Tactics Under Maresca

[Dames]

8 hours ago, Lillehamring said:

Not shitstirring here, Dames. genuine question:

 

regarding:  Hull tactically out done us on Saturday - if we played a game and allowed an opponent to take 21 shots at us, whilst only generating 4 on target ourselves (including one that was deflected) - would you be posting on here saying that we tactically outdid them?  Forget about the result and our poor shooting, simply from a tactical perspective - can it really be argued that exposing yourself to that amount of shots can be tactically sensible or, for that matter, even a tactic?

 

Also, the problem we had last year was giving the ball away and immediately conceding - this has  happened once this year from KDH setting up Ramsey - and we've only conceded one goal from a set piece - which problems are you thinking of that have not been corrected?

 

I mean if this is all that you're basing your sink and swim argument on, apart from the fact that there is such a long way to go, and we are so new to all this, these seem to be fairly intangible issues (if they even are issues) that you are suggesting.

You can’t say forget about poor shooting when its a key part of the point you’re trying to make. You can have 100 shots in a game but if they are all poor or miss the target you cant claim to dominate the game. Hull restricted us to just 1 actual attempt on target. That is tactically sensible, people can bang on about the 21 attempts all they want but not one of them seriously troubled the keeper and we created no clear cut chances. To me that is the sign of the opposition executing a very well thought out tactical game plan. A plan we are going to see much more of this season. 
 

As for the problems not being corrected i’ve already said. We are still far to congested in the middle which means we spend far too much time playing in front of the opposition and because we have players prone to giving the ball away we are easy to turn over in the middle and break against 2 cbs that really really hate playing on the turn. During those long poor spells in games this season thats whats been happening, we’re getting caught in the middle and broke against, we’re just lucky that the standard is so much lower in this league. 
 

So yes it is sink or swim because the same issues we’ve had are persisting so we need to sort them out before we are sussed out and it becomes a long hard season. Its also worrying that we’ve not really created any clear cut chances for our strikers yet this season in the league. 

7 hours ago, sbfox said:

I mean you're ignoring objective reality. The system Maresca plays isn't just 'tucking in a full back', or knocking it sideways like Rogers.

Not really, you’re just being a hipster. The only real difference so far is the full backs tucking in and the formation changing when we have the ball otherwise we are going through the majority of games keeping the ball playing slowly. 

[RumbleFox]

17 minutes ago, Dames said:

 

Not really, you’re just being a hipster. The only real difference so far is the full backs tucking in and the formation changing when we have the ball otherwise we are going through the majority of games keeping the ball playing slowly. 

And the fact we’ve had the best start to any season in our entire history whilst totally revamping our first 11 and after a brutal relegation and a club wide mentality of losing?

[Dames]

1 minute ago, RumbleFox said:

And the fact we’ve had the best start to any season in our entire history whilst totally revamping our first 11 and after a brutal relegation and a club wide mentality of losing?

And that means we should just totally ignore all the flaws or not discuss them at all? because that totally worked last season when we were told to ignore stuff because the manager lead us to an FA cup win and a European semi final. 

[foxinsocks]

with Ricardo sneaking in to midfield the defence shift across - so Doyle left a big space for their right winger.  When we lose the ball the left wing has to come back and pick up their right winger.  Other clubs will have noted this - expect a rash of attacks down their right wing

[Dames]

4 minutes ago, foxinsocks said:

with Ricardo sneaking in to midfield the defence shift across - so Doyle left a big space for their right winger.  When we lose the ball the left wing has to come back and pick up their right winger.  Other clubs will have noted this - expect a rash of attacks down their right wing

Its going to happen a lot when we get caught in transition from Ndidi or KDH losing the ball. Worrying that none of the 3 cbs have any sort of recovery pace and 2 of them are extremely uncomfortable with runners in behind. 

[honeybradger]

I'll be honest, i just dont think we can succeed in the long term as a club while playing possession football, in fact it is killing us.

 

Even if we destroy this division this season, what happens when we get promoted to the PL? A case study would be Burnley, who were a level above in the championship but look dire in the PL. Possession football simply doesnt work unless you incredible players that would be good in any other system.

 

The only team i can remember that played good possession football in their debut PL season was Leeds, otherwise it's teams like Wolves, Brentford etc who set up to counter the opposition rather than play their "style" that get promoted and do well in the PL. 

