We've had a couple of decent halves recently, that's about it at the moment.

The Norwich match was obviously only because of the wrongful sending off, but we were appalling before that.

Poor first half against QPR, good second half.

Decent first half against Birmingham, poor second half.

We've looked a bit better defensively, but have played a pair of relegation battlers and still needed last ditch tackles to prevent goals.

We've not looked particularly great going forwards.

Still a lot that needs to be improved on if we're to make a fist of it, this season or next.

Edited March 13, 20241 yr by TeaCider24

7 minutes ago, Leesider said:

I thought you might be missing the "fannying around at the back"

Even @Neverbefore doesn't miss that 🙂 🙂 🙂 

Carrick is doing what most said he needed to: adjusting his tactics to his players. Pretty much the first rule of football is, if you can't score, don't concede. We had a massive stroke of luck against Norwich but we took advantage of it and have kept on doing so. We've also been able to name an unchanged team for 3 matches in a row which is possibly the first time this season. 

We're not playing "good" football but we are being effective and we know that once we can build an effective foundation that we can then add in the exciting stuff. Carrick does seem to be tweaking the formation a bit each time. I think Latte Lath played a lot deeper yesterday. It didn't really work but he did put a shift in defending. Part of the legacy of Wilder is that we have central defenders in McNair and Clarke who are comfortable playing high up the pitch. McNair in particular appeared to be reading from the overlapping centre-back book. He interchanged very effectively with Ayling. Ayling's presence on the ball, awareness and technique is still Premier league standard. Doesn't have the pace anymore but he's a lot more comfortable playing with 3 central defenders behind him.

It'll be interesting to see what Carrick does against Blackburn. Third relegation threatened team in a row, they are likely to sit back and hope to nick a draw or win. They've gone 6 games without a win but as long as they get a draw against us they'll feel that's a step towards safety for the season. We'll have a few sore players after three games in quick succession so it's likely that Carrick looks to freshen up a couple of positions if he can. Latte Lath in particular has put in a lot of minutes since returning from injury so we may see a reversion to 4-2-3-1 with Jones on the right and Forss in the middle.  Might also be a disguised 3-5-2 with Ayling as a RCB and Jones as a wing-back.

Nine matches left. No team wins all their matches but if we average 2ppg (e.g. 5 wins, 3 draws, 1 loss) then that sees us end the season with a promotion winning run of form on 71 points which probably sees us in 7th-8th.

1.5ppg (4 wins, 2 draws, 3 losses) is a respectable run, sees us end the season on 67 points which will probably end up around 8-9th. Given everything that has happened this season, that's a perfectly fine outcome and probably par for the course after this summer's rebuild and the January sales.

18 minutes ago, Erimus74 said:

Considering the injuries we've the whole season & thecstriker situation it's amazing we're still in contention at all
IMO, Latte Lath has shown what a difference a recognised striker can make, I'm hoping, maybe, been naive, that we looked at signing a striker in January but the prices we were quoted were ridiculous & so along with the war chest available in the summer meant we'll go with who we have & go for it in the summer ready for next season

thought LL looked good until around 60ish minutes when he started to fade and was on his heels a lot

needed to be taken off, would've been a good time for silvera's pace/energy

Yes we were lucky with the sending off, but following the dismissal we were so professional, how many times in the past have we struggled to overcome the one man advantage, against QPR we again rode our luck & good defending, players blocking shots resulting in going ingoaless at HT when in the not to distant past we'd have conceded goals in those situations & in the second half we just took control, last night we won ugly, lets just enjoy & give credit to Boro for turning around our awful run

Im over the moon we've taken 9 points from 3 games, including 2 cleansheets on the bounce & jumped from 6 points from 3rd bottom to 5 points from 6th top

Roll on Blackburn

Edited March 13, 20241 yr by Erimus74

7 minutes ago, mendieta420 said:

thought LL looked good until around 60ish minutes when he started to fade and was on his heels a lot

needed to be taken off, would've been a good time for silvera's pace/energy

Yes, I thought he would have took him off, can see Silvera starting v Blackburn, ELL has out in a lot of minutes since returning from injury, he took a knock last night, around his lower back too

16 minutes ago, Erimus74 said:

Yes, I thought he would have took him off, can see Silvera starting v Blackburn, ELL has out in a lot of minutes since returning from injury, he took a knock last night, around his lower back too

Was an odd one that one, he looked injured to me too but Maddo reckoned he was just winded. The fact he kept going and wasn't brought off may suggest that, too.

