Boro Vs Watford (Away) 0-0

[thomas 501]

Shut up shop against the big boys and top half of the table, but play with a bit of intent against the lower teams.

 

The worst part for me is that games that we draw 'could' have been won with a bit more attacking threat. Not every game has to have the same approach of being solid. You need risks at times to win football games.

 

100% agree with that, remember what happened to man city when we came out in the second half more postive, we did not over commit we were not exposed at the back it was beautiful but it took us going one nil down for them for them to think oww we have got to attack now why cant we start like that.

[wilsoncgp 9,283]

karanka doesnt do risk, but if this style of football continues, he will have too as we are chucking away too many points and seriously need too start gaining more

 

Well he didn't throw any points away today. We weren't in the lead and we left with a point. Could be worse than a 0-0 away from home. I don't feel having watched the game that Watford were there for the taking either. We set up to cancel them out and that's what we did. Not the most positive of games but could be much much worse than that.

[Ayresome7 187]

How did we not lose this game 3 or 4-0?

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=faYfuFAY3I0

[Jimmy 140]

Interesting point about those saying that we don't play negative football and it's just our lack of decent attacking players letting us down.. but obviously having the worst stats in the league for goals, shots, chances etc does that mean people think the likes of Hull, Sunderland, Burnley etc have got better attacking players than us?

Genuine question, not trying to argue.

[thathornet 0]

Thanks for singing there's only one graham taylor. I couldn't because I was somewhat choked up. Especially seeing his wife and family were there.

 

Watford could have won, but so could Boro with a touch of luck. If you consider what would happen if you opened up? There would have been more likely a win either way. We had very little space anywhere to create much, if you give us space by being more attacking then I would suggest 70-30 that we would have higher chances of winning the game. This is v Watford away not Man city or Spurs or Liverpool. You're doing ok, with the players you've got. Occasionally you'll stifle decent teams and snatch a winner with that and I think it'll keep you up - but its not exciting. Would you swap for gung ho, goals but relegated? Maybe next season you should expect more once your secure and can justify a top name signing or three.

[Tom 2,492]

Thanks for singing there's only one graham taylor. I couldn't because I was somewhat choked up. Especially seeing his wife and family were there.

 

Watford could have won, but so could Boro with a touch of luck. If you consider what would happen if you opened up? There would have been more likely a win either way. We had very little space anywhere to create much, if you give us space by being more attacking then I would suggest 70-30 that we would have higher chances of winning the game. This is v Watford away not Man city or Spurs or Liverpool. You're doing ok, with the players you've got. Occasionally you'll stifle decent teams and snatch a winner with that and I think it'll keep you up - but its not exciting. Would you swap for gung ho, goals but relegated? Maybe next season you should expect more once your secure and can justify a top name signing or three.

 

Good post that, mate. Very nice to see an outsider's perspective.

[Uwe 3,545]

Interesting point about those saying that we don't play negative football and it's just our lack of decent attacking players letting us down.. but obviously having the worst stats in the league for goals, shots, chances etc does that mean people think the likes of Hull, Sunderland, Burnley etc have got better attacking players than us?

Genuine question, not trying to argue.

 

I don't think it's as simple as saying it's either AK's tactics or our formation or our attacking lines abilities. And fixing one of those things will somehow magically sort out our lack of goals. It will be a perfect storm if all of those things. Sorting out the three behind the striker will go some way to helping out with goals. But until the DM's can help link up the whole of the team we will always be lacklustre in attack. We know that's not Claytons job, as much as I live Grant I don't think he's good enough to do it in the prem and we saw how toothless we were when Forshaw has a poor game.

But we can't do it all at once and I think our attacking 3 are the ones karanka is looking at fixing first and rightly so too. Then we can look at upgrading our 'box to box' midfielder

[Uwe 3,545]

Thanks for singing there's only one graham taylor. I couldn't because I was somewhat choked up. Especially seeing his wife and family were there.

 

Watford could have won, but so could Boro with a touch of luck. If you consider what would happen if you opened up? There would have been more likely a win either way. We had very little space anywhere to create much, if you give us space by being more attacking then I would suggest 70-30 that we would have higher chances of winning the game. This is v Watford away not Man city or Spurs or Liverpool. You're doing ok, with the players you've got. Occasionally you'll stifle decent teams and snatch a winner with that and I think it'll keep you up - but its not exciting. Would you swap for gung ho, goals but relegated? Maybe next season you should expect more once your secure and can justify a top name signing or three.