[Dames]

4 minutes ago, honeybradger said:

I'll be honest, i just dont think we can succeed in the long term as a club while playing possession football, in fact it is killing us.

 

Even if we destroy this division this season, what happens when we get promoted to the PL? A case study would be Burnley, who were a level above in the championship but look dire in the PL. Possession football simply doesnt work unless you incredible players that would be good in any other system.

 

The only team i can remember that played good possession football in their debut PL season was Leeds, otherwise it's teams like Wolves, Brentford etc who set up to counter the opposition rather than play their "style" that get promoted and do well in the PL. 

I don’t even think Leeds were a possession side, they were just extremely high energy in that first season in the Prem but it caught up with them. 
 

I don’t think possession football will kill us in the long run but what would become our undoing is the absolute rigidness to stick to the system. Its all fine and well saying believe in the system it works at Man City but they have world class players capable of turning a game in an instant and thats when possession based systems really thrive when you have players capable of turning a game. Otherwise you need to lean to be flexible and change according the flow of a game. It happened to us so many times last season when a manager made changes and we didn’t react. Modern players especially at the top level are fitter than they were 15 years ago so they are capable of keeping shape and chasing shadows for 90 minutes. Its funny because its actually our high standard of fitness thats got us through this season so far as opposed to any sort of tactical master plan. 

[sbfox]

6 minutes ago, Dames said:

I don’t even think Leeds were a possession side, they were just extremely high energy in that first season in the Prem but it caught up with them. 
 

I don’t think possession football will kill us in the long run but what would become our undoing is the absolute rigidness to stick to the system. Its all fine and well saying believe in the system it works at Man City but they have world class players capable of turning a game in an instant and thats when possession based systems really thrive when you have players capable of turning a game. Otherwise you need to lean to be flexible and change according the flow of a game. It happened to us so many times last season when a manager made changes and we didn’t react. Modern players especially at the top level are fitter than they were 15 years ago so they are capable of keeping shape and chasing shadows for 90 minutes. Its funny because its actually our high standard of fitness thats got us through this season so far as opposed to any sort of tactical master plan. 

So what would your plan B system be? 

[RumbleFox]

36 minutes ago, Dames said:

And that means we should just totally ignore all the flaws or not discuss them at all? because that totally worked last season when we were told to ignore stuff because the manager lead us to an FA cup win and a European semi final. 

I don’t think I said that? I believe that is a little bit of a straw man. I think you’ve used what you think a lot of people are arguing and applied it to myself unfairly. I also think you’ve confused “not being able to discuss them at all” with “allowing people to argue against your viewpoint”. I’m not silencing or cancelling you, I am disagreeing. There is a huge difference. In fact I love it when people present me with an alternate viewpoint to my own because many times I’m wrong. I love having my mind changed. 

 

At no point did I say we should ignore those things that went wrong last season but I apologise if I wasn’t clear. I merely pointed out that you saying “the only real difference” was demonstrably an exaggeration. We haven’t played as well as the results suggest, I agree with you on that, you are completely correct. You are also completely correct when you argue that we need to improve. But “sink or swim” was maybe a slight overstatement in my opinion. We ended up sleep walking to relegation last season. It was brutal. Painful. And many many people ignored the signs so I 100% understand your concerns but I think we have to give the new set up time and not use last season’s failing against them unfairly. I’m not saying we give them infinite time or that we don’t criticise them when necessary but we owe it to the new manager to at least give him some breathing space.
 

Also, Hull beat us despite not have many shots and yet you argue that they tactically outdid us or that they weren’t fortunate. This may be true, you might be right but I can’t see how you can argue in their defence and then not give us credit for the points we’ve taken this season? We haven’t had as many shots as we’d liked but we won despite this. By your own reckoning this has to mean that up until Hull we have tactically outdone all of our other opponents? I don’t see how you can argue for one but not the other?
 

I honestly do get your frustration and me saying “the best start in our history” obviously doesn’t mean I’m saying that covers ALL ills. You are right, we have to be careful. But you can’t just ignore it either. It’s not just “a decent start” or even “a good start”. It is, empirically, “the best start to a season in the entire 139 year history”. It can’t just be completely ignored. You can understand why people might be pleased with the best start this team has ever had in its history surely?

