Hoof !

Anybody else find it embarrassing when throughout the second half the Hudersfield fans shouted "Hoof" every time we got the ball ? Surely it's time to at least try and play some football on the ground. Fitness teamwork and spoiling works to a certain extent but not for ever. It's our attitude that's wrong - there was one time in the decond half when they had 2 men in our penalty area - we had 8 !

Tarkowski seemed to be particularly guilty of launching it long, particularly in the second half. I don’t know whether he had been told to do that or not, but they just seemed to be blind hoofs upfield more often than not.

I don't know what you're talking about. First 60 minutes we did nothing but push it around and look for openings, like a not quite as good Arsenal. This was having no results. We were never going to score. Partially because Huddersfield were very disciplined and partially because we don't have the skill to land the killer blow. Yes, it got more direct after that including the slightly amusing sight of Tarkowski twice simply leathering it as far as he could with no regard for direction or likely outcome but you wouldn't want a manager that couldn't change things when need be.

kindonyes wrote:Anybody else find it embarrassing when throughout the second half the Hudersfield fans shouted "Hoof" every time we got the ball ?

No.

Should we try to pass through teams and be more gung Ho and have less players in our box?

We'd get beat 3-0, would you be happy with this style?

It's the PL, it's a case of scrapping your way to 40 points.

Teams have done their homework on us on how to play at TM.

I much prefer watching the likes of cork/defour picking up the ball from the defence and then trying to work the ball forward however, it was far too often there was no movement.

If you are going to play 4-5-1, to me it would suggest that you are looking to use the width of the pitch and yesterday, we didn't do that anywhere near as much as we should. The only real chance we had where Wood headed wide, came from that movement. The only time we looked dangerous was when we got the 1-2 passing with some speed.

It looked laboured at times and I thought our players looked a bit tired if Im being honest - did wonder whether the Leeds game had helped.. Still a point we had and we move on.

Think we may see a difference when Wells is fit. He will offer something different.

Its still an excellent start to the season so let's keep some perspective on it.

kaptin1 wrote:Tarkowski seemed to be particularly guilty of launching it long, particularly in the second half. I don’t know whether he had been told to do that or not, but they just seemed to be blind hoofs upfield more often than not.

Problem was there was no outlet ball to be played. One thing for sure two teams like that and the grass on the wings will be pristine at the end of the season

When we signed Wood it was pretty obvious how Dyche was intending to play.

Anybody else remember the clamour down the road for a Change of style away from big fat Sams perceived 'hoof'. That went well, didn't it!

Why are you fretting over what the Huddersfield fans were chanting?

I can't believe we are in season 4, and still people are still harping in about our style.
We have the same manager, with the same ideas on how he wants us to play.
We've got 4 strikers who like a scrap, header and are best with their backs to goal, and we signed a supposedly dead ball specialist.
We don't play football, we play the percentages.

If it gets us 40 points a season and we finish 17th then it's objectives achieved.

We played some decent stuff yesterday until the delivery.
All this talk of our first half and their second is wrong.
It was our game until we changed to 4-4-2, then they took over.

We do mix it up. I thought we were trying to over complicate it at times, the small margins seemed against us yesterday. Final ball's weren't quite at it, controlling and distribution seemed a bit off. That and some excellent defending. They had done their homework and had clearly a game plan to frustrate. Very little space for us to work in. It made for a niggly, bitty game but I kind of expected it to be that way. The onus was on us to come at them. They were compact, defensively throwing bodies on the line and hitting us on the break. Now who does that remind you of? They almost out Burnleyed us.

Huddersfield fans thought they had won the league judging by their reaction at full time. Never seen a manager so delighted with a 0-0 draw.

Thought we were very negative yesterday.
Ward in particular in 2nd half always looked to play the ball backwards letting Hudders regroup.

We're not going to change styles but maybe focus on ball work more in training.

NL Claret wrote:Huddersfield fans thought they had won the league judging by their reaction at full time. Never seen a manager so delighted with a 0-0 draw.

You missed our game at Old Trafford last season?

