The Voice - Match preview Bradford City vs Northampton Town Saturday 19th November @ 3:00pm

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Is it true we’ve only won 5 in 28 at home? Seen that posted on FB tonight…..if true that is truly diabolical.

while this formation suits us away from home it evidently doesnt at home. Why are we playing it out from the back with two CBs who are not comfortable on the ball? It was painful to watch and clues were there before the goal.

for the love of Christ, Sparky, sort it out.

18k fans there today - loads of comps handed out. It was an ideal time (albeit weather was not controllable) to make an impression and boost sales before Christmas of tickets, merch and what not.

It was instead a hideous performance.

 

That is the standard we should be at every game , don't think they are capable of that sort of performance . Well played
Northampton.

 

I sit in B block of the main stand and I was closer to most of the clearances and passes that Songo’o made in the 2nd half than any of our players were.

 

Can't disagree there was little in it until Smallwoods shocking pass, but we never looked like getting back into the game, yes it's difficult at 2 - 0 down but as a team we had no answer to Northamptons counter attacks.
2 - 0 with the second 45 minutes plus extra time gives you a chance if you change things, I was honestly disappointed Sparkie didn't make at least one change at half time.

 

Those pink shirts were a hit for our City players, in the first half the likes of Platt, Smallwood and Songo'o picked them out time and time again.
Need to bring back the voltage cherry shirts to give the players a chance to find their teammate.

Glad it is a few weeks before they are at home again as this is beyond a joke now Sparky.
Wright was lively when he came on and Oliver won pretty much everything in the air but is unable to control his own feet alas.

This result might be a wake-up call but the way we keep playing at home makes it un-likely

 

I’ve said this before an Il say it again

Unless we get a box to box midfielder who can do the business, our chances of promotion are slim.

Lemme visualise our problem here

Cook is the man to finish chances not create them

that leaves Wright/Eisa, Chapman & Banks

They have pace but through 90% of the game, they cannot utilise it because we don’t get the ball forward quick enough. When we do get the ball forward to them, The wingers are doubled up on, usually Banks, an Chapman is outnumbered in the middle of the pitch

You have the full backs, who cant fully commit to going forward because of the lack of pace at the back

that leaves the CMs. Who are both defensive minded an provide feck all to the attack. There is a massive gap between Smallwood - Gillead & Chapman. There is no fluidity in the middle of the park.

Ive said it time an time again this season, 2 CDMs at home does not work. But reasons unknown to man, Hughes choses to persist with it

I hope todays result is the most important lesson learnt today, because it clearly showed what can an will happen for the rest of the season at home if we do not switch up our style of play

 

All this is spot on, and several people on here have been pointing it out for some time. I continue to have grave doubts about MH. I was prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt and still am, but if we're still playing like this after the January window then that's it for me.
The main problem is obvious. Cook is a great finisher, but that's just about all he is, and the burden of providing him with chances falls onto just three players, the two wide players and the no. 10. Smallwood and Gilliead have no pace, rarely get involved in creative play and rarely, never in Gilliead's case, score. Away, when the opposition come on to us, there's space to create something but at home the lack of support and penetration from Smallwood and Gilliead completely stunts our play. I'm giving MH the benefit of the doubt and I'm assuming he sees this and will do something about it in January. But if he doesn't, well he's not the manager a lot of us hoped he would be.

 

It wasn’t an odd we we shite and got battered.

Simple!

 

Even after today's result Sparkie isn't far off, we were very much in the game until our two bits of poor play but not sure we ever looked like getting back into the game.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p0dhfbng?partner=uk.co.bbc&origin=share-mobile

 

You just on about our home form or our spectacular away form? Oh by the way achieved by the same manager you have just said isn't good enough. Which is it?

 

h

Home form. And where did I say he wasn't good enough? I said I had doubts and I still do.

 

The Valley Parade hoodoo continues and again we see a team come to VP and 'do a number on us'. As with most home games this season we saw a theme develop where we look tidy enough for half an hour without creating anything of note, then the dreaded edge of our own box passes become more frequent. We make a mistake (this week we didnt get away with it like we have done previously), heads go down we concede another and should have again. Crowd then boos them off, we come out second half, look as bad as the first, try and change it up and look even worse. And as soon as we take Chapman off and bring Oliver on to go 4-4-2 we as well give up cos it's not worked once yet.
A strange conundrum and one Hughes is gonna have to give serious thought too, our away form is automatic promotion, our home form is lower half of the league at best. How he fixes it I'm not sure, we have no plan B to speak of so it's a case of tweeking the plan A that works so well away from home. As Hughes said after that first goal at home is imperative to changing the general malaise around Valley Parade right now, a malaise that is getting very hard.to shift. He's gonna have to work out how to get the best out of Andy Cook, yet another home game where we created nothing for the lad, he had to earn his own penalty.
We ain't out of the running by any stretch but he's gonna have to change the mindset because the fantastic home crowds are restless.

 

I do find peoples obsession with 2 up front pretty comical. Very few good teams play 2 up front. The way Hughes wants us to play won’t work with 2 strikers, especially when we come up against a team playing 3 in midfield, we will struggle to retain possession which is his entire tactical approach.

We lost today because of a dreadful error resulting in a goal and then we lost of heads and found ourselves 2-0 down and it was game over. I don’t think 2 strikers up front would have changed that. I would argue Critchlow at CB would have had a bigger influence and possibly East at CM rather than Gilliead.

Also worth noting that Northampton have had a couple of seasons with Brady as manager, after getting relegated from L1 and then just missing out on playoffs last season, they now look like a good L2 team. We need to give Hughes time and patience, these things don’t happen overnight.

 

Can’t wait for Orient game and probably another 3 points on the road.
I do feel sorry for the home fans who have had nothing to cheer this season.

 

Agree entirely with this. Seemed lively, on the front foot, causing them problems....then a defence splitting pass from the captain..in the wrong direction.....Thought Lewis should have done better for second, could have come out and got the ball from where I was in the Kop. Platt, Songo'o not a good pairing...

 

The good news is we were slightly better than recent VP performances but the devastating news is that we were outclassed by a much better than in Northampton and if that is the standard we need to reach there is a long way to go before we get there

 

You said "grave doubts" suggesting you are very worried that he isn't up to the task. We are 5th in the table missing 2 of our arguably best players (Walker and Osadebe) and you have grave doubts-have a word with yourself.

 

We lost today because our CM partnership were shocking. Our full backs were poor and our forward was fully marked out of the game.

Oh and CB’s were shite!

We have a lot of work to do.

 

Well we’ve just been battered at home by a team who played 4-3-3 formation.
So we had a 2 man advantage in midfield. Where did that get us?