 

Anyway, I agree with you that we need to improve and that we cannot be complacent. But I don’t think it’s true that it is sink or swim quite yet and I do think we need to give Maresca time and space and put our faith in him. 
 

I’m always reminded of Kevin Keegan’s staunch defence of Leonardo’s elbow at USA 94 in these occasions. He just wouldn’t concede he’d maybe made a mistake. It was painful to listen to. I’m not saying you’ve “made a mistake” but I do feel you have overstated the immediacy and scale of the “problems” and it’s ok to sometimes admit when we maybe could have worded things differently. I do it every day. 

Edited 5 September 2023 by RumbleFox

[Dames]

7 minutes ago, RumbleFox said:

I don’t think I said that? I believe that is a little bit of a straw man. I think you’ve used what you think a lot of people are arguing and applied it to myself unfairly. I also think you’ve confused “not being able to discuss them at all” with “allowing people to argue against your viewpoint”. I’m not silencing or cancelling you, I am disagreeing. There is a huge difference. In fact I love it when people present me with an alternate viewpoint to my own because many times I’m wrong. I love having my kind changed. 

 

At no point did I say we should ignore those things that went wrong last season but I apologise if I wasn’t clear. I merely pointed out that you saying “the only real difference” was demonstrably an exaggeration. We haven’t played as well as the results suggest, I agree with you on that, you are completely correct. You are also completely correct when you argue that we need to improve. But “sink or swim” was maybe a slight overstatement in my opinion. We ended up sleep walking to relegation last season. It was brutal. Painful. And many many people ignored the signs so I 100% understand your concerns but I think we have to give the new set up time and not use last season’s failing against them unfairly. I’m not saying we give them infinite time or that we don’t criticise them when necessary but we owe it to the new manager to at least give him some breathing space.
 

Also, Hull beat us despite not have many shots and yet you argue that they tactically outdid us or that they weren’t fortunate. This may be true, you might be right but I can’t see how you can argue in their defence and then not give us credit for the points we’ve taken this season? We haven’t had has many shots as we’d liked but we won despite this. By your own reckoning this has to mean that up until Hull we have tactically outdone all of our other opponents? I don’t see how you can argue for one but not the other?
 

I honestly do get your frustration and me saying “the best start in our history” obviously doesn’t mean I’m saying that covers ALL ills. You are right, we have to be careful. But you can’t just ignore it either. It’s not just “a decent start” or even “a good start”. It is, empirically, “the best start to a season in the entire 139 year history”. It can’t just be completely ignored. You can understand why people might be pleased with the best start this team has ever had in its history surely?

 

Anyway, I agree with you that we need to improve and that we cannot be complacent. But I don’t think it’s true that it is sink or swim quite yet and I do think we need to give Maresca time and space and put our faith in him. 
 

I’m always reminded of Kevin Keegan’s staunch defence of Leonardo’s elbow at USA 94 in these occasions. He just wouldn’t concede he’d maybe made a mistake. It was painful to listen to. I’m not saying you’ve “made a mistake” but I do feel you have overstated the immediacy and scale of the “problems” and it’s ok to sometimes admit when we maybe could have worded things differently. I do it every day. 

Probably the best counter argument i’ve had on this thread. Although your initial post did suggest to ignore everything i can hold my hands up and say you’re not wrong and perhaps I could have worded it differently but I think what i’m trying to get at is we’ve got an international break now and after that we have a real good chance to go on a run to set the course of the rest of the season. We need to get our strikers firing, you dont get out of this league when your striker only scores at current rate less than 1 in every 6 games. 
 

I’ve given us credit this season, i’m really pleased we look 10x fitter than last season and its helped us get last minute wins and points on board and we aren’t beaten the minute we concede but at the same time similar to last season we need more answers to the problems. I’m hopeful Maresca is smart enough to realise this and not just rigidly stick to what worked at Man City but I won’t lie and say I don’t have some small concerns already but i’m going to give him plenty of time.

 

10 minutes ago, sbfox said:

So what would your plan B system be? 

You don’t need a plan b system you need to be willing to 1) adapt to the opposition if things aren’t going well and 2) change plan a if needed, not to a set system but as with point 1 the specific needs of that game. Essentially you have to be flexible which we haven’t seen much of in recent years. Plan a isn’t always going to work especially with the quality of players we have. 

