ToffeeWeb - Season 2009-10

The Mail Bag

Turning point

Obviously we have lost the derby game and we are very down right now... especially that we only have one win in eleven games. However, we completely outplayed Liverpool and it is hard to comprehend how we did not win that game let alone lose it.

With the swagger returning to our play and the determination back, I wouldn't be surprised if this game inspires the team to start a run of good results, ie, like the Villa game last year. Let's hope we can get things rolling on Wednesday against a poor AEK team. COYB
Ian Tod, liverpool Posted 30/11/2009 at 14:15:03

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Ray Robinson
1 Posted 30/11/2009 at 20:16:53

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Ian, I get the gist of your post in that we dominated Liverpool but at no point do I think we "outplayed" them. We deserved at least a point but don’t mistake blood and guts, spirit and fight, which we had in abundance, for good football. Martin Keown was spot on with this analysis last night on MOTD2.

Bryan Douglas
2 Posted 30/11/2009 at 20:51:34

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Ian, we did not win because we didn’t score the three goals required — in fact we scored NONE, nil, zilck, nottin’.

James Newcombe
3 Posted 30/11/2009 at 21:38:36

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You’re right, Keown was absolutely correct. Now - if he can see the futility of packing a midfield with players and then punting long balls over all of them, for a lone forward to sort out - and most of the fans can see it... Why are we playing this way?
I refuse to believe that the players aren’t capable of passing and moving into space. No matter what your opinion on individuals in the squad, you don’t get to play professional football - never mind in the Premier League - without being a bit skillful with a ball at your feet?

Dick Fearon
4 Posted 30/11/2009 at 21:40:18

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We lost the derby because we did not create enough scoring opportunities. The closer we got to the others' goal, the more we ran out of ideas. Tiny and Bily’s efforts were our only 2 clear cut chances.

Over the years at all levels of the game I have seen hundreds of really crap teams yet even the worst of them playing against top clubs have been able to forge more goal scoring chances. As said by someone in an earlier post, if you aim for a low scoring game there is always a danger of losing to a fluke goal.

We have known for years that Moyes lacks attacking flair but the departure of Irvine, another dour defensive minded Scot, and the incoming of much vaunted Steve Round suggested that things would change. Any hope we had that Round would act as a counterbalance to Moyes's ultra-cautious nature was proved false. If anything, it has got worse.

Tom Bowers
5 Posted 30/11/2009 at 23:15:18

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In agreement with most of these posts. Got to say we are quite limited when it comes to creating chances. There was a time for a while (but not recently) when Baines was very effective getting down the flank and crossing dangerously but that has waned. We are still pumping in the high balls to people with their backs to the goal and nothing happens except an easy clearance for the opposition.

Fellaini, despite his height, is very poor one-on-one in the air, much like Crouch. In fact, if he was 4 inches shorter I wouldn’t have him in my Sunday team. Yobo is another who doesn’t compete well in the air. It’s all down to timing and some have it and some don’t.

We cannot use certain players again in Athens but, even if we could, I’m not so sure we could muster a win in that volatile climate — just like Lisbon. DM will go for the draw again and it will be a nailbiter once again. However, we have to turn the corner sometime so why not in this game... even if we get hammered for 89 minutes and snatch a winning goal.

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