You'd hope James McCarthy will have a full preseason behind him in September
You'd hope James McCarthy will have a full preseason behind him in September
Well the only way hourihane gets in the villa team is as a sitting midfielder an horing a midfield three with McGinn and grealish ahead of him. He kept Whelan, jedinak and byarnasson out of the villa team in playoff final all of whom are experienced holding midfielders st international level and world cup level in bjsrnsson and jedinak. .
https://www.offtheball.com/soccer/na...coleman-868638
It's so difficult that Doherty can't get in the team. The fact it's a gent like Coleman keeping him out makes it easier. And the fact that he had an absolutely cracking game yesterday adds to the easiness.
There's talk of playing Hourihane in a more defensive role.
Denmark have probably reached their upper level, they might play a bit better or bit worse. We have the scope to improve especially in 3 or 4 positions in midfield, though not many options upfront.
As well as Mick did to prepare the team for the Denmark game, you get the feeling he's not that interested in change, he'll be encouraged by the first 60 mins, the last 5 minutes and stand by the present incumbents.
Thats one of my gripes from his first stint in charge and these peculiar selections or misselections that he has end up costing us, which it did in some of the qualifications first time around. He always insists stubbornly on one or two players who shouldn't be near the team.
I also agree with Fixer we could have been 3-0 down at that point just like the home game, Eriksen pointing out that they weren't sharp enough. That's the crux of it.
Keogh was caught flat footed cos he had to change direction as he saw the ball and player come in. You stop things at source, stop the run, block the runner, get in front. Nothing more nothing less.
The game was interesting because we were more open, so it was much more entertaining than a MON game even if we couldn't hold onto the ball, but we didnt play any better in the last few minutes it was simply that we actually realised we needed to score and therefore pushed forward, previously it appeared we were happy for them to keep banging them wide and over the bar.
Been saying a long time now about Hendrick, and his position, a bit like McClean living off past glories or the odd goal here and there. I call it the delorean showreel. Pick out 3-5 minutes of about 500 mins of football and you can make anyone seem good and valuable. O'Dowda is certainly not our answer to the retaining possession, he hits it about 3 feet in front of him and against decent opposition that doesn't and hasnt cut the mustard. Next.
I'm a bloke,I'm an ocker
And I really love your knockers,I'm a labourer by day,
I **** up all me pay,Watching footy on TV,
Just feed me more VB,Just pour my beer,And get my smokes, And go away
Last time I remember us needing to score against Denmark they picked us off at will.
Silly to say they could have been 3 up. They had 3 or 4 chances. Had one gone in the game may well have have changed and we'd have woken up. After we scored we actually kept on the attack. I think our players sensed the momentum had changed. I loved seeing that.
Paul's a great one for saying what doesn't work. I'm not sure I've ever heard him say what does work.
In general, I was quite relaxed during the first half. They had no more of the ball than I would have expected or that I would have been uncomfortable with. We had a terrible 10-15 mins in the second half, no disguising that. But we actually had 3-4 good chances to score. We didn't even get in their box 18 months ago! And we had a lot of nervous moments in the first 0-0 too.
Much better showing on Friday in my opinion.
Last edited by Stuttgart88; 10/06/2019 at 12:50 PM.
There's a line from the beginning of Fight Club that I think of when Paul makes one of his pronouncements - "On a long enough time line, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero." (ie eventually, everyone dies)
Paul will make a prediction about a player, say that a defender looks like he'll eventually give away a penalty. Then, eventually, the player gives away a penalty, and Paul points to his post and says "see, I was right, and nobody else said it would happen". The thing is that most, if not all, defenders will eventually give away a penalty, so he might as well have said "he looks like he'll eventually pass to the goalkeeper" in terms of its insight, because eventually every defender will pass back to the goalkeeper, and nobody else said it would happen because we all know eventually it will happen, and we all know that each of us have watched football long enough to realise this.
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