[filbertway]

11 hours ago, Lillehamring said:

Not shitstirring here, Dames. genuine question:

 

regarding:  Hull tactically out done us on Saturday - if we played a game and allowed an opponent to take 21 shots at us, whilst only generating 4 on target ourselves (including one that was deflected) - would you be posting on here saying that we tactically outdid them?  Forget about the result and our poor shooting, simply from a tactical perspective - can it really be argued that exposing yourself to that amount of shots can be tactically sensible or, for that matter, even a tactic?

 

Reminds me of this game when the forum was frothing over what a tactical genius Rodgers was  

 

[LCFCJohn]

1 hour ago, RumbleFox said:

And the fact we’ve had the best start to any season in our entire history whilst totally revamping our first 11 and after a brutal relegation and a club wide mentality of losing?

This is the impressive bit more so than the unbolded bit.
 

Not being funny but beating Coventry, Huddersfield, Cardiff and Rotherham makes a bit of a mockery of ‘best start in our history’ as rarely would we have such a favourable start fixture wise relative to the level we are at.

 

But, you have nailed it that the club was very much in a losing mentality and uncertainty over transfers so it is impressive that Maresca has come in and navigated the fixtures professionally as we could have just as easily had an awful start.
 

It doesn’t mean he is perfect and is now never to be questioned though and I’m sure he’d think the same. (And yes I know from the above exchange that you aren’t of this view yourself). 

[Lillehamring]

2 hours ago, Dames said:

You can’t say forget about poor shooting when its a key part of the point you’re trying to make. You can have 100 shots in a game but if they are all poor or miss the target you cant claim to dominate the game. Hull restricted us to just 1 actual attempt on target. That is tactically sensible, people can bang on about the 21 attempts all they want but not one of them seriously troubled the keeper and we created no clear cut chances. To me that is the sign of the opposition executing a very well thought out tactical game plan. A plan we are going to see much more of this season. 
 

As for the problems not being corrected i’ve already said. We are still far to congested in the middle which means we spend far too much time playing in front of the opposition and because we have players prone to giving the ball away we are easy to turn over in the middle and break against 2 cbs that really really hate playing on the turn. During those long poor spells in games this season thats whats been happening, we’re getting caught in the middle and broke against, we’re just lucky that the standard is so much lower in this league. 
 

So yes it is sink or swim because the same issues we’ve had are persisting so we need to sort them out before we are sussed out and it becomes a long hard season. Its also worrying that we’ve not really created any clear cut chances for our strikers yet this season in the league. 

Not really, you’re just being a hipster. The only real difference so far is the full backs tucking in and the formation changing when we have the ball otherwise we are going through the majority of games keeping the ball playing slowly. 

The issue with the shots not being on target has nothing to do with tactics - 11 of those shots were in the box, one hit the post, seven were blocked - if allowing that sort of pressure is a tactic then it has to be the riskiest tactic ever.  There's no way Hull came into that game with rosenior saying, 'ok, it's alright if we allow them to have 21 shots, because we'll block a third of them, most of them will be poor and miss the goal, and we can always rely on the woodwork to keep out anything else.'  No way.

 

Hull did not 'restrict' us to one on target, that was the result of poor decision making and execution - given the players we have we should have hit the target far more often - we have the fifth most shots on target in the league, despite only having 1 against hull.  In fact, in every other game this season we have outscored our expected goals - Given our shooting form in the other games, rosenior would never have come up with a tactic that allowed us to have that many chances.

 

If every team from now on adopts the "tactic" of allowing us to have 21 shots then, rather than 'sink or swim' - it'll be a case of 'can we play you every week'!

 

As for the same issues - i disagree - i don't know the numbers for whether we are better or worse for giving the ball away, but what i can tell you is that our response to those situations is much much better - maresca is instilling them with a sense of cruciality when it comes to ball repossession, and this is reflected in the fact that, unlike last year, we are not giving up many chances in these situations (perhaps coventry was the worst, but that was game 1 under maresca), and certain far fewer goals.  Again, this is an area that can be improved, but until then it's not costing us because of they improvement in our response and, quite rightly, because of the quality of the opposition.  Sink or swim, or simply an area for improvement?