I also thought he might take him off but soon after I was thinking it, he made a good header from a defensive corner. He's not your stereotypical big lad up front but he's got one hell of a leap on him. So maybe it was more about that?

6 minutes ago, wilsoncgp said:

Was an odd one that one, he looked injured to me too but Maddo reckoned he was just winded. The fact he kept going and wasn't brought off may suggest that, too.

I also thought he might take him off but soon after I was thinking it, he made a good header from a defensive corner. He's not your stereotypical big lad up front but he's got one hell of a leap on him. So maybe it was more about that?

Archie Stephens leap 😉

Yes he may have been winded, good player for me 

11 hours ago, p_mards said:

What a massive win that thankfully keeps our season alive. Our formation worked well yet again as we controlled the central areas incredibly well and looked comfortable sat into our incredibly effective low block. The current tactics and defensive mentality takes me back to the days of Karanka as we look a nightmare to break down. The quality of the game was obviously poor but we held our shape and had the moment of high quality in attack from McGree. It was clear that a few players standards had dropped after the tight turnaround of Wednesday, Saturday & Tuesday, with the latter two being long away days, so some of the less impressive performances like O'Brien need to be viewed in that context. The current style of play isn't attractive but it sure brings the best out of our team, especially from the likes of Ayling, Berg, McNair & Clarke. Considering our defensive performances under Carrick I can't believe that we've managed to keep back-to-back clean sheets. Hopefully we can now make the most of the break to recharge the batteries for Saturday as the starting 11 have played a lot of minutes in a short space of time.

While the current style of play and tactics isn't Carrick's first choice, I'd like to think that he's learnt a lot about the effectiveness of holding more of a solid structure behind the ball - certainly when injuries bite and the team isn't able to dominate possession as preferred. Hopefully it helps takes the edge off the bipolar nature of our form under him. At the moment we're akin to a team like Coventry City with the way we have a solid structure behind the ball but can counter-attack and grind out scrappy wins - seemingly in a consistent manner. If we can somehow scrape into the play-offs and get promoted then we'll look back at Howson's experienced reaction to Norwich's Sainz stray boot and view it as a massive sliding doors moment.

Keep saying this I do appreciate your thoughtful and considered posts.

1 hour ago, AnglianRed said:

Couldn't agree more.

At this stage of the season, even though the play-offs are once more within reach (albeit still a long shot), I think its more important to build team cohesion and understanding of roles.

Playing 2 games a week will take it out of the players, so we can't expect brilliant football game after game. Think this was a perfect example of grinding out a result, even though we were below par. Keeps our momentum going and builds confidence & morale in the team. Play to our strengths, even if it isn't always pretty.

Does seem as though Carrick has had some sort of epiphany. Whatever, this run of results is giving us all reason to be hopeful for the rest of the season.

Epiphany equals a good bollocking off Gibson and told to pull his finger out 😀

 

Really looking forward to the Blackburn game & again, probably historically, we dont know which Boro turn up

Only downer im on nights 😔

2 hours ago, wilsoncgp said:

Was an odd one that one, he looked injured to me too but Maddo reckoned he was just winded. The fact he kept going and wasn't brought off may suggest that, too.

I also thought he might take him off but soon after I was thinking it, he made a good header from a defensive corner. He's not your stereotypical big lad up front but he's got one hell of a leap on him. So maybe it was more about that?

I think lath had some kind of specific role last night which I assume Carrick thought was working so didn’t wanna bring him off. All the space in behind I’d have liked to see Silvera given a go aswell.

2 hours ago, Erimus74 said:

Yes, I thought he would have took him off, can see Silvera starting v Blackburn, ELL has out in a lot of minutes since returning from injury, he took a knock last night, around his lower back too

He looked knackered. Was a bit weird from Carrick tbh, no idea why he didn't eat up a few minutes of that added time by subbing Lath for Silvera or Jones.

1 hour ago, Erimus 63 said:

Epiphany equals a good bollocking off Gibson and told to pull his finger out 😀

 

I was thinking what a crazy sliding doors that (now rescinded I believe) red card could end up being for Carrick. 

Norwich were already one up and let's be honest, looked certain to add to their tally sooner rather than later. 

Imagine if we'd lost heavily then turned up to QPR totally bereft of confidence with the fans on the team's back? 

Ref keeps his card in his pocket and we're possibly going into the international break with a new manager. 

Apologies in advance for any drunken posts next weekend😬  I'm off to Vilamoura  tomorrow to celebrate my 60th Birthday & Sunday being Paddy's Day will result in vast quantities of alcohol being consumed 👀........