The Voice - Match preview Most liked posts in thread: Bradford City vs Walsall Saturday 3 September @ 3:00pm

What a weird game that was.

Hughes half time team talk: How the hell are you lot 2-0 up?

While Walsall had a lot of the ball their shooting was appalling-thank god.

They have some big units in there. Though I had to laugh when Banks gently nudged their giant #6 in the back in the first half and he fell down to the floor. I mean he must be at least twice the size of Banks.

Onto the Ref. My oh my. Didn't recall him telling their goalkeeper to hurry up at dead ball kicks but he seemed to do it all the second half to Lewis who was immense today.

Credit to a well drilled Walsall side who stuck at their task. Glad they didn't park the bus and came to have a go.

Wright to start over Chapman for me from now on as he did more in the 15 mins than Chapman did all game-looked lively took up good attacking positions, defended well and was direct with pace. Looked a real threat and had Walsall on the back foot at times.

Hughes subs today were on the money for me and shows how well he reads the game. And what a subs bench that was. Probably the best we have had for years.

 

We're technical but today Walsall were just as good in that department of not better. They moved the ball quicker than us and we seem to have that problem we've had in the past where we don't like to run through the middle ourselves. And for all our supposed technical ability our goals came from pretty direct play, Youngs from a Lewis goal kick and Cooks from a first time cross from Halliday. Our build up play was non existent because Walsall bullied us and as you allude to could be a problem when the weather turns.

 

Smallwood was on at Platt the whole game for not bringing it forward or losing his man. Not Platts best game for me. As for Sutton he was totally ineffective unfortunately. I can’t see how he gets in front of East or Songo’O. If there’s one criticism of the window it’s the lack of recruitment in CM.

 

Don’t think there was much wrong with our CB pairing they withstood a battering. Platt was sound enough defensively however I thought his distribution in the first half in particular was very poor. Critchlow was a little shaky first half but did well second.
For me our weakness today was midfield Sutton and Smallwood were poor and once again we missed Gillead in there

 

Isn't it great when you play poorly but manage to grind out a win? A sign of a good team, or so they say. Onward and upwards!

 

I wouldn't go as far as say fluked a win, yes we were caught of guard today in certain areas of the pitch, but end of day it's swings and roundabouts with L2 players, full credit to Walsall today they turned up to win the game, and we weren't quite at the races for sure, but tbh we benefited from Walsalls attitude to win by hitting them on the break. After our opening home fixtures it was a refreshing change.

 

Today was not exactly a belting day at the office, but the reason we won was the good work in the transfer market.

Sure, Cook was here last season, but the pivotal players ended up being Lewis & Young, and the new signings up front added something as well.

I just don't know who is going to be able to match our transfer market prowess this season. Both our defeats were ridiculous in nature. When we've drawn, we've been stupidly unlucky.

Next week we're playing a team that are bang in form in Mansfield, they've only dropped points against high flyers - if we beat them, it will be clear we're a force this season.

I might even promote us from a 7th place expected finish.

We have an embarrassment of riches, and we haven't even got going.

 

I was impressed by Wallsall they played a high energy pressing game and didn’t allow us to play our normal game they attacked in numbers and defended in numbers. We won the game because of that extra bit of quality we have added this year. And we can take comfort on how we saw off the last fifteen minutes of the game. A tough task now next week

 

The ref was poor against Doncaster and this one yesterday is the attila the hun character, who refereed in the Forest Green game (at home) last season.

He preens around and wants to be the centre of attention - hence the early dubious penalty award.

I thought Crewe deserved a point, but I do think a better referee would have helped us with Donny's obvious timewasting and we were deserved more.

But then again, we didn't really deserve a point yesterday

 

To be fair i thought Levi was one of the only ones to play well first half. And if played in a certain position, namely right back with an emphasis to get forward, i think he'd be an asset to a team looking for that sort of player. However, if you are looking to get promoted then you need better in central midfield, he just doesn't excel there.

 

Great point. I've never been a fan of utility players because by that their very nature they ain't good enough to hold down a slot in a regular position. They serve a role based on others being out either injured or suspended. Notice know we have a right back who is a right back. None of this ludicrous stuff we were seeing on here last season with people asking for Foulds to play right back because he'd filled in for half a game or so. Same with our centre backs, we now have three proper ones. Whenever i read 'midfielder but can also play left back' i think we need to look elsewhere. Similar reason as to why we've let FCD and Staunton go, no one really knew what position they excelled in.

 

We really are spoilt for choice at RB, we have Sutton for his energy, happy with Halliday for his work rate and crossing then we have Hendrie for his height defending corners..

 

Like Port Vale, Oldham, Crewe etc they feel like one of those teams we've played a thousand times over the years and draw more often than not. Reeks of 1-1, followed by lots of moaning about the ref not giving us owt.

 

You really are blind arent you. There's nothing wrong with my understanding of the game sunshine. I've seen 50 plus years of teams parking the bus, timewasting, shirt pulling, professional tactics and generally disrupting games.

The person with zero understanding is you if you think that good teams can just "overcome it". Parky used it at Wigan, we spent 89 minutes behind the ball, frustrating play and basically doing everything we could to get a zero on the wigan side of the scorecard.

It worked, it works very very often. It's football.

You are a frickin joke. You have no idea at all about how the real world and real football works. Just get back to watching Liverpool and washing cars for a living.

Your not a real person your are a parody hologram of a real person. The Alan Partridge of posters. The product of a one night stand between David Brent & Hayley Cropper.

Real people can debate. I'm actually wondering if you have aspergers.

 

Cheers Hayley. The day I need any advice from you will be the day I check off this planet.

 

Lewis
Halliday Platt Crichlow Ridehalgh
Banks Gilliead Smallwood Pereira
Harratt Cook

 

The one and only! In the same category as Drysdale / Boyeson etc!

 

It's not about teams "helping us" though, they've every right to bend the rules to suit, it's more about the referee enforcing the said rules and clamping down on illegal time wasting like they promised to do with the new directive at the start of the season.

 

You are right like in Rugby League do with an independent timekeeper, Liverpool scored in the 8th minute of extra time even though the ref indicated 5, It needs taking out of there hands