What are we lacking ?

[colinwhite]

Really annoyed after saturdays defeat and of course we are conceding give away goals. Parker may be inept or whatever but the thing we lack (and had under Jokanovic) was genuine PACE ,in our side. Im not talking players that are nippy or quick . Im talking about pace and mobillity which Fredricks and sessegnon gave us.
Our best 2 players Mitro and Cairney are slow ,which probably wouldnt matter as much if we had the option of players with genuine pace around them . Cavelero and Knockheart are both quick but dont beat a man with out putting the brakes on our play.

[Whitesideup]

Colin - good post, and I agree .. well, partly. Both Kaz and Knockaert have good pace on the ball, and Kamara as well  (if little guile). I hope Bobby Reid gets back to full fitness as he has both pace and guile. I love watching him getting the ball. His first touch is generally so good, and he gets forward to help Mitro.

But the big difference between Joka's team was the attacking threat of the full-backs and Fredericks in particular. And we didn't play with out and out wingers, so it was quite a different way of playing. And Colin, you are right. Don't think we have that option, though Denis can get forward ...clearly not for the next two games, mind. Christie is powerful, and strong, and probably has good pace, but does not carry the same threat and ball delivery not the greatest. Bryan? Does try but does not have blistering pace, and generally has Kav occupying the space ahead of him.

[MJG]

Its not pace as in physical pace we are missing, its speed of thought and seed of play. You can still have a slow bunch pf players but knock the ball around quickly.

[toshes mate]

Pace is nothing without artifice and intent.  Even the fastest runners have a style that gets them to where they want to be efficiently and effectively, suggesting they have copious grey matter to go with the muscles elsewhere.  Speed of thought, confidence in ability, ball skills, and a team shape and style that makes good use of those essentials is what teams should reach for.  It helps if a coach has experience of using these abilities in match play at the highest level, but it also helps if a coach has a fail safe plan for improving these attributes in training.

[One Martin Thomas]

If I started a post "what are we not lacking" it would be easier to answer !

[bog]

Slavisa Jokanovic.


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[grandad]

What pace we do have is cancelled out by our slow playing out from the back. By the time we do advance into the other half the opposition have 11 behind the ball. Our wingers are stifled with no space to attack. Everything then comes to a halt until we eventually lose the ball & the oppo have lots of space to make a break away down our empty flanks as we have pushed up our backs.

[Statto]

Parker has as much pace at his disposal as Jokanovic had. Parker just doesn't utilise it. Our two fastest players under Jokanovic, Fredericks and Sessegnon, would have been absolutely dire as inverted full-backs or wingers in Parker's system.

[Sgt Fulham]

Slavisa Jokanovic.


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:plus one:

[Whitestone]

The style of play that Scott Parker is enforcing on the players is the biggest issue IMO. It is soooo slow and ponderous. There's no excitement in our play. We need to move the ball quicker. We rarely catch teams on the counter. By the time we make the final third we rarely outnumber the opposition who more often than not have two banks of four which we struggle to break down as we look for the perfect goal.

Other than the Millwall game I can't think of another enjoyable game where we played well throughout the 90 minutes.  We have a decent squad who are underachieving. The football being dished up is so dull and predictable. Personally I hold the manager accountable. The tactics are his and he seems reluctant to change the style of play which will ultimately cost him his job because as it stands he's nowhere near achieving the target he was set. I feel sure that the manager isn't getting the best out of the squad.

[bill taylors apprentice]

Its not pace as in physical pace we are missing, its speed of thought and seed of play. You can still have a slow bunch pf players but knock the ball around quickly.

Bingo!
That's the problem sussed in a few simple words.
I wonder why we can see it and the HC doesn't?

[filham]

What pace we do have is cancelled out by our slow playing out from the back. By the time we do advance into the other half the opposition have 11 behind the ball. Our wingers are stifled with no space to attack. Everything then comes to a halt until we eventually lose the ball & the oppo have lots of space to make a break away down our empty flanks as we have pushed up our backs.

That is exactly how I see it. Cav and Kamara are not carthorses but to give them a chance to show their pace we really have to get early balls to them while they have some space to attack.

[colinwhite]

Its not pace as in physical pace we are missing, its speed of thought and seed of play. You can still have a slow bunch pf players but knock the ball around quickly.