 

Certainly there is lots to be improved on but you open yourself up for these kind of debate battles when you use sweeping melodramatic phrases like 'sink or swim' - the suggestion that if things don't improve completely in the next (i forget what you originally said) few games we'll drown!  I mean, even if we lose the next two games, there's still a more than reasonable chance we'll be in the top 6, and having two of our toughest fixtures out of the way.

 

It really isn't as bad as you Imagine

 

 

[Dames]

25 minutes ago, Lillehamring said:

The issue with the shots not being on target has nothing to do with tactics - 11 of those shots were in the box, one hit the post, seven were blocked - if allowing that sort of pressure is a tactic then it has to be the riskiest tactic ever.  There's no way Hull came into that game with rosenior saying, 'ok, it's alright if we allow them to have 21 shots, because we'll block a third of them, most of them will be poor and miss the goal, and we can always rely on the woodwork to keep out anything else.'  No way.

 

Hull did not 'restrict' us to one on target, that was the result of poor decision making and execution - given the players we have we should have hit the target far more often - we have the fifth most shots on target in the league, despite only having 1 against hull.  In fact, in every other game this season we have outscored our expected goals - Given our shooting form in the other games, rosenior would never have come up with a tactic that allowed us to have that many chances.

 

If every team from now on adopts the "tactic" of allowing us to have 21 shots then, rather than 'sink or swim' - it'll be a case of 'can we play you every week'!

 

As for the same issues - i disagree - i don't know the numbers for whether we are better or worse for giving the ball away, but what i can tell you is that our response to those situations is much much better - maresca is instilling them with a sense of cruciality when it comes to ball repossession, and this is reflected in the fact that, unlike last year, we are not giving up many chances in these situations (perhaps coventry was the worst, but that was game 1 under maresca), and certain far fewer goals.  Again, this is an area that can be improved, but until then it's not costing us because of they improvement in our response and, quite rightly, because of the quality of the opposition.  Sink or swim, or simply an area for improvement?

 

Certainly there is lots to be improved on but you open yourself up for these kind of debate battles when you use sweeping melodramatic phrases like 'sink or swim' - the suggestion that if things don't improve completely in the next (i forget what you originally said) few games we'll drown!  I mean, even if we lose the next two games, there's still a more than reasonable chance we'll be in the top 6, and having two of our toughest fixtures out of the way.

 

It really isn't as bad as you Imagine

 

 

They and a lot of other teams will come into games with the plan of letting us have the ball but squeezing us and rushing us in areas so we don’t threaten and we are resorting to poor decision making and execution, its totally part of the game plan and its one thats worked against us time and time again for a while now. We can’t keep relying on ‘Play like that and we’ll be fine’ because it really didn’t work out last season. We finally need a way to counter act teams that sit in but the progress in my opinion is a little too slow. 
 

If we were creating many genuine chances we wouldnt be in a situation where we are 5 league games in and a striker hasn’t scored yet. To get out of this division you need your strikers firing and the current potential rate of 1in 6 amounts to less than 8 goals a season, not enough to get us up. So unless things do change soon we can see ourselves swamped in the middle of the pack which quite frankly given our resources is unacceptable. I’m by no means saying we will get relegated but looking to scrape top 6 is not good enough either. So in terms of automatic promotion, we’ve got a crucial period coming up which will set the tone for the rest of the season and in regards to that it really is sink or swim. 
 

 

[sbfox]

2 minutes ago, Dames said:

They and a lot of other teams will come into games with the plan of letting us have the ball but squeezing us and rushing us in areas so we don’t threaten and we are resorting to poor decision making and execution, its totally part of the game plan and its one thats worked against us time and time again for a while now. We can’t keep relying on ‘Play like that and we’ll be fine’ because it really didn’t work out last season. We finally need a way to counter act teams that sit in but the progress in my opinion is a little too slow. 
 

If we were creating many genuine chances we wouldnt be in a situation where we are 5 league games in and a striker hasn’t scored yet. To get out of this division you need your strikers firing and the current potential rate of 1in 6 amounts to less than 8 goals a season, not enough to get us up. So unless things do change soon we can see ourselves swamped in the middle of the pack which quite frankly given our resources is unacceptable. I’m by no means saying we will get relegated but looking to scrape top 6 is not good enough either. So in terms of automatic promotion, we’ve got a crucial period coming up which will set the tone for the rest of the season and in regards to that it really is sink or swim. 
 

