Our latest Ukranian holiday

[HatterDon]

Is there anyone who actually got all 90+ minutes on television? I mean,without buffering and being kicked off and being shunted onto the Spurs match? Is there a FofFer among the 63 Fulham supporters who made the trek? [That's the number I heard "on the radio."]

If so, could they please pass along their assessment of how we looked tonight? I finally gave up and got the radio link to Rufus and his hyper sidekick, so I know the facts, and the sequences, but not the details. Speaking of Rufus's partner in crime, he kept saying "Fulham fans can't quite relax yet," as if it were the truth. Hell we wrapped up the tie before we left home. We could have put out a lineup of scrubs and still hung on. Why we DIDN'T do that -- why we got our main guys tired and, in one case, injured in a match that we didn't really need to go all out for is the subject of another thread. For this one, could someone who saw the whole thing, tell us how we looked?

[ImperialWhite]

I saw very little of the first half hour, but from half time I saw it all in a good quality stream.

I agreed with you before the match started, HD, regarding sending out a first XI, but we were poor enough that had we sent out a much weaker squad then it is entirely plausible that we could have been knocked out. Even with our full squad, if Dnipro hadn't been so wasteful with their chances they could have nicked a couple more goals.

The pitch was as awful as the radio implied, but I'm not sure that's the whole answer. Passing was poor (even, again, from the usually excellent passer, Murphy). Our forwards were isolated, so we had no outlet for the ball going forwards - watching AJ trying to hold up a ball (or even worse win an aerial one) was as frustrating as it was against Wolves.

And Kasami really should have scored that. Would have saved us a few minutes of grief!

The Ukraine TV station had it as 23 shots to 2, but the BBC (who are presumably more reliable) had it as 21 to 12. Either way, it's not good conceding more than 20 shots, even if many of them were shots from outside the box and we were intending to soak up pressure anyway.

Beyond the excitement of looking forward to the group stages, not impressed.

[HatterDon]

Well, since apparently nobody saw all the 90 minutes on FB, it's going to be difficult to determine exactly how we looked.

Perhaps there'll be someone of the 63 road warriors who can give us an accurate assessment.

[richie17]

Agree with above, we'd have been buried with a reserve team.  Watched the last hour and an hour inside your own penalty area is not the best.  If that's inaccurate then that's inaccurate but I suspect not.

[TonyGilroy]

I got nothing for half an hour and then a very good stream.

We were organised enough and defended well. There were no heroics from Schwarzer and whilst Dnipro could have scored they'd have needed to play better. We coped with them. Job done.

It just looks horribly slow, tired and predictable to me. Fresh legs urgently needed and then we must be patient and give them time to bed in.

This squad, unstrengthened, will be very lucky not to be relegated.

[MJG]

I got nothing for half an hour and then a very good stream.

We were organised enough and defended well. There were no heroics from Schwarzer and whilst Dnipro could have scored they'd have needed to play better. We coped with them. Job done.

It just looks horribly slow, tired and predictable to me. Fresh legs urgently needed and then we must be patient and give them time to bed in.

This squad, unstrengthened, will be very lucky not to be relegated.

I would disagree with the Schwazer remark, I thought he was everywhere last night stopping things ( i also think he had a couple of mare moments as well) and made some very good saves.
As for organised, I would disagree with that as well, too much last ditch tackles and not enough holding them up, keeping our shape, I mean we gave them over 20 shots at goal.

Back to the main point, I watched all the second half and possibly saw about 25 minutes of the first half.The pitch was poor, our passing was off until the last 15 minutes, AJ ran around like a schoolboy on his first day of term in a playground, Dembele did not do much. It was almost 6 midfielders for much of the game.

I would agree with TG about how slow we look, I must have watched between 5-10 live games in the last week and we are by far the slowest team around, we have no energy or pace, it will be our downfall if its not addressed. You can get away with it in a team setup like Roy had, but the fluid(nice way of saying a mess) way we are playing its not looking good.

[Holders]

Overall, Dnipro were unlucky not to go through. Going forward they were good both games. If they could have finished we'd be out. And what was Brede doing for their goal?

[TonyGilroy]

Schwarzer was certainly busy and made saves. He's a good keeper and played well as ever but didn't need to do anything extraordinary.

And for all Dnipro's pressure our defence did what it needed to do. Open goals weren't missed. The ball didn't keep hitting the post, good goals weren't disallowed. Dnipro weren't unlucky.

A team is entitled to defend and we did it well enough yesterday.

The problems are our inability to get forward or do anything quickly or with an element of surprise.

[Vinnieffc]

We've lost 2 in a row. The end is nigh. Hughes out.  Get Coat gif

[AlFayedsChequebook]

Without Bobby we had no way of leading any kind of counter attack/relieving pressure on the defence.

If we had gone out with a reserve side, we would have been smashed, especially due to the conditions and the fact that any reserve side would have had 0 minutes playing time together.

[The Equalizer]

I know two people who are out there, and one who attempted to get out there but was stopped at the border...  064.gif

[Mr_Moon]

Just back.

We were useless but who cares! Krakow here we come!!!