Sorry just a bit of a grumpy post by me where i didnt explain myself too well. Of course we move the ball too slowly etc ,agree with just about all the comments made by people. BUT we have no pace on the counter when we transition into either attack or defence. Our team of 2 seasons ago could really threaten teams on the counter,and cover up mistakes with the abillity to quickly get back.
Added to this is that our dominant players on the ball have no pace and we dont threaten teams in behind. This means tteams have little  fear of us when they press us high if we play out of their press.
Its no coincidance that  in our best performance of late against Derby,reid played the runner with 2 deep lying play-makers behind him ,while Kamaras directness complemented Cavalerios guile.

[colinwhite]

As for the idea that pace doesnt matter too much ,simply not true . Real pace stretches teams and creates fear and uncertainty in their ranks.
Whilst Im in the moaning  mode, our main strengths are also our biggest weaknesses. ????
Mitro is an excellent finsher,box player ,and hold/link up player. But he provides no threat in behind ,paricularly on the counter,which considerably restricts our abillity to mix up our play,and allows teams to squeeze the space high when they press us. Tc is fantastic on the ball but not fast or mobile and cant tackle.This means if  we are to get the best out of him we have to play 3 players centrally. For me, he doesnt work in the number 10 role, hes much better picking up the ball of our back 4.Ream is great in possession but not the physical defender we need on occasions, Cavalero is great one on one withe ball but poor defensively, and so on.

[Forever Fulham]

We need quickness when it matters.  And a manager that can get the best teamwork out of a team of individuals.  Jokanovic.   He didn't have time to get that teamwork element right when we got promoted.  We should have stuck with him.  We need a proper defensive mid, especially if we don't have speedy backs who will commit to transitioning back fast on the counter.  Denis has foot speed but I don't know what's going on in his brain sometimes.  Ream is not fast, not that tall, is what, 158'?  But the rest of his game is normally really quality, so we can work with him in the back.  But he needs the right partner.  And Mawson--what does he do well?  I'd give Christie more game time.  The raw materials are there.  We need about three new faces at the break and maybe under Parker we can make the playoffs, just barely.  As long as Scott is our manager, I don't hold out much hope for anything better than a midtable finish.  Under Slava, we got the ball forward quickly and off to the races we went!  Creating opportunities through chaos.  Not anymore. 

[Matt10]

Not once in the Brentford match did we play slow between Ream and Mawson. If anything, we played the fastest I've seen. The change in strategy in the first 15 minutes of the second half were where we needed to stay. We stopped sending in crosses to 1 man Mitro, and started to recycle to the top of the box where we got 3 shots, 1 that included a shot from Christie in the tucked in FB role that we used to do earlier in the season with SSess.

Thie issue that I see is that we pressure too high and too fast, forcing our positions to be overcommitted and reliant on perfect execution by that individual player. Christie did well to put the early pressure, and even fouled to stop Brentford's momentum. Bryan did the same until he was yellow-carded.

The main difference between our chance creation, and the opponents we've faced, is that when the ball is still in our own half, we choose to play ground passes in tight spots, while the opposition has no problem sending long balls down the sides. The ball down the sides is effective to start a high pressure (pressure from the front) versus what we currently deal with is high pressure from the back (defensive line forced to pressure, and midfielders drop back). I think if we took this same approach as our opposition, we'd be able to take a bit more advantage of our players abilities and keep the opposition on their toes.

The question I have is if Parker will modify his methods to do so, which I am not 100% he will. Overall though, I do not think it is going to take an entire reset button approach to get us back on the right track.   

[The Rational Fan]

Fredericks, Odoi, R.Sessegnon and Stefjo have pace getting back. Betts, Ream, KMac, Cairney and Mitro were the immobile spine with the other six players being fantastic B2B runners forwards and BACKWARDS.

[colinwhite]

Matt ,I havent watched the game back but my impression is that just about all of their dangerous attacks against brentford came from us losing the ball in their final third through bad decision making,trying to force the issue,or simply poor passing. They then turned us over quickly and we didnt recover in transition quickly enough. Basic stuff which happens when your low on confidence and every mistake compounds the situation and makes you less willing to take a risk next time.
We transiton to attack slowly and often with a square ball,particularly from our back line and this is in part due to the lack of real pace in our forward players. Have have quickness ,but our lack of mobillity and pace to get in behind from deeper positions as an option ,makes it easier for teams to press us high without fear,making us a bit of a one trick pony in attack.In Kamara sfirst 2games this issue seemed to find some resolution particularly whe Bobby Reid was playing in the offensive midfield position as a free runner.

