Support your club whoever is in charge, blah blah, yeah I get it. But it is becoming more of a chore to watch this dross with each passing week. Bad, bad, bad management. I want him gone, and I want him to take his **** tactics and his nasty style of football with him.
If we were going to make these kind of statements after one particularly bad performance, then Tilson would've been gone long before RM eventually cast the axe. I value your opinion on these boards as they're largely more rounded than 95% of regular posters, but I do think that kind of judgement is rash.
I thought Herd played quite well today actually.
I thought he was absolutely abysmal.
It's hard to see where we've come from and where we go from here, to be quite honest. To start with, I could see why we went with a solid three at the back and two wing-backs, as Crewe pressed with a front three onto our back line in the first half and looked to mount pressure, which is something I understand they've done continually this season (which would explain their freakish results). However, we were all over the place today. Either we weren't familiar with the formation at all, in which case we shouldn't have played it, or the players went completely to pot when it actually mattered, in which case individuals have to be held accountable.
I felt for Barker today. He's generally a consistent performer, but he had Herd gifting possession to the opposition to his left, and Coughlan doing the same to his right, leaving him conducting the job of three people himself. Clohessy was great, as always, and probably the best of an awful, awful bunch defensively. Coughlan didn't do an awful lot wrong in this field, but his distribution was abysmal. Prosser, again, I felt for. He struggled positionally, which was largely down to Johnny, Johnny Herd. Herd, IMO, was all over the place. His positioning was terrible, his distribution even worse and I genuinely can't think of a performance that played into the opposition's hand as much as Herd's today. I know I haven't been his biggest fan in the past and I know how this might come across, but I genuinely cannot see where Herd goes from here. I'm led to believe he spent a week with Crewe earlier this month, and they must've known exactly how to get to him.
In midfield, Grant and Timlin toiled but were let down massively by those around them. Soares was massively hit and miss and needed to get involved more, but Herd was miles off where he should've been and there was absolutely no balance in the team whatsoever.
Up top, the less said the better. Fairhurst, I just can't see what he offers the team at all. He's not quick, he's not good in the air and he certainly doesn't look predatory... Him and Paterson both shyed away from sticking their foot in when the ball was whipped in, and it cost us a goal in the second half... Both PS and TW went bat**** mental when Pato/Fairhurst failed to get anything on Soares' deep cross, and it led directly to Crawford being brought on who definitely looked to be more effective.
It's been said that we're a Jekyll and Hyde side at the moment, and that was more than evident today. I'm trying not to put today's blame at anybody's door, but Herd's performance enrages me every time I think about it. For the second goal, Barker had to drag himself out wide as Herd was woefully out of position and, when the cross came in, Herd was nowhere to be seen. Yes, Morris should've done better, but nobody even attempted to get anything on the delivery.
Tactically, it's hard to tell. We went in with a system that directly led to our downfall, which leads me to think that either we weren't prepared for it at all, or it just didn't translate to the playing field. Either way, it was to blame for todays abysmal showing and PS needs to learn that this crop of players don't look like functioning in a system other than 4-4-2 or, at a push, 4-3-3/4-5-1.
Ratings, for Pringello's benefit.
Morris - 6 - Distribution was good as ever and was tragically let down for the goals.
Clohessy - 6 - Easily our best signing this Summer, with Corr a close runner up.
Barker - 6 - Let down by those around him
Coughlan - 5 - Defensively sound, anything else was terrible
Prosser - 5 - If he was meant to play CB, then he was good enough aside from one slip. If he was meant to play LB, he was out of position most of today.
Herd - 4 - Less said the better
Grant - 7 - Never say die attitude, yet again.
Timlin - 7 - Class act when things were going his way, showed some spirit when it wasn't.
Soares - 6 - Difficult to judge as we were so imbalanced.
Fairhurst - 4 - Bye.
Paterson - 5 - Ineffectual, needs to develop a pair of testicles and put his body on the line for the cause.
Subs - Hall - 7 - We looked a far better outfit when he was introduced with, funnily enough, more balance.
Jarvis - 5 - Pretty ineffecutal, but the game was long gone by the time he came on.
Crawford -6 - Impressive work rate.
