10 minutes ago, Humpty said:

I don't agree with that assessment. We were well short of our best and we ultimately shot ourselves. We didn't deserve to win either but there certainly wasn't big gap in quality...just go read Daniel Farke's comments in his press conference he admits to the quality we have at our disposal.

Lol. Opposition coaches tend to be complimentary when they win. But as NB4 pointed out, his squad is worth about £100m more than ours.

There is an argument that Boro shot themselves in the foot, both defensively and in attack, but I would argue we did the best we could against a superior team. Leeds smothered us - gave us no time or space to play. They were fast and physical. Ruthlessly exposed our players' individual weaknesses.

Against mid or lower table opposition (or less aggressive top teams like Burnley) our mistakes wouldn't have been as costly. Boro are a decent upper-mid table team...possibly a top 6 team. Leeds are a PL team in waiting.

I saw a sizeable gap in quality, physicality and mentality. As I keep saying, I won't knock Boro too much...we are what we are. But IMO we're a good way short of being at Leeds' level. We showed some fight & determination 2nd half and looked like getting back into the game for a brief period, but we just couldn't sustain the energy & focus.

Respect your opinion but i don't agree with it. I might respond later in a bit more depth when i have more time.

19 hours ago, Downsouth said:

Massive game tonight seems that no-one is really interested in the game judging by posts so far

I knew my dig would work what a tremendous post count!

Last night was disappointing and as Anglia Red said it exposed our level of physicality. On a positive note I would still rather watch Carrick try to play football than anything Pulis or Warnock produced 

We have lost one third of our games and have one of the highest goals against in the league. If we don't make the playoffs then Carrick has to go. The aim this season must have been promotion. I think top two was always out of reach given the likes of Leeds,Sheff Utd and Burnley. We all know that the playoffs are a bit of a lottery but I will settle for that. As I said ,failure to get into the playoffs means Carrick has failed. He will have had his chance and time for a change. Football is after all a results based business.

6 minutes ago, Downsouth said:

I knew my dig would work what a tremendous post count!

I think they call that trolling 🤔

10 minutes ago, pikerman said:

Last night was disappointing and as Anglia Red said it exposed our level of physicality. On a positive note I would still rather watch Carrick try to play football than anything Pulis or Warnock produced 

Me too. Doesn't make it any less disappointing that we aren't competing at the top table when we should be though.

Agree with Maddo & Dana 100%

I think we, collectively as players & Carrick, with constantly giving needless balls away, poor subs, cost us dearly & more to blame for the defeat than Leeds were for their pressing throughout

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p0kb6nzp?partner=uk.co.bbc&origin=share-mobile

4 minutes ago, Humpty said:

Me too. Doesn't make it any less disappointing that we aren't competing at the top table when we should be though.

I honestly don't think we're good enough to be competing for the top 3.

I hoped at the start of the season that Leeds would fall apart, Burnley would limp along under Parker and Wilder would be too busy raging against sandwiches to properly compete. In that case I felt like we had a shot at the top 2. Hasn't worked out that way. All those three look like pulling away and although one might collapse, I don't see 2 out of 3 of them collapsing.

Right now we're in a pack with Blackburn, WBA, Sunderland, & Norwich as the best of the rest. Norwich are being carried by Sainz and it's hard to tell whether Sunderland were simply having a golden patch with their youngsters. Eustace has proved himself a good, well-organised coach and is getting Blackburn to overperform. Corberan is still largely working with a grab bag of free transfers at WBA: bit like Mowbray with us. Our results against these are played 4, won 1, draw 1, lost 2 which really isn't good enough but still time to turn that around. 

Beginning of the season I thought Coventry & Luton would be up there and maybe Stoke might finally come good. Coventry might still go on a run. Hard to see Luton turning it around. Stoke are being Stoke. Teams like Millwall and Watford might hang around and challenge for 6th.

Realistically, we're challenging for 4th-6th with an outside chance at 3rd. That's probably pretty consistent with the quality of our squad. If we don't make the playoffs then I reckon that is underperformance but making the top 2 required everything to go our way from day 1 and it hasn't.

Millwall have apparently approached Mark Robins, so I'm actually glad that we'll be facing the last hurrah of Neil Harris on Saturday instead 😂

22 minutes ago, Bruce said:

I honestly don't think we're good enough to be competing for the top 3.

I hoped at the start of the season that Leeds would fall apart, Burnley would limp along under Parker and Wilder would be too busy raging against sandwiches to properly compete. In that case I felt like we had a shot at the top 2. Hasn't worked out that way. All those three look like pulling away and although one might collapse, I don't see 2 out of 3 of them collapsing.

Right now we're in a pack with Blackburn, WBA, Sunderland, & Norwich as the best of the rest. Norwich are being carried by Sainz and it's hard to tell whether Sunderland were simply having a golden patch with their youngsters. Eustace has proved himself a good, well-organised coach and is getting Blackburn to overperform. Corberan is still largely working with a grab bag of free transfers at WBA: bit like Mowbray with us. Our results against these are played 4, won 1, draw 1, lost 2 which really isn't good enough but still time to turn that around. 

Beginning of the season I thought Coventry & Luton would be up there and maybe Stoke might finally come good. Coventry might still go on a run. Hard to see Luton turning it around. Stoke are being Stoke. Teams like Millwall and Watford might hang around and challenge for 6th.

Realistically, we're challenging for 4th-6th with an outside chance at 3rd. That's probably pretty consistent with the quality of our squad. If we don't make the playoffs then I reckon that is underperformance but making the top 2 required everything to go our way from day 1 and it hasn't.

Bookies didn't see it that way at the start of the season. They had us joint 2nd favorites and I tend to agree with them in this instance.

40 minutes ago, Humpty said:

Bookies didn't see it that way at the start of the season. They had us joint 2nd favorites and I tend to agree with them in this instance.

https://insights.betfred.com/football/championship-promotion-odds-24-25-season/

Joint 3rd favourites, with pretty much nothing between us, sheff utd, Coventry, Luton and West brom. That all those teams had the same odds shows that they were guessing.

Betting follows the money anyway, not the actual chances. 

2 hours ago, AnglianRed said:

What game were you watching?

We were completely outclassed by Leeds for 75% of the game. They were literally in a different league for most of the match and Boro simply couldn't live with them. There is clearly a big gap in quality, both man for man and how effectively they play as a team. We got what we deserved.

The first half they were much better and controlled the game. In the second half we controlled the game and didn’t let Leeds play their game in their ground, not many teams will do that. If we’d have got the final pass right on two or three occasions we could have took the lead. Doak also had a great chance to put us 2-1 up. In the end we came unstuck and they deserved their goals and the win but on another night we could have won that game.

2 teams came away with 3 points from Elland Road last season and I wouldn’t be surprised if it is similar this season. Losing away at Leeds is no shame, especially in the manor we went about it. 

Listened to Carrick's post match interview. Most of what he had to say was arrogant piffle. I think he is now starting to really annoy a large section of the fans. Simply not good enough last night, and his in game management is non existent. If we don't win the next home game I think he's in for a shock.

2 minutes ago, Plastic Goat said:

Listened to Carrick's post match interview. Most of what he had to say was arrogant piffle. I think he is now starting to really annoy a large section of the fans. Simply not good enough last night, and his in game management is non existent. If we don't win the next home game I think he's in for a shock.

You should start a thread about it.