Haven't had a chance to read everyone else's match reports yet (up at 4.30 yesterday morning to fly back, and in office until midnight last night...) but here's my two-penneth.
Blackwell thinks we lost because we didn't listen to instructions. He isn't a deep thinker (widely acknowledged). He therefore sent out the same team a at Preston, rationalised we could treat it as an away game, and said "2-0 again please lads". In his mind we therefore didn't play to orders as we didn't oblige with a 2-0 win. The problem of course is (a) it wasn't an away game and (b) we weren't playing Preston. Watford easily read our play and approach and picked us off at will. The problem stemmed from the back. Greegs and Butler didn't make any howlers, but their presence as a centre back partnership that hoofed and lumbered crippled us as a team. Our best and most mobile centre back was stood at left back (whilst an 850,000 left back sat in the stands). We therefore couldn't bring the ball out of defence (it was like watching Sunday league the way Gregan lumped in forward every time) and we couldn't intercept any pass made to King running into channels - Butler or Gregan just lumbered across to cover the run on goal but couldn't stop them keeping easy retaining possession and gaining territory every time - from which they gained successive corners and set pieces. Our willingness to concede set pieces was staggering and proved our undoing. You cannot give that many set pieces against a well drilled team. The midfield seemed a bit baffled by what was going on behind them. Richardson lacked any real purpose, Douglas struggled to get near it. Miller was by-passed. Lewis was played far too near Hulse, rather than putting your best crosser of the ball on the wing so he can deliver crosses to your best header of the ball (radical but it might just work). Hulse just looked bewildered by it all, and desperately frustrated at being so isolated. He was given a mauling by their centrebacks and the ref was weak in actually brandishing cards, but this is the Championship and Gregan bases his entire game around kicking forwards, so we can't really complain. Against the above backdrop the result had a gruesome inevitability. The one thing we were unfortunate with was the 2nd goal. A real freak and it came at a time that I was actually feeling some hope for the first time, after Richardson was pulled off, Blake came on and initially started linking play well, and we looked fleetingly like a cohesive team rather than an isolated back four, waving at a confused midfield 5, pointing at a solitary big bloke. The most frustrating thing about this brief period is it demonstrated that Watford fundamentally aren't very good, and their defence was weak. We never in the match really isolated and tried to take on their full backs. All in all, Watford came to win the match, we came not to lose. On that basis the right team won. On the plus side, cracking list meet, a couple of blinding meals out over the weekend and enormous quantities of cider consumed. Waddle ******* This message and any attachment are confidential and may be privileged or otherwise protected from disclosure. If you are not the intended recipient, please telephone or email the sender and delete this message and any attachment from your system. If you are not the intended recipient you must not copy this message or attachment or disclose the contents to any other person. For further information about Clifford Chance please see our website at http://www.cliffordchance.com or refer to any Clifford Chance office. _______________________________________________ the Leeds List is an unmoderated mailing list and the list administrators accept no liability for the personal views and opinions of contributors. Leedslist mailing list [email protected] http://list.zetnet.co.uk/mailman/listinfo/leedslist
