View from a Wimbledon Fan

[Animis]

21 minutes ago, marshy said:

I disagree slightly there. It’s not that we haven’t won. Although I grant you there is an element who think we should steamroll everyone we play. 
 

Many cases are derived from our seemingly lack of ability to hang onto leads, and like Saturday just throw them away. It leads to frustration and lashing out because time after time it simply repeats itself. 
 

We’ have no God given right to beat sides, but no one can tell me that at 2  nil,  most sides would not go on to win.

 

I actually told my lad at 2 nil we could end up drawing, or worse loose it. 
 

I wonder what the odds were for the draw at 2-0. Might have to start looking.

 

As one of our esteemed former managers called it, 'a nightmare lead' - it's been a defeatist attitude and culture for 20 odd years.

[Johnny Concrete]

10 minutes ago, marshy said:

I disagree slightly there. It’s not that we haven’t won. Although I grant you there is an element who think we should steamroll everyone we play. 
 

Many cases are derived from our seemingly lack of ability to hang onto leads, and like Saturday just throw them away. It leads to frustration and lashing out because time after time it simply repeats itself. 
 

We’ have no God given right to beat sides, but no one can tell me that at 2  nil,  most sides would not go on to win.

 

I actually told my lad at 2 nil we could end up drawing, or worse loose it. 
 

I wonder what the odds were for the draw at 2-0. Might have to start looking.

 

I'll tell you what they were mate, I stuck a fiver on Bet365 in play at 14/1, minutes after we scored the second. Unfortunately you could just see what was going to happen.

[Roy Of The Roasters]

33 minutes ago, N0rtherner said:

 

I think people have just got to the point they moan about poor performances and being disappointed with lost points, etc. and honestly that's fair. But we've come away from Wimbledon by going to joint 6th and this alleged weak defence have conceded 3rd least goals in the league... Our biggest weakness I would say is midfield and offense squandering far too many chances to bury games. Watching so many of these games where we hang on to a nailbiting one goal lead and set ourselves up for a sucker punch towards the end, and in several games we should have been finished with the game after 60 minutes and being 3-4 goals up.

 

Gregory is starting to get there, getting himself in position and "scoring at will".. but the others like Paterson, Berahino, Adeniran, etc. need to calm down and be cooler and more clinical in their finishing.

 

Good post.

 

I get weary at times of the expectations of some of our fans. The meltdown starts at about 3:02 PM most Saturdays. It seems that unless we're playing the opposition off the park and winning by a couple of goals in the first 10 minutes then it's an outrage. When will people understand that we're in L1 on merit, having just been relegated after an absolute shocker of a season both on and off the pitch, and having had to recruit a significant number of new players.

 

There was a real concern going into this season that we would struggle. That the trapdoor might open. And yet here we are, a quarter of the way into the season, only outside the playoffs on goal difference, only lost once in five, third tightest defence in the league. And there's room for improvement. While the jury is out on DMs ability to deliver that improvement, there are enough positives to justify giving him more time to do so.

[Sham67]

53 minutes ago, marshy said:

I disagree slightly there. It’s not that we haven’t won. Although I grant you there is an element who think we should steamroll everyone we play. 
 

Many cases are derived from our seemingly lack of ability to hang onto leads, and like Saturday just throw them away. It leads to frustration and lashing out because time after time it simply repeats itself. 
 

We’ have no God given right to beat sides, but no one can tell me that at 2  nil,  most sides would not go on to win.

 

I actually told my lad at 2 nil we could end up drawing, or worse loose it. 
 

I wonder what the odds were for the draw at 2-0. Might have to start looking.

Without having to give more than two seconds thought. I can think of 2 other teams giving away 2-0 leads on Saturday. One of 2-0 up at home with ten minutes to go that ended up losing.

 I suppose that I’m making is that it happens every week.

[dumboldowl]

1 hour ago, Southie_Owl said:

It’s been frustrating supporting Wednesday for 28 years now.  Nice that it’s not changing anytime soon.  

 

Make that 62 and I agree completely.  Except that it's even more frustrating nowadays. 

[marshy]

2 minutes ago, Sham67 said:

Without having to give more than two seconds thought. I can think of 2 other teams giving away 2-0 leads on Saturday. One of 2-0 up at home with ten minutes to go that ended up losing.

 I suppose that I’m making is that it happens every week.

Absolutely it does, and I wouldn’t dispute that. Up and down the land at 80 mins plus.  What I would suggest is that those sides don’t do it as frequently as we do. And that is what becomes so frustrating. 

[Ian]

2 hours ago, N0rtherner said:

 

I think people have just got to the point they moan about poor performances and being disappointed with lost points, etc. and honestly that's fair. But we've come away from Wimbledon by going to joint 6th 

7th is not joint 6th….it’s 7th

 

with more than a quarter of the season gone we are outside the play off places and even those would be the lowest expectation of the most pessimistic Wednesday fan. The top 5 are starting to pull away

[Sham67]

48 minutes ago, marshy said:

Absolutely it does, and I wouldn’t dispute that. Up and down the land at 80 mins plus.  What I would suggest is that those sides don’t do it as frequently as we do. And that is what becomes so frustrating. 