[Matt10]

Matt ,I havent watched the game back but my impression is that just about all of their dangerous attacks against brentford came from us losing the ball in their final third through bad decision making,trying to force the issue,or simply poor passing. They then turned us over quickly and we didnt recover in transition quickly enough. Basic stuff which happens when your low on confidence and every mistake compounds the situation and makes you less willing to take a risk next time.
We transiton to attack slowly and often with a square ball,particularly from our back line and this is in part due to the lack of real pace in our forward players. Have have quickness ,but our lack of mobillity and pace to get in behind from deeper positions as an option ,makes it easier for teams to press us high without fear,making us a bit of a one trick pony in attack.In Kamara sfirst 2games this issue seemed to find some resolution particularly whe Bobby Reid was playing in the offensive midfield position as a free runner.

Yes, that's right. When we were in advanced positions, we didn't build up slowly at all, we actually sent forward passes multiple times, but Mitro was so far isolated, that the only thing we could do to truly build numbers was to find central passes - that would be off the mark unfortunately. At certain times as well, Cav tried to switch the point attack to Kebano, but each pass was under-hit and thus intercepted.

People used to call Schurrle lazy and uninterested in defending. While his defending prowess was not great, he was clearly instructed by Ranieri to stay up the pitch to be an outlet for counter attacks. In Parker's system, we drop everyone back, and leave Mitro in the centre-circle. This means we only have 1 outlet, who is already isolated. So any forward pass we make has to mean that Mitro needs to go side to side to get past the passing lane of the defensive midfielder and the centre-back who's on him like glue. In the second half, it was more apparent that Parker wanted Cavaleiro to stay up just a bit more so he could be an outlet, because we just could not get the ball to Mitro.

To be honest, Brentford's attacks were taking advantage of our attempts to build numbers, but not able to find Mitro. Their scoring chances were a mix of luck in 50/50 balls and penetrating runs by Benrhama and Jensen. They took advantage of our midfielders pushing more advanced, and our high defensive line where they could be advantageous in multiple 3 v 2 situations.

I know our back line passing is frustrating for supporters, but it's not used just for the sake of it. It's used to pull players out of position, so we can create triangles in those gaps. There's frustration with Parker's tactics, I get that, but these tactics were not a slow play. We moved the ball very fast, and we made Brentford work very hard. Brentford's CBs played from the back equally, if not slightly more, than we did. The difference is that they hoofed the ball down the sides more often when pressure was felt.

Pace is one thing, but pace isn't seen because we don't make streaking runs off the ball. We check to the ball with our wingers, and let the FBs to be there to play a point in the triangle. This widens up our area of play, instead of forcing overlaps that would narrow one side of play. It's a possession based tactic, one that I think is misunderstood and results in thinking we are playing slowly or have no pace. If we did try streaking runs off the ball, I do not think pace in getting behind teams would be the issue. We simply do not see that in Parker's tactics.

When his tactics are criticized in how we attack, I would tend to agree because it is relative to the mentality it's placed on our players. This can be seen multiple times in the match where a through ball to Cavaleiro, could be played by Cairney multiple times, but Cairney opts to pass square. Onomah is also guilty of it. The exceptions are Johansen, but even then his switch of play, or long balls, are more square. As I mentioned earlier, you could see Cavaleiro try to force those through balls to Kebano, but they are low percentage completions - which is not what Parker's system is about. 

My hope is that Parker allows the boys a bit more freedom by releasing one or two of those runs, and doesn't put as high pressure for our defensive line to confront the opponent so quickly. I do not want to see Ranieri levels of low depth in the line, but it's clear that we are second favorites in 50/50 ball situations, and need to ensure there is enough cover if the first ball cannot be recovered.

[Bassey the warrior]

Lacking enough goal threats. We are too defensive and don't pose enough of a threat going forward. Lacking a bit of creativity and pace. In defence Hector will help but he'll take time to get match fit.