Boro V Nottingham Forest (A) 1-2

[Teemo 41]

I thought Fredricks and Friend were outstanding. Forest mate i was watching the match with worried everytime they were on the ball running forward.

[Will 2,958]

Dimi's positioning for their first goal was awful. He gave himself no chance to save it as he was stood a foot away from the near post. Yes it was a brilliant shot but if his positioning was correct he could have saved it.

 

Having watched the goal again his positioning was a little bit too close to the post but there was absolutely no way Dimi would have saved that shot even if he'd been another foot or 2 to his left.

[DanFromDownSouth 1,706]

Fredricks - 3 - Poor yesterday, offered nothing going forward, with probably all of his crosses not making the first post. Kept diving in at Antonio at every give opportunity, missing the ball entirely a lot of the time.

 

What planet are you on to give Fredericks a 3. When he was on he was one of the only players causing them real problems. Our outlet was there and when Nsue came on we looked different

 

I can't remember a time that Antonio didn't get past Fredricks. He dived into tackles non stop, most of the time missing. Leaving us exposed on the right flank, time and time again. I can't remember a single cross that he put in that was remotely dangerous!

[Guest Changing Times]

I do understand what Dan is saying here about Fredericks. I think I mentioned during the game that he'd had a lot of the ball but he then needed to do something with it. If you're getting into positions to put a cross in then you need to make some of them good ones. The reason he had a lot of space is because Antonio was often leaving the fullback to go forward and Bamford was always cutting inside to draw their fullback leaving lots of space. However as often as we got into that space yesterday, not a lot came from it really. Sometimes what looks like a great attacking outlet actually isn't one and that's exactly what happened yesterday in my opinion.

 

Defensively, he did dive in on Antonio on a few occasions as Kalas also did from memory, I think his pace worried them and they were trying to get in ahead of him all the time? Personally that seems a mistake to me as you're better off hitting him as he gets the ball rather than trying to get in ahead of him as if you fail then he's away and gone.

[DanFromDownSouth 1,706]

I thought defensively we look better when Nsue was on as he stood Antonio up, and Jockeyed him, rather than diving in. Diving in is good and effective if you get it right which unfortunately Fredericks didn't get it right.

 

Like CT has said he got into good positions and I'm not saying he didn't (Maybe the OP was worded badly) then either dallied on the ball for too long, or put in a poor cross.

[Guest Changing Times]

I can remember a similar game we had seasons ago, at home against Liverpool, possibly McClaren's first season as manager. Our outlet that day was Quedrue, we'd keep knocking the ball about and then working him free on the left hand side, not quite as advanced as Fredericks but inside their half. However not much would come of it. I think we lost that game 2-1 and our goal came right at the end from Southgate after a scramble from a set piece, other than that we never looked like scoring. The thing is, I think they let us attack them in that way because it didn't hurt them and they knew they would eventually win the ball back.

 

Yesterday was the same thing. Forest were content to let us attack them in that way because it wasn't amounting to anything. There was no quality once we got into those positions and they were defensively well set in their penalty area so when the ball did go in there they could defend it fairly comfortably. Also it's not like we've got some big target man type to get on the end of crosses anyway. We ran out of ideas long before the end of the game. The goal we did score was slightly odd rather than being well worked. With the amount of possession we had we really should have been able to force/create more chances but too often it was a bit too slow and predictable.

 

To me, yesterday was a perfect example of the limitations of someone like Leadbitter and the total inconsistency of Tomlin. When things are tight someone in the middle of the park and/or someone playing in that free role need to be able to create things and generally get hold of the game. However the game passed both of these by and it's not the first time either unfortunately.

[Denzel Zanzibar 6,972]

Dimi's positioning for their first goal was awful. He gave himself no chance to save it as he was stood a foot away from the near post. Yes it was a brilliant shot but if his positioning was correct he could have saved it.

 

Don't talk utter ***. Most keepers wouldn't have saved that either, it was a great shot from fairly close range.

[p_mards 1,365]

Dimi's positioning for their first goal was awful. He gave himself no chance to save it as he was stood a foot away from the near post. Yes it was a brilliant shot but if his positioning was correct he could have saved it.

 

Don't talk utter ***. Most keepers wouldn't have saved that either, it was a great shot from fairly close range.

Watch it again(pause on 27seconds):

 

How can I be talking "utter ***" ?. It was awful positioning as he left far too much of his left hand side exposed.

[Will 2,958]

Dimi's positioning for their first goal was awful. He gave himself no chance to save it as he was stood a foot away from the near post. Yes it was a brilliant shot but if his positioning was correct he could have saved it.

 

Don't talk utter ***. Most keepers wouldn't have saved that either, it was a great shot from fairly close range.

Watch it again(pause on 27seconds):

 

How can I be talking "utter ***" ?. It was awful positioning as he left far too much of his left hand side exposed.

 

His positioning wasn't awful, it wasn't great but it definitely wasn't awful. If he'd saved that shot it would've been one of the saves of the season regardless of where he was/could have been positioned.

[Prowler 197]

Now, now children :P

[p_mards 1,365]

Karanka will be delighted that Dimi was closer to performing a pole dance than the middle of his goal. Some Nottingham fans were probably tempted to stuff a bundle of notes down his shorts.

 

It's the sort of save that Meijas seems far better at. He has made several really good saves to them type of shots in his few games; away to Shef Wed last season, Man City away and ***nal away. It's just a shame that he can't claim crosses, handle shots close to him or throw balls. Anything else?.

[jamesp 125]

Steele would have saved it no bother

 

 

 

 

Don't have a clue what Ben Gibson was doing for that second goal

[p_mards 1,365]

Yeah Gibson was really bad for it. Also Kalas got too tight and was done by a bit of skill, then wasn't strong enough and decided to do a bit of impromptu break dancing.

 

For the opening goal the first problem was that Leadbitter and Clayton were too close to each other and left a huge gap for Garner to look up an get a shot off.

[Weasel 966]

Gibson needs to be dropped, he's awful.

[p_mards 1,365]

Gibson has really struggled without Ayala alongside him. The saying that CB's are all about partnerships is proving very true with him. Our CB's haven't been getting the same level of protection though. We should never have got that exposed for the second goal.

 

With there being no midweek game the time on the training pitch will have come at a much needed time as we have plenty of things to work on defensively, plus even help integrate Carayol back into the side as he hasn't played with a lot our new players. His return will give Karanka a good LW to select from so could convince him to put Bamford in strike instead of on the RW, with Adomah going back to his natural RW, which will give us a much better balance.