Just had a quick check on Saturday’s PL & EFL results. Four teams held 2-0 leads and none of them won. Giving a win completion rate of 0%. We have led 2-0 three times this season and won 2 out of 3. So going on that non-scientific survey, we seem to be outperforming the norm.

[scilly owl]

You wouldn’t think that our manager used to be a defender would you.

[Adem Poric]

On the day it feels completely unacceptable that we can chuck away a 2-0 lead against a team wo are obviously not as good as us. We all know how strong that squad is on paper so the frustration when we throw away points is high. Knowing we should be challenging the top two and we currently aren't is annoying. 

 

Then you go away and think about it a bit and realise we are 7 points off the top two without playing well for 90 minutes of any game and still have 34 games to play.

 

I want to see more positivity in how the team is set up and definitely more consistency in selection but i'm not panicking yet. We have time.

[adelphi1867]

2 hours ago, N0rtherner said:

 

I think people have just got to the point they moan about poor performances and being disappointed with lost points, etc. and honestly that's fair. But we've come away from Wimbledon by going to joint 6th and this alleged weak defence have conceded 3rd least goals in the league... Our biggest weakness I would say is midfield and offense squandering far too many chances to bury games. Watching so many of these games where we hang on to a nailbiting one goal lead and set ourselves up for a sucker punch towards the end, and in several games we should have been finished with the game after 60 minutes and being 3-4 goals up.

 

Gregory is starting to get there, getting himself in position and "scoring at will".. but the others like Paterson, Berahino, Adeniran, etc. need to calm down and be cooler and more clinical in their finishing.

Too true.

I can just see the poster's on here on Saturday, being down when we went 2-0 up, and being over joyed by the 2nd Womble's goal, cos they could have a go.

[room0035]

13 hours ago, Bez said:

Had a pint with a colleague of mine who supports Wimbledon.  
 

He said we were the best team they have played this season and we were a constant threat - they haven’t been undone as much by anyone as much as we did.  
 

Said we couldn’t finish them off and wasted tons of chances. 
 

He thought Bannan and Gregory were too good for this league and we used Hunt well. 
 

Also said that we were really disorganised at the back and it was clear that his team were targeting our LB (Brown).  
 

He said our centre backs were very poor with the ball and looked like bambi on ice…

 

He couldn’t believe we didn’t shut up shop towards the end.  Felt like we wanted to score a third but that left us exposed for them to equalise.  Apparently Wimbledon have really struggled against teams who go defensive so thinks we threw away the win. 

You mean like a team playing a 3-5-2 when you only have 2 fit centre backs, but you have 3 or 4 players who can play full back.

 

Common sense or any manager win a bit of ability of working with what he have, would have played a 4-4-2 or a 4-3-3 with two fit centre backs and two full backs. 

 

But not Darren, then he likes us to play out from the back, or as Wimbledon and the other teams we have played call it set up chances for the other team.

 

Good luck to Wimbledon though where they have come from in the last 10 years is a real credit to them, formed in 2002 in 19, 6 promotions in 13 seasons. They are the first club formed since 2000 to make the football league, they know their club and play to their strengths, the also entertain their fans 40 goals in 12 games involving their team, they also don't charge as much as us even though they are based in London, they give youth a chance and young managers coming into the game.

 

They will only get better as they progress.

 

[marshy]

28 minutes ago, Sham67 said:

Just had a quick check on Saturday’s PL & EFL results. Four teams held 2-0 leads and none of them won. Giving a win completion rate of 0%. We have led 2-0 three times this season and won 2 out of 3. So going on that non-scientific survey, we seem to be outperforming the norm.

As I said I’m not doubting it does happen. I just struggle with the frequency of how often it happens to us. How many points dropped is it from winning positions in the last few years?

 

Not doubting it happens to a degree up and down the land, but in our case it’s as if we get our share plus a few others. 
we must be mentally stronger and be able to see games out. What’s the answer.  Goodness only knows. 

[room0035]

10 minutes ago, Adem Poric said:

On the day it feels completely unacceptable that we can chuck away a 2-0 lead against a team wo are obviously not as good as us. We all know how strong that squad is on paper so the frustration when we throw away points is high. Knowing we should be challenging the top two and we currently aren't is annoying. 

 

Then you go away and think about it a bit and realise we are 7 points off the top two without playing well for 90 minutes of any game and still have 34 games to play.

 

I want to see more positivity in how the team is set up and definitely more consistency in selection but i'm not panicking yet. We have time.

The problem is we have 3 times in the last 6 games throw away 2 points, Ipswich, Shrewsbury and now Wimbledon.

 

The problems are all there to see, we have very little going forward other than the strikers scoring 1 in 5 or 6 chances, we waste too many chances, we have no goals in midfield, we have defenders and midfielders playing out of position when we have more than a big enough squad to cover injures when formations are correct to the players we have.

 

I mean what sort of plonker, plays a 3-5-2 when you only have 2 fit centre backs, but then does not call any players up from the under 23's as cover if needed, we had no defenders on the bench on Saturday but 4 wingers but not on the pitch, the youth team players are allowed to come into the first team if we have injuries or what is the point in having them.