 

Good post that, mate. Very nice to see an outsider's perspective.

 

Cheers for that Hornet ?

Even though it's exact what I said in another thread, you're obviously a very intelligent bloke :D

["KM" 1,656]

Interesting point about those saying that we don't play negative football and it's just our lack of decent attacking players letting us down.. but obviously having the worst stats in the league for goals, shots, chances etc does that mean people think the likes of Hull, Sunderland, Burnley etc have got better attacking players than us?

Genuine question, not trying to argue.

 

I don't buy into that theory either. We will play exactly the same brand of football even with these supposed new signings that are coming in. Aitor sets us up not to lose and this is where this ultra defensive brand of football derives from. The style isn't pleasing on the eye but if it keeps us up it's a good foundation to build on next season.

[Betamaxman 14]

I was at the Bristol v Cardiff fans where Bristol lost 3-2.

Wasn't a particularly exciting or entertaining game and believe me when I say none of be Bristol fans were walking away saying

 

Oh well at least we attack 'd :s

 

Context mate. If they watched totally defensive football week after week, they may well have been saying 'Oh well, at least we attacked', despite having lost by a single goal.

 

In the same way that I would have rather have seen us 'have a go' and lose 3-2, than lose 1-0 in the 95th minute away to Bristol City like we did last season.

 

We looked more like the team in the bottom three in that match, than the team who were top of the league.

 

Someone made a really good point a few posts ago. Against the top half of this division, the defensive approach is totally warranted. Against lower teams I think we do sometimes need to shake off the shackles.

[ManBearPig 1,853]

It's not the players we have, it's how Karanka tells them to play.

 

Remember Swansea when we won 3-0? Clayton was high up to give Negredo an assist and then De Roon scored. I'm sure Karanka said he was unhappy as it was a bad performance shape wise from us because they didn't stay in the middle and pushed too high up?

[wilsoncgp 9,283]

It's not the players we have, it's how Karanka tells them to play.

 

Remember Swansea when we won 3-0? Clayton was high up to give Negredo an assist and then De Roon scored. I'm sure Karanka said he was unhappy as it was a bad performance shape wise from us because they didn't stay in the middle and pushed too high up?

 

All I'll say to this is that it will be interesting to see what happens after this window, should we get all the reinforcements we are after at the top end of the pitch. Ultimately that will decide whether your first statement is correct or not.

 

The only reason I can't agree for sure right now is that I personally don't believe we have the players to play any good attacking football. When you consider the squad and see that, with Ramirez injured, our most creative players are our full backs, it is very difficult to say that it isn't the players.

 

We have a defence-oriented squad, at least in terms of where the quality lies. Having good strikers, as I believe we do in Negredo, Gestede and Stuani, does not mean we have good attacking options. The disconnect lies in between the 2. Adding Bojan and Snodgrass would certainly help with that.

[ManBearPig 1,853]

It's not the players we have, it's how Karanka tells them to play.

 

Remember Swansea when we won 3-0? Clayton was high up to give Negredo an assist and then De Roon scored. I'm sure Karanka said he was unhappy as it was a bad performance shape wise from us because they didn't stay in the middle and pushed too high up?

 

All I'll say to this is that it will be interesting to see what happens after this window, should we get all the reinforcements we are after at the top end of the pitch. Ultimately that will decide whether your first statement is correct or not.

 

The only reason I can't agree for sure right now is that I personally don't believe we have the players to play any good attacking football. When you consider the squad and see that, with Ramirez injured, our most creative players are our full backs, it is very difficult to say that it isn't the players.

 

We have a defence-oriented squad, at least in terms of where the quality lies. Having good strikers, as I believe we do in Negredo, Gestede and Stuani, does not mean we have good attacking options. The disconnect lies in between the 2. Adding Bojan and Snodgrass would certainly help with that.

 

Disagree. Clayton at Huddersfield scored goals from Midfield (11) in the same time with us he has scored (1). But now he plays further back.

 

It's obvious when you watch that we keep possession over taking risks. We do have the players who can attack, we just chose not to. Downing and Ramirez are all capable of scoring goals, but they have to sacrifice that over defensive positions.

 

Like you, I hope with this window Karanka can get some people in to help with this. But I can't help in the back of my mind that we could have Aguero up front and still not get enough people to support him.

[Will 2,958]

It's not the players we have, it's how Karanka tells them to play.

