Leicester V Boro 1-2 (Azaz, Silvera)

[Rob 6,209 9.5k]

15 hours ago, Blanco said:

Delighted that we moved away from “fannying about football” and played a man’s game today. It showed in the result. I wonder if Carrick is on here and took my advice from Wednesday? 🤔

was all smogzilla , he made the match day thread

[northern boro 452 10.4k]

Middlesbrough Football Club are aware of an incident which took place during yesterday’s game at Leicester City.

 

https://www.mfc.co.uk/news/2024/february/18/statement-from-the-club/

[LinoJo3 5,505 13.2k]

25 minutes ago, Plastic Goat said:

I see Sheff Utd losing again. Only three wins so far and thirteen points. You do wonder wether promotion is worth it.  What sort of season have those fans had.

Of course it’s worth it, look at Luton fans they’re loving it even though they’re still fighting relegation. Every club that gets promoted makes progress in some way even if they come back down. You become instantly more attractive to players and obviously get a fortune even if you drop back down again.

Ive never really understood the thing where fans say there weekend is ruined if the team lose, like honestly what difference does it make to a fan lol. Just take it less serious, if we go up and get battered every week in the long run we’re still in a better place than we have been in almost 10 years.

[Erimus74 5,259 5.4k]

Love the championship, prefer it everyday of the week over the PL & in all truth would I renew if we went up, I didnt last time but agree it's the place to be if only for one season, all the money Gibbo has invested then its a bit of payback time & a bit more money for better players etc

Edited February 18, 2024 by Erimus74

[sanddancer 2,098 6.2k]

3 hours ago, AnglianRed said:

I think its harsh to call it a "lucky" win.

Yes Leicester created plenty of chances (as expected) and fluffed a couple of really good ones.

But despite that, it felt to me that Boro were actually more composed in defence, were usually able to get back into position quicker and didn't leave players unmarked like we usually do.

True we needed a bit of last-ditch defending at times, particularly after Vardy scored, but thats to be expected against a team with their record.

In a nutshell, I didn't find myself thinking "WTF are we playing at?" as often as usual.

On top of that, our attacking play seemed a bit more co-ordinated. Whether that was the formation, the players selected, or Leicester just giving us a bit more time & space, I don't know.

Totally agree it was a hard fought deserved win not many have managed to do. Pretty, no, but it doesn’t need to be when all the team is working together for one cause. 
 

[Barnaby 1,129 2.2k]

19 hours ago, Barnaby said:

Yeah and more pain and suffering for me...They've only just started speaking to me 

He wasn't even Plymouths Player...He was on loan to them from Villa who we negotiated a fee (2m) for 

[HolgateHero 788 2.2k]

6 hours ago, smogsterking the Inspirati said:

Just be grateful its not another 7 nation army chant. Although it would be nice to see a bit more originality with the tunes used.

I tried a few times to start a 'Scott MacDonald lives in Yarm E-I-E-I-OOO....' chant to the tune of Old MacDonald's farm. But I never worked any of the other lines out and it didn't catch on.

 

[Changing Times 15,603 22.7k]

6 hours ago, AnglianRed said:

I think its harsh to call it a "lucky" win.

Yes Leicester created plenty of chances (as expected) and fluffed a couple of really good ones.

But despite that, it felt to me that Boro were actually more composed in defence, were usually able to get back into position quicker and didn't leave players unmarked like we usually do.

True we needed a bit of last-ditch defending at times, particularly after Vardy scored, but thats to be expected against a team with their record.

In a nutshell, I didn't find myself thinking "WTF are we playing at?" as often as usual.

On top of that, our attacking play seemed a bit more co-ordinated. Whether that was the formation, the players selected, or Leicester just giving us a bit more time & space, I don't know.