 

We don't play the same way as last season. 

[filbertway]

40 minutes ago, Lillehamring said:

The issue with the shots not being on target has nothing to do with tactics - 11 of those shots were in the box, one hit the post, seven were blocked - if allowing that sort of pressure is a tactic then it has to be the riskiest tactic ever.  There's no way Hull came into that game with rosenior saying, 'ok, it's alright if we allow them to have 21 shots, because we'll block a third of them, most of them will be poor and miss the goal, and we can always rely on the woodwork to keep out anything else.'  No way.

 

Hull did not 'restrict' us to one on target, that was the result of poor decision making and execution - given the players we have we should have hit the target far more often - we have the fifth most shots on target in the league, despite only having 1 against hull.  In fact, in every other game this season we have outscored our expected goals - Given our shooting form in the other games, rosenior would never have come up with a tactic that allowed us to have that many chances.

 

If every team from now on adopts the "tactic" of allowing us to have 21 shots then, rather than 'sink or swim' - it'll be a case of 'can we play you every week'!

 

As for the same issues - i disagree - i don't know the numbers for whether we are better or worse for giving the ball away, but what i can tell you is that our response to those situations is much much better - maresca is instilling them with a sense of cruciality when it comes to ball repossession, and this is reflected in the fact that, unlike last year, we are not giving up many chances in these situations (perhaps coventry was the worst, but that was game 1 under maresca), and certain far fewer goals.  Again, this is an area that can be improved, but until then it's not costing us because of they improvement in our response and, quite rightly, because of the quality of the opposition.  Sink or swim, or simply an area for improvement?

 

Certainly there is lots to be improved on but you open yourself up for these kind of debate battles when you use sweeping melodramatic phrases like 'sink or swim' - the suggestion that if things don't improve completely in the next (i forget what you originally said) few games we'll drown!  I mean, even if we lose the next two games, there's still a more than reasonable chance we'll be in the top 6, and having two of our toughest fixtures out of the way.

 

It really isn't as bad as you Imagine

 

 

 

Sit deep and try and restrict the opposition to low percentage chances while trying to hit them on the break when the opportunity presents itself. It's a pretty standard tactic used by underdogs in any league in the world. You're making out that Hull or Rosenior weren't expecting the game to go exactly the way it did. They'd have come into the game looking to be compact and hard to break down, which will allow shooting chances, but if you've got 8 men in the box, you're likely going to get a body in the way of a shot. Alternatively, the opposition can try their luck from 25-30 yards, which barring a worldie will likely result in you getting the ball back.

 

The concerning thing is that we are still goin to struggle against this style of tactic, the greater concern is that we also look incredibly uncomfortable when teams have the balls to press us as well.

 

It's still a new system and new way of playing so you'd expect us to improve, but nobody is wrong for saying there are clear weaknesses right now and we have to hope that the team and coaching staff are working hard to iron those weaknesses out.

 

 

[st albans fox]

2 hours ago, Dames said:

Its funny because its actually our high standard of fitness thats got us through this season so far as opposed to any sort of tactical master plan. 

Maresca would argue that we’re only fitter last twenty because the opposition have been chasing the ball around for the first 70 - that’s a large part of the tactical plan 

[sylofox]

3 hours ago, honeybradger said:

I'll be honest, i just dont think we can succeed in the long term as a club while playing possession football, in fact it is killing us.

 

Even if we destroy this division this season, what happens when we get promoted to the PL? A case study would be Burnley, who were a level above in the championship but look dire in the PL. Possession football simply doesnt work unless you incredible players that would be good in any other system.

 

The only team i can remember that played good possession football in their debut PL season was Leeds, otherwise it's teams like Wolves, Brentford etc who set up to counter the opposition rather than play their "style" that get promoted and do well in the PL. 

Incredible to think in 15/16 we showed the world how to play without the ball. But ever since we've tried to play keep ball. Our best gams since have been when we've reverted to a counter attacking side. The game that suits Vardy and would have Daka, that was wasted money.

 

The rot that's appeared since 15/16 is from top to bottom. Rodgers just accelerated it all.