 

Remember Swansea when we won 3-0? Clayton was high up to give Negredo an assist and then De Roon scored. I'm sure Karanka said he was unhappy as it was a bad performance shape wise from us because they didn't stay in the middle and pushed too high up?

 

All I'll say to this is that it will be interesting to see what happens after this window, should we get all the reinforcements we are after at the top end of the pitch. Ultimately that will decide whether your first statement is correct or not.

 

The only reason I can't agree for sure right now is that I personally don't believe we have the players to play any good attacking football. When you consider the squad and see that, with Ramirez injured, our most creative players are our full backs, it is very difficult to say that it isn't the players.

 

We have a defence-oriented squad, at least in terms of where the quality lies. Having good strikers, as I believe we do in Negredo, Gestede and Stuani, does not mean we have good attacking options. The disconnect lies in between the 2. Adding Bojan and Snodgrass would certainly help with that.

 

Disagree. Clayton at Huddersfield scored goals from Midfield (11) in the same time with us he has scored (1). But now he plays further back.

 

It's obvious when you watch that we keep possession over taking risks. We do have the players who can attack, we just chose not to. Downing and Ramirez are all capable of scoring goals, but they have to sacrifice that over defensive positions.

 

Like you, I hope with this window Karanka can get some people in to help with this. But I can't help in the back of my mind that we could have Aguero up front and still not get enough people to support him.

 

Clayton is a really bad example. At Huddersfield he was playing as an attacking midfielder but Karanka identified that his best qualities were actually breaking up play and covering a lot of ground, so he moved him deeper into a midfield two, initially. Comparing his goal stats when he was an attacking player against now where he is the screen in front of the back four is just stupid.

 

Ramirez does take risks, they don't always come off but he definitely does take risks. Downing's desire, or lack of, is nothing to do with tactics, we've seen other players in our system take a lot more risks than he does and stay in the side week after week. Downings biggest problem is himself, always has been.

[ManBearPig 1,853]

It's not the players we have, it's how Karanka tells them to play.

 

Remember Swansea when we won 3-0? Clayton was high up to give Negredo an assist and then De Roon scored. I'm sure Karanka said he was unhappy as it was a bad performance shape wise from us because they didn't stay in the middle and pushed too high up?

 

All I'll say to this is that it will be interesting to see what happens after this window, should we get all the reinforcements we are after at the top end of the pitch. Ultimately that will decide whether your first statement is correct or not.

 

The only reason I can't agree for sure right now is that I personally don't believe we have the players to play any good attacking football. When you consider the squad and see that, with Ramirez injured, our most creative players are our full backs, it is very difficult to say that it isn't the players.

 

We have a defence-oriented squad, at least in terms of where the quality lies. Having good strikers, as I believe we do in Negredo, Gestede and Stuani, does not mean we have good attacking options. The disconnect lies in between the 2. Adding Bojan and Snodgrass would certainly help with that.

 

Disagree. Clayton at Huddersfield scored goals from Midfield (11) in the same time with us he has scored (1). But now he plays further back.

 

It's obvious when you watch that we keep possession over taking risks. We do have the players who can attack, we just chose not to. Downing and Ramirez are all capable of scoring goals, but they have to sacrifice that over defensive positions.

 

Like you, I hope with this window Karanka can get some people in to help with this. But I can't help in the back of my mind that we could have Aguero up front and still not get enough people to support him.

 

Clayton is a really bad example. At Huddersfield he was playing as an attacking midfielder but Karanka identified that his best qualities were actually breaking up play and covering a lot of ground, so he moved him deeper into a midfield two, initially. Comparing his goal stats when he was an attacking player against now where he is the screen in front of the back four is just stupid.

 

Ramirez does take risks, they don't always come off but he definitely does take risks. Downing's desire, or lack of, is nothing to do with tactics, we've seen other players in our system take a lot more risks than he does and stay in the side week after week. Downings biggest problem is himself, always has been.

 

Okay...so you agree with me that Clayton has been moved to a different position? My point was that his stats for goals are lower because of this reason. Hence, taking an attacking player and making them more defensive. So Clayton is a good example of Karanka adopting for a more defensive approach? Clayton has all the attributes to be a box to box midfielder, but he plays with the handbrake on. Don't get me wrong, I think he is fantastic as a cdm, but I also feel he could and should offer more.

 

We'll disagree about Downing, if we played him in CAM he is a totally different player to the one on the left. But he can't attack as much due to having to cover Friend. Once again, this takes away our attacking threat.