[quote="kindonyes"]
Anybody else find it embarrassing when throughout the second half the Hudersfield fans shouted "Hoof" every time we got the ball ? /quote]

You must have led a sheltered life if things like that embarrass you! UTC

Tall Paul wrote:You missed our game at Old Trafford last season?

And Liverpool this season.

4-5-1 is excellent away but does not work at home. Makes us hard to beat but easy to shut down

The second half was a poor spectacle but we will have to win and draw ugly this season to get the
points. The best we played for 90 mins was against W Brom but we lost. We are clearly not creating enough chances though.

Mixed. That's the best way for us to play and it's how we do play. Passing mixed with direct play.

Drop ward and bring ray deakin in

Quickenthetempo wrote:We're not going to change styles but maybe focus on ball work more in training.

But we've NEVER focussed on ball work since Dyche came. Hard work yes, but not (foot)ball work.

kindonyes wrote:But we've NEVER focussed on ball work since Dyche came. Hard work yes, but not (foot)ball work.

Changing to 451 means we need to. Some of the touches and passes yesterday were diabolical, it creates doubt and affects trust in passing to certain players.

The quicker it's sorted the better.

I'd much prefer the away fans to shout "whoosh".

kindonyes wrote:Hoof !

Anybody else find it embarrassing when throughout the second half the Hudersfield fans shouted "Hoof" every time we got the ball ? Surely it's time to at least try and play some football on the ground. Fitness teamwork and spoiling works to a certain extent but not for ever. It's our attitude that's wrong - there was one time in the decond half when they had 2 men in our penalty area - we had 8 !

What name do you normally post under?or have you created an account to get that off your chest?

FCBurnley wrote:4-5-1 is excellent away but does not work at home. Makes us hard to beat but easy to shut down

Spot on !

After our awful away performances last season SD has at last recognised the need to change from 4-4-2, and the 4-5-1 formation is already bringing points onto the table

However, playing 4-4-2 at home was our strength last season. Yes we had a stumbled run of home form after Xmas but I think SD had decided that from Jan he would be happy to accept draws at home given we had points in the bank

I was hoping for a point against WBA and 3 from Huddersfield at the start of this season, 4-4-2 could have achieved that

As someone has already stated, we just tried to over complicate it yesterday.
The passing was bloody awful, but mainly because we never took the easy pass and tried to be clever. There was also a lack of urgency about our game, and against teams that harass like Huddersfield did, and we do against the bigger clubs, if you don't play the ball quickly they snuff out everything.

Nothing to do with style, nothing to do with formation, and nothing to do with the players selected, but all about the players doing their jobs. Yesterday they didn't.

kindonyes wrote:Hoof !

Anybody else find it embarrassing when throughout the second half the Hudersfield fans shouted "Hoof" every time we got the ball ?

No - and did they?

I am confused.

We played 442 against palace and hardly touched the ball. Dyche got the usual utc criticism but now 442 is the future again.

Do any of the utc experts take into account the opposition and they will be fully aware of our home form from last season and set up accordingly.

Playing 442 again yesterday would have given them anow extra man in midfield and allowed them to play out from the back which is their preferred style.

I thought in the first half yesterday, the football we tried to play was OK. We mixed the game up and went long to Wood a bit, but we did also look to work it through midfield a healthy amount. The trouble was that too often we moved the ball a bit slowly (the one thing neither Defour nor Cork have in their locker is a raking cross field pass), and as someone else said above, as is often the way under Dyche when we have played football, it was all a bit stilted and lacking in tempo. This wasn't helped by the fact that we lacked width and anyone willing to run beyond - all of Hendrick, Arfield and Brady tended to come short, and in the case of Arfield in particular very narrow.

In the second half, I thought our football went down hill fast and by the time Huddersfield decided to make a positive change after 60 minutes, I thought our performance had become ragged and a bit direct when what we really needed was to keep playing the same way but with more tempo and more width. I thought it reflected badly on Dyche that the first manager to try and change the pattern of the game was Wagner.

The final nail in the coffin of our performance was the decision to bring Barnes on and go 4-4-2. That could be considered a positive change; I'd say it was negative because after that none of our players bar Defour showed the slightest interest in playing neat, incisive football on the deck and we increasingly tried to just launch it. Dyche occasionally gets caricatured