 

I personally have no interest in this style we have moved to. To me it's not entertaining with the quality of players we've had or got.

 

Watching paint dry springs to mind. I'd rather go down fighting than losing with tippy tappy football.

[CosbehFox]

16 minutes ago, filbertway said:

 

Sit deep and try and restrict the opposition to low percentage chances while trying to hit them on the break when the opportunity presents itself. It's a pretty standard tactic used by underdogs in any league in the world. You're making out that Hull or Rosenior weren't expecting the game to go exactly the way it did. They'd have come into the game looking to be compact and hard to break down, which will allow shooting chances, but if you've got 8 men in the box, you're likely going to get a body in the way of a shot. Alternatively, the opposition can try their luck from 25-30 yards, which barring a worldie will likely result in you getting the ball back.

 

The concerning thing is that we are still goin to struggle against this style of tactic, the greater concern is that we also look incredibly uncomfortable when teams have the balls to press us as well.

 

It's still a new system and new way of playing so you'd expect us to improve, but nobody is wrong for saying there are clear weaknesses right now and we have to hope that the team and coaching staff are working hard to iron those weaknesses out.

 

 

Well summed up. 
 

xG model suggest we had three major chances; one blocked from Kele, one header from Casadei and when Casadei hit it over. That ain’t a bad stint from an away side playing league favourites. 
 

The fact Rosensior post match went into over drive on praise tells us that they were playing over their ability but that’s fair fcuks. Sort of performance as a Hull fan you want to see and buys a manager credit 

[LVFox]

I think until we've played 4 or 5 more we really won't know our true position. To me, its either:

 

A) We are winning games despite our attacking play not being at its best, and not having any creator or goal scorer in good form.

 

B) the tactical style doesn't suit our players and we will struggle to see anyone hit form whilst these patterns of play are so hardwired rather than allowing freedom.

 

I think it's A, but definitely fair to have questions.

[StriderHiryu]

4 hours ago, honeybradger said:

I'll be honest, i just dont think we can succeed in the long term as a club while playing possession football, in fact it is killing us.

 

Even if we destroy this division this season, what happens when we get promoted to the PL? A case study would be Burnley, who were a level above in the championship but look dire in the PL. Possession football simply doesnt work unless you incredible players that would be good in any other system.

 

The only team i can remember that played good possession football in their debut PL season was Leeds, otherwise it's teams like Wolves, Brentford etc who set up to counter the opposition rather than play their "style" that get promoted and do well in the PL. 

What about Brighton? Would you say Billy Gilmour or Pascal Gross are "incredible?"

 

Without being facetious, the debate for using tactics that won't work at the top level or with the players we have is a good one. It could definitely turn out to be the case with Maresca's current setup. But he could always change his tactics later, both Pep and Klopp have done it. Klopp even changed Liverpool's style to being way more of a possession team than when he first took over. I find it amazing that people are already fully knives out for a guy that has been here for 3 months and saw the highest player turnover the club has seen in years. If it all turns out to be crap, we will call it out in this thread, but let's give the guy some time first.

 

There's something else to consider here though, outside of tactics. And that's the club's business model. Brighton, have made the best player sales in the Premier League, taking our crown in recent years. Why do teams want their players so much? It's because of the football they play. Caceido is worth 115M (supposedly) because he's a press resistant midfielder that can tackle, pass, turn, etc. It seems to me that our entire business model as a club is to develop talent from our catchment area / sign undervalued young players, develop them into top class ones and then sell them on. Do this enough times and eventually you might not need to sell and you can make a run at trophies and / or the Champions League. That's what we did on our last "cycle". So if that is our business model, does it not make sense to play the style of football Maresca plays even if the fans hate it? That's an interesting debate to have too!

 

For what it's worth, I care about Leicester winning trophies rather than Brighton's "net spend champions" award. But in order to compete with the Chelsea's of this world, you do need to do something innovative. For me, even if Maresca is a bust in the end, I rate the club for having the balls to try it.

 

 

 

 

Edited 5 September 2023 by StriderHiryu

[messerschmitt]

2 hours ago, Lillehamring said:

The issue with the shots not being on target has nothing to do with tactics - 11 of those shots were in the box, one hit the post, seven were blocked - if allowing that sort of pressure is a tactic then it has to be the riskiest tactic ever.  There's no way Hull came into that game with rosenior saying, 'ok, it's alright if we allow them to have 21 shots, because we'll block a third of them, most of them will be poor and miss the goal, and we can always rely on the woodwork to keep out anything else.'  No way.

