Most liked posts in thread: Even Bowyer can see it!

Also get Drury out. He couldn't teach a duck to float

 

He needs a more capable number 2 imo, plus we need a proper coaching set up, it all feels like it’s done on the cheap and it’s showing on the pitch.

Play Reeves, Palmer and Taylor together and it’s what you’ll get though, even if you have the best intentions in your head. They have no creativity between them.

 

I saw his comments and was amazed. Bowyer sounds like a fan rather than the man in charge of how we play.

 

Palmer and Reeves (especially the invisible Palmer) just don't roam with the ball enough.

We can't play a 2 man midfield with them because they're so negative and lack physicality so we get overrun and create nothing

 

Since Reeves has returned, we've scored 4 goals from open play in 9 league games.

We've scored 8 in 9 total (including 3 penalties).

Before Reeves returned, we'd scored 16 in 9 (including 1 penalty).

Reeves has sucked the life and movement out of our midfield, no it is definitely not all down to him, but watching him on the field of play it looks like a know-all coach stepped into a training session to 'show everyone how it's done' - only without getting it done.

He needs to stop standing around gesticulating, and actually move with the ball (and off it).

 

Ever since Reeves got back in to the team this has got worst.

Him and Palmer just go sideways.

Reeves is the worst because he has the ability but just seems he is doing a Payne on us and will wave goodbye. Passing time.

 

Reeves drops deep. Collects the ball off the defenders then passes it 5 yards. Runs gets the ball ball and passes it 5 yards.

Since he came back in we have been more negative but he's frustrating because he has the ability to be able to control a game, spread play and drive us forward but he seems unwilling to do that for whatever reason.

 

We can criticise Reeves and Palmer till the "cows come home" but one of our biggest problems is our lack of movement off the ball. If you watch both of them closely they are both looking to play a forward ball. Yet you see other teams dragging our defenders around and creating space for their midfield players.
If there is no option for them to pass the ball forward they should carry the ball. All of a sudden Nicky Law looks he would have been a good option.
Another problem we now have is Ben Richards-Everton. At the start of the season I thought I thought, not before time we have a CB that won't be bullied. Now he seems to think he is a footballing CB (which he isn't) and is starting to look a soft touch.

 

We are currently saddled with a midfield that is small, weak, doesn’t create, and doesn’t score. So what is the point of them.

This is the route of our problems, midfield, we desperately need a quality influential midfielder who can get the team going forward and doesn’t mind being a nasty bugger.

 

The problem is midfield can't pick a decent pass
to create an opening and that's just as much down
to lack of movement from other players.

The training ground is where you communicate
what is required from midfield and recipients.If
there's no movement then midfield just make
an easy pass so they don't lose possession.

Different opposition demand different tactics,
it's called a game plan.

Do the coaches impress this on the players in
training? When will they start a game on the front
foot? When will they implement the belief that the
next game is winnable rather than spouting what
a "hard game" it will be?

 

Akpan has probably assisted and scored more than Reeves and Palmer combined.

But if no one's moving for the ball then I would say that's more laziness and lack of belief more than anything. You know from a young age to pass and move and find space, and I noticed earlier in the season Reeves would actually be looking for a pass and no one would be moving in front of him, so whether he's disillusioned or not I don't know.


Then when he's passed it to our CB's you'll find there's quite alot of space to run into as Reeves is then marked, but the problem is 1) can you trust a League 2 CB to be a BPD 2) would a League 2 defender have the confidence to push forward, and the answer is usually no. At the moment opposition's know that if they just man mark everyone without the ball, the ball carrier doesn't have the confidence in them to actually push forward with it and then we're stuck with tapping it side to side for 80 minutes.


And I feel sorry for Vaughan as there's countless times where he's made runs and whoever has the ball doesn't have confidence or the vision to make the pass.

When we get forward we could be lethal with our forwards but nobody has the balls to bring it that far up the pitch

 

That belief comes from the manager.
The fact he shouted 'slow down' to one of our players who rushed over for a throw in during the last 5 mins at Orient says all i need to know about Bowyer trying not to lose.
That safety first mentality makes the players keep the ball without venturing from safe areas with more of our players in said area.
Go up the pitch you are outnumbered with a greater chance of losing the ball. Surely, surely this apprehension comes from Bowyer. Unless O Donnell is broke from a gambling habit and all the boys are trying to help him get his clean sheet bonuses.

 

Reading that it suggests to me the players train with regards a certain way of playing then don't apply it in game time, you can practice 7 days a week but it means nothing if it's not followed up in a competitive game, and reading this comment it's down to the players :
“It’s all right passing it sideways and backwards but you’ve got to go forwards. I’m afraid we didn’t do enough of that and it's very disappointing”.

 

Just think our players don't back themselves creatively. How often do we prat about with it down the flanks before getting a ball in when our forwards are by that point double marked? We seem to love to pass it along the line from full back to full back and hope an opening will create itself.

 

It's been the same all season. Backwards, backwards, sideways, hoof.

Pritchard's goal at VP against Crawley was a clear example that this group of players are capable of passing through the thirds and creating good chances. They're just not allowed the regular freedom to do so.

Just because he knows what the problem is doesn't mean he knows how to fix it either.

 

Yes I wonder if Bowyer flipped a coin to decide which one of the two he hooked off because IMO Palmer offered nothing.

 

Palmer and Reeves just isn’t a combination which works. I think one of those with Cooke may work, but together they just tread water and don’t drive on.

I like Pritchard and would like to see him fitted in somewhere.

We don’t have a McCall/Jones-type ball winner.

 

Taking the team from saturday, bin Taylor for Pritchard and Palmer for Cooke and I think it'll perform better

 

Alternatively, replace one of them with McCarten. From the moment he came on he was trying to drive things forward and if we'd had that kind of impact from the start, we just might have got something from the game.