1 upvotes, 1 direct replies (showing 1)
View submission: Thoughts on last few games?
Backwards and sideways. Keep possession, but don't risk a throughball or ball over the top. Even our counter attacks seem to go nowhere as no one has confidence to keep going. They stop and play it backwards or sideways. I'd rather see players take a chance, we are playing too safe.
Defenders get dragged up high then exposed when we lose the ball. Attackers dropping deep to get the ball and then have too many players to beat.
We caught City and Brighton at a fortunate time, but even they are more mentally resilient and knew they could turn us over. We have no confidence and Palmer is broken from carrying the whole team on his shoulders. Even he has succumb to the pressure of expectations.
Comment by ifcoffeewereblue at 09/02/2025 at 08:49 UTC
2 upvotes, 1 direct replies
This is what stands out to me the most as well. Besides looking just plain tired, there is 0 risk taking or urgency. It feels like the only players who have any license to take risk are Noni and Cucu. Everyone else hits the breaks and passes backwards. There's no confidence to try something different and no pace in transition to get to goal before teams recover. To be fair to Palmer, I read somewhere that he actually had created something crazy like 20 big chances over the last month, but they haven't been put away. But he's looked a ghost of his December form.