Stokes lost control of the ball, tried to recover the situation and ended up giving it away, Germany scored from a deflection otherwise the shot would have been saved, so yes Stokes made a mistake.
I said he made a mark, some positives, virtually his first competivive game for us and it's against Germany.
Considering that, he did well and deserves more future call ups. It's curmudgeonly to focus on what he did wrong
For the home game Id like to see wison play centre half with clark to see if we could start to develop a game where the centre halves are confident to pass the ball to allow us avoid constant hoofing from the back. Without that the midfield constantly will get the ball facing their own goal under massive pressure. Dunne and o shea have tons of experience dont see the point of them been involved and delaney did well but he does not have that technical ability and age is against him
Id like coleman to play but to sharpen up on the basics then we have a super player. Id have McClean left full. Couple of reasons kelly is just a stop gap, and O brien is a right footer converted from midfield but doing a good defensive job at the Hammers. McClean is not good enough for a wide attacking role. Could his undoubted abilities be harnessed in to a left full?If not then O brien to be rewarded for battling back from such injuries
Id have Gibson and MCcarthy as our 2 sitting midfielders. Easy because they are head and shoulders above everyone else especially gibson who was excellent last night.
Wide I would have mcgeady and stokes. I think stokes has the technical ability and bit of pace to do a good job and be creative as well as been a goal threat and offering decent defensive cover unlike doyle last nite. Mcgeady for me is made for that role great technically can keep the ball decent pace and has done well defensively.
Id have reid behind the front man just because he is getting more game time than wes but really i would be delighted with either.In the next campaign id like to think brady might grow into the role
Id have long up front. can hold it up, pace to get in behind. needs to be more disciplined. Hopefully he can be a goal threat with good delivery from likes of coleman, mcclean, stokes and mcgeady
I've felt that McClean could be a left back too.
Agree with Geysir on Stokes. I saw enough in his performance to think there's something there. The dropping volley was a poor effort, but there's no way could anyone say Keane would have buried it. The chance when he rounded Neuer was very difficult, although he scored beautifully from a not dissimilar position against Motherwell last week. He was indeed onside that time. I joked with Paul O'Shea at the time that it was preceded by the best passage of play we had put together in 2 years.
I thought McCarthy was anonymous but maybe that was the drink, and Paul O 'Shea's company.
If you compare that to the Spanish mauling in Gdansk I'd say it was a notable improvement. Then we barely got into their half and had only one timid shot on goal all night. Yes, we were way inferior to Germany but we created far more than we did in Gdansk and also than in Stockholm and Austria, both nowhere near Germany's quality.
Let's hope for more a attack-minded selection on Tuesday and then we'll debate the ins and outs after that game.
I am not sure about McClean at full-back, he gives the team something different as an attacking player wide-midfield. He also always works hard helping out the defence. Gibson I think was the player who showed most passing ability last night. Sad to say that McCarthy had a poor match, can anyone justify selecting him ahead of G Whelan in midfield? It is good that people are getting a chance; so no complaints about Stokes last night, but we need to be honest as well and if he expects to start as a regular striker he should have scored last night. Planing to go to the game tuesday so hope King gives a few other players a start. Also Clark has to be one of the C/Bs from now on.
Yep, Clark is looking far more mature than last year and I think still has some improving in him.
Less of the doom and gloom lads.
Last night was a huge improvement on Trapp's team which played Germany not long ago and got destroyed, conceding twice as many goals.. at home.
Long way to go obviously, but all in all a positive result.
Well done Noel King!
I'm so glad Ardee Bhoy introduced me to this website
http://waterfordwhispersnews.com/201...ttoni-already/
Anyway, despite King's GUBU selection I'm upbeat. I gave Trap the benefit of the doubt for four years. I'll at least do the same for Kinger for four days.
How about a Roy Evans style 3-5-2 with McGeady in the McManaman role and Coleman/McClean as Wingbacks...
Nobody is saying it is a positive result.
What we are saying is there are positives to be taken.
We got destroyed last night but at least we played more football than we have in the past 5 years and tried to play the game.
We created more chances last night than we had against Sweden and Austria combined.
Stokes looked bright, Clark did well, Forde had a stormer. So there are positives. A bad result but a better performance than we have been used to
Folding my way into the big money!!!
Actually i have to say I thought Delaney did well too in his first competitive international
Folding my way into the big money!!!
Volleying air is a Robbie Keane trademark, not sure he would have put away that ball that came off the bar any better than Stokes did.
As for the Stokes chance one-on-one against Neuer, if Robbie Keane was so good at putting those away at ease then he'd have done so against Lloris in Paris, we'd have gone to South Africa, and the Thierry handball would never have happened.
He's a great finisher, Robbie Keane, but let's not assign him mythical qualities.
Last edited by brine3; 12/10/2013 at 2:49 PM.
Yep, Clark isn't great. He passes a ball straight to an onrushing midfielder at least once in every match. Did it in Sweden, did it in Dublin against Austria and did it last night.
We desperately need a brilliant young centre-back. For now I'd play Marc Wilson there.
At least Wilson's mistakes are made under pressure. Clark's can happen when he's not under pressure at all and are mostly due to brain farts.
He was in a difficult spot for the first goal he was being closed down and didn't really have a safe outlet you have to give credit to Germany there. Also perhaps we could have realised this and remained more defensive but we were trying to break.
And it was a bad decision by the linesman, which was all we needed when we were already out classed.
Maybe we should have hoofed earlier, there is a time to hoof.
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