and our better players made the difference, no problem there.

My initial posts contained both positive and negative comments, no one says anything about the positive so the resulting discussion is all about the negative, thats the way it usually is.

Let us be clear, I praised the players overall performance, among others I singled out new boys Vardey and Moore for really stepping up, I praised Pearson for setting up with the 2 players in front of the back 4 and was more than happy with the solidity that gave our defence, but no one said a word about that.......

But I suggest that we failed to get after 'Boro first half, lacked creativity or that our shape was poor and the comments come flooding in. I try to explain and expand on that and I am branded as negative, I actually thought I started off giving a very balanced view......

[marbelladave]

Correct me if i'm wrong but didn't we do fairly well against the better sides in this league last season? We struggled against the dross and especially away from home. So marbella if you're worried we haven't completely changed then you needn't worry about better teams punishing us as invariably we'll be ok against them. If we have mastered the art of combatting crap teams who sit back and defend against us then the futures bright.

Before the shitstorm that my (I thought) measured criticism invoked, I was at pains to point out that having only taken 1 point off 'Boro last season, saturday was a big improvement.

Strangely no one commented on that.......