We were more composed in defence because we were hardly attacking.  It's easy to get back into position when you aren't leaving it to go very far.  They had more good chances than we did but didn't take them.  I really don't see why calling it lucky is an issue to be honest, it's not meant as a slight against us.  We should have beaten teams this season but buggered those games up, and Leicester should have beaten us but buggered it up.  I think iyf the roles were reversed yesterday, I doubt this forum would be full of people saying well done to whoever we played.  I can't remember many people praising Preston in midweek for example, and Leicester played better against us than we did against Preston.  If they'd have taken their chances they'd have won comfortably, I don't see what's wrong with saying that?

 

[Pork Slops 712 1.2k]

18 minutes ago, HolgateHero said:

I tried a few times to start a 'Scott MacDonald lives in Yarm E-I-E-I-OOO....' chant to the tune of Old MacDonald's farm. But I never worked any of the other lines out and it didn't catch on.

 

Telling us what that is to be chanted to the tune of is superfluous and it is a travesty that it didn't take off.

[LinoJo3 5,505 13.2k]

55 minutes ago, Changing Times said:

We were more composed in defence because we were hardly attacking.  It's easy to get back into position when you aren't leaving it to go very far.  They had more good chances than we did but didn't take them.  I really don't see why calling it lucky is an issue to be honest, it's not meant as a slight against us.  We should have beaten teams this season but buggered those games up, and Leicester should have beaten us but buggered it up.  I think iyf the roles were reversed yesterday, I doubt this forum would be full of people saying well done to whoever we played.  I can't remember many people praising Preston in midweek for example, and Leicester played better against us than we did against Preston.  If they'd have taken their chances they'd have won comfortably, I don't see what's wrong with saying that?

 

Because everyone knows it was a bit lucky, but that equally doesn’t mean we didn’t play well. They had chances, we had chances, we took ours, they didn’t, we defended quite well in the main and their chances came mostly from their extra quality rather than being gifted the ball.

I think people just wanna enjoy a good result and a good performance from the players after weeks of disappointment, not every game needs to be over analysed and dosed with ‘realism’, just enjoy it.

[Changing Times 15,603 22.7k]

Just now, LinoJo3 said:

Because everyone knows it was a bit lucky, but that equally doesn’t mean we didn’t play well. They had chances, we had chances, we took ours, they didn’t, we defended quite well in the main and their chances came mostly from their extra quality rather than being gifted the ball.

I think people just wanna enjoy a good result and a good performance from the players after weeks of disappointment, not every game needs to be over analysed and dosed with ‘realism’, just enjoy it.

It was just the idea that we should change our style of play to more like yesterday that I'm questioning mate.  Nothing to do with enjoying the win.

[LinoJo3 5,505 13.2k]

6 minutes ago, Changing Times said:

It was just the idea that we should change our style of play to more like yesterday that I'm questioning mate.  Nothing to do with enjoying the win.

Fair enough.

I get where people are coming from tbh, I don’t think it’s so much the set up people want but more the application of it. We closed down, denied space, were more aggressive trying to win the ball back etc. It’s annoying to see us defend like that knowing there’s a high chance next Saturday we will be watching us give the ball away, inviting shots and parting the Red Sea for anyone with the ball.

Its that kind of inconsistency that will keep us in this league for a long time.

[Changing Times 15,603 22.7k]

12 hours ago, Bruce said:

It's good just to enjoy an unexpected win. In some ways you can't learn a lot from it other than it's quite funny to suddenly turn into Leicester's Rotherham. But there is possibly one thing that stands out.

This season we have been at our most effective when playing away and playing against patently superior teams. Our away record is the 7th best in the league and only Leicester have scored more goals than us away from (30 vs 35). This reflects us setting up more defensively and the other teams being more inclined to attack us. Our home form is terrible, 14th in the league and only Stoke has scored fewer goals at home than us (17 vs 12).

What this tells me is that last season's "Carrickball" based on keeping possession and overrunning opponents has stopped working. Last season we were third in the table at home and only Burnley and Sheffield Utd scored more than us (49, 47, 46) while only Burnley conceded fewer goals at home than us (15 vs 19). Again, last season, our away record was pretty middling - 9th in the league. 