 

Hull did not 'restrict' us to one on target, that was the result of poor decision making and execution - given the players we have we should have hit the target far more often - we have the fifth most shots on target in the league, despite only having 1 against hull.  In fact, in every other game this season we have outscored our expected goals - Given our shooting form in the other games, rosenior would never have come up with a tactic that allowed us to have that many chances.

 

If every team from now on adopts the "tactic" of allowing us to have 21 shots then, rather than 'sink or swim' - it'll be a case of 'can we play you every week'!

 

As for the same issues - i disagree - i don't know the numbers for whether we are better or worse for giving the ball away, but what i can tell you is that our response to those situations is much much better - maresca is instilling them with a sense of cruciality when it comes to ball repossession, and this is reflected in the fact that, unlike last year, we are not giving up many chances in these situations (perhaps coventry was the worst, but that was game 1 under maresca), and certain far fewer goals.  Again, this is an area that can be improved, but until then it's not costing us because of they improvement in our response and, quite rightly, because of the quality of the opposition.  Sink or swim, or simply an area for improvement?

 

Certainly there is lots to be improved on but you open yourself up for these kind of debate battles when you use sweeping melodramatic phrases like 'sink or swim' - the suggestion that if things don't improve completely in the next (i forget what you originally said) few games we'll drown!  I mean, even if we lose the next two games, there's still a more than reasonable chance we'll be in the top 6, and having two of our toughest fixtures out of the way.

 

It really isn't as bad as you Imagine

 

 

Pretty spot on, you speak too much sense for this forum

looking OK to me so far, things should get better and before the season, there were plenty of "we could get relegated again""

[Dahnsouff]

1 hour ago, sylofox said:

Incredible to think in 15/16 we showed the world how to play without the ball. But ever since we've tried to play keep ball. Our best gams since have been when we've reverted to a counter attacking side. The game that suits Vardy and would have Daka, that was wasted money.

 

The rot that's appeared since 15/16 is from top to bottom. Rodgers just accelerated it all.

 

I personally have no interest in this style we have moved to. To me it's not entertaining with the quality of players we've had or got.

 

Watching paint dry springs to mind. I'd rather go down fighting than losing with tippy tappy football.

Just not sure how practical a counter attacking style is for us, in this league at the moment

[messerschmitt]

12 minutes ago, StriderHiryu said:

What about Brighton? Would you say Billy Gilmour or Pascal Gross are "incredible?"

 

Without being facetious, the debate for using tactics that won't work at the top level or with the players we have is a good one. It could definitely turn out to be the case with Maresca's current setup. But he could always change his tactics later, both Pep and Klopp have done it. Klopp even changed Liverpool's style to being way more of a possession team than when he first took over. I find it amazing that people are already fully knives out for a guy that has been here for 3 months and saw the highest player turnover the club has seen in years. If it all turns out to be crap, I will call it out in this thread, but let's give the guy some time first.

 

There's something else to consider here though, outside of tactics. And that's the club's business model. Brighton, have made the best player sales in the Premier League, taking our crown in recent years. Why do teams want their players so much? It's because of the football they play. Caceido is worth 115M (supposedly) because he's a press resistant midfielder that can tackle, pass, turn, etc. It seems to me that our entire business model as a club is to develop talent from our catchment area / sign undervalued young players, develop them into top class ones and then sell them on. Do this enough times and eventually you might not need to sell and you can make a run at trophies and / or the Champions League. That's what we did on our last "cycle". So if that is our business model, does it not make sense to play the style of football Maresca plays even if the fans hate it? That's an interesting debate to have too!

 

 

The "Tactics under Maresca" is easily the most sensible thread on the forum

[Dames]

31 minutes ago, Dahnsouff said:

Just not sure how practical a counter attacking style is for us, in this league at the moment

Its massively not practical but its concerning that we’re still vulnerable to it after all these years. 
 

To make this style work against counter attacking sides you need a DM who can read the game well as well at least one composed CB able to step up as well as a CB with recovery pace to cover. Our recent line ups have none of these types of players.