 

We have loan players who never play, why did we waste money on Kamberi, Corbeanu and Shodipo when they get little to no game time, Shodipo scored more goals than any player in our squad last season yet cannot make the team ahead of Brown who so far in his profession career 1 goal in 40+ senior appearances.

 

There are so many issues but the big one is simple play a formation for the players you have, if you are playing with wide men pick them and if you are playing more than 1 striker up front play strikers there not midfielders, this did not work with Gary Monk, we got relegated and scored no goals. 

[Tewkesbury]

4 minutes ago, room0035 said:

You mean like a team playing a 3-5-2 when you only have 2 fit centre backs, but you have 3 or 4 players who can play full back.

 

Common sense or any manager win a bit of ability of working with what he have, would have played a 4-4-2 or a 4-3-3 with two fit centre backs and two full backs. 

 

But not Darren, then he likes us to play out from the back, or as Wimbledon and the other teams we have played call it set up chances for the other team.

 

Good luck to Wimbledon though where they have come from in the last 10 years is a real credit to them, formed in 2002 in 19, 6 promotions in 13 seasons. They are the first club formed since 2000 to make the football league, they know their club and play to their strengths, the also entertain their fans 40 goals in 12 games involving their team, they also don't charge as much as us even though they are based in London, they give youth a chance and young managers coming into the game.

 

They will only get better as they progress.

 

He doesn't have a choice with the formation.

Our midfield is based on 2 holding with 1 in front of them. That's what all of the playing Wing and Bannan out of position all season has been about. That's not going to change.

Gregory can't play alone in the middle, so we need Pato up there with him as a ball winner and to harry the defence.

That leaves us with 352, 532 or 424. Our fullbacks aren't good enough for 424, so it's 352 with wingbacks.

 

We've not conceded playing it from the back yet, and we have the 3rd best defence in the league. The fullbacks and centre backs aren't the problem.

 

Maybe we should be looking at the 19th best attack for where the issues lie.

 

 

[Sham67]

10 minutes ago, marshy said:

As I said I’m not doubting it does happen. I just struggle with the frequency of how often it happens to us. How many points dropped is it from winning positions in the last few years?

 

Not doubting it happens to a degree up and down the land, but in our case it’s as if we get our share plus a few others. 
we must be mentally stronger and be able to see games out. What’s the answer.  Goodness only knows. 

I was referring specifically to losing 2-0 leads. If you want to broaden the debate to try and win some kind of internet points. Knock yourself out, I’ll not be responding.

[room0035]

45 minutes ago, Sham67 said:

Just had a quick check on Saturday’s PL & EFL results. Four teams held 2-0 leads and none of them won. Giving a win completion rate of 0%. We have led 2-0 three times this season and won 2 out of 3. So going on that non-scientific survey, we seem to be outperforming the norm.

The other team we have played this season when the other team has scored, we have failed to win 6 of 7 games in the league, the only time we won was away to Wigan.

 

Kind of shows there is a lack of leadership on the pitch and possible some mental fragility issues.

[Earlsfieldowl]

3 hours ago, areNOTwhatTHEYseem said:

 

Pulis is still available, I suppose.

Bruce probably will be quite soon 

[Sham67]

1 minute ago, room0035 said:

The other team we have played this season when the other team has scored, we have failed to win 6 of 7 games in the league, the only time we won was away to Wigan.

 

Kind of shows there is a lack of leadership on the pitch and possible some mental fragility issues.

See my response above.

[Tewkesbury]

2 minutes ago, room0035 said:

The problem is we have 3 times in the last 6 games throw away 2 points, Ipswich, Shrewsbury and now Wimbledon.

 

The problems are all there to see, we have very little going forward other than the strikers scoring 1 in 5 or 6 chances, we waste too many chances, we have no goals in midfield, we have defenders and midfielders playing out of position when we have more than a big enough squad to cover injures when formations are correct to the players we have.

 

I mean what sort of plonker, plays a 3-5-2 when you only have 2 fit centre backs, but then does not call any players up from the under 23's as cover if needed, we had no defenders on the bench on Saturday but 4 wingers but not on the pitch, the youth team players are allowed to come into the first team if we have injuries or what is the point in having them.

 

We have loan players who never play, why did we waste money on Kamberi, Corbeanu and Shodipo when they get little to no game time, Shodipo scored more goals than any player in our squad last season yet cannot make the team ahead of Brown who so far in his profession career 1 goal in 40+ senior appearances.

 

There are so many issues but the big one is simple play a formation for the players you have, if you are playing with wide men pick them and if you are playing more than 1 striker up front play strikers there not midfielders, this did not work with Gary Monk, we got relegated and scored no goals. 

The entire change from 4231 was to accommodate Gregory and play to his strengths.

 

He didn't score in 6 and he didn't have the bottle to drop him, so DM had to change the formation to give him Pato in support. We went from fast wing play to slow build up.

 

I'll admit, Gregory's now thriving in the slow build up, pack the box style. Shame about the rest of the team though.