Obviously we have poorer players this season and we had to deal with a massive overhaul and never-ending injury crisis but that affects home and away equally. The fact that our away form and performances against better teams has improved significantly while our home form and matches against weaker sides has got massively worse tells you that our problem is not defending, it is over-committing in attack and being unable to defend a counter-attack when we lose possession.

I think making the daft basic mistakes at home rather than being counter attacked is a problem.  There aren't that many counter attack goals scored in general I think, like as a percentage I mean.

I'd also say that our issue isn't over committing in attack either, it's not being good enough in attack full stop.  We have a solid defensive record at home, it's one of the best in the league, but our goal scoring it terrible.  Only Millwall and Stoke have fewer goals at home this season, and we are level with Rotherham, QPR, and Sheff Wed, which is three teams I'd prefer not to be level with in any statistical category.  We've played 16 games at home this season, and in 13 of those we've managed either 0 or 1 goal, scoring just 9 times in total.  It's only the Southampton, Cardiff, and Preston games that have given us half the goals!  We actually have more shots this season per game than last season, and we hit the target more often this season than last season but we don't score the goals.  The lack of quality is the issue to me, partly as a result of the business we did in the summer, partly as a result of injuries weakening the line ups at times, and partly as a result of Carrick messing about with his selections on occasions - start of the season especially.  The solution to me would be potentially bringing in better players in the summer, the players we signed last summer improving over time, and Carrick getting the best players into the side as much as possible.  Three things that I'd say are very much achievable.

[LinoJo3 5,505 13.2k]

2 minutes ago, Changing Times said:

I think making the daft basic mistakes at home rather than being counter attacked is a problem.  There aren't that many counter attack goals scored in general I think, like as a percentage I mean.

I'd also say that our issue isn't over committing in attack either, it's not being good enough in attack full stop.  We have a solid defensive record at home, it's one of the best in the league, but our goal scoring it terrible.  Only Millwall and Stoke have fewer goals at home this season, and we are level with Rotherham, QPR, and Sheff Wed, which is three teams I'd prefer not to be level with in any statistical category.  We've played 16 games at home this season, and in 13 of those we've managed either 0 or 1 goal, scoring just 9 times in total.  It's only the Southampton, Cardiff, and Preston games that have given us half the goals!  We actually have more shots this season per game than last season, and we hit the target more often this season than last season but we don't score the goals.  The lack of quality is the issue to me, partly as a result of the business we did in the summer, partly as a result of injuries weakening the line ups at times, and partly as a result of Carrick messing about with his selections on occasions - start of the season especially.  The solution to me would be potentially bringing in better players in the summer, the players we signed last summer improving over time, and Carrick getting the best players into the side as much as possible.  Three things that I'd say are very much achievable.

Agree, so could there not be an argument that while we have our current team for the rest of this season we could change to a slightly less open style. 
 

While over commiting might not be an issue, we could still commit slightly less forward to make up for our lack of quality in the attack. Maybe play a midfield 3 and keep Barlaser and O’Brien a bit deeper letting Azaz push forward to support a front 3.

It’s small tweaks but if we can’t keep the ball in the final 3rd when we flood it with players then surely it would make sense to enable us to plug the gaps quicker. 

[Changing Times 15,603 22.7k]

7 minutes ago, LinoJo3 said:

Fair enough.

I get where people are coming from tbh, I don’t think it’s so much the set up people want but more the application of it. We closed down, denied space, were more aggressive trying to win the ball back etc. It’s annoying to see us defend like that knowing there’s a high chance next Saturday we will be watching us give the ball away, inviting shots and parting the Red Sea for anyone with the ball.

Its that kind of inconsistency that will keep us in this league for a long time.

I don't think that's down to inconsistency, it's more the pattern of different games, although at the same time I completely agree that we are inconsistent! The less you have the ball then the fewer mistakes you can make with it.  The fewer risks you take then the same thing applies - we made 42 clearances yesterday, we were under too much pressure to try and play out from the back so we didn't do it a great deal. I don't believe we worked any harder yesterday than we do in any other games, it's just that most of it was spent defending/chasing the ball, so it looks like you're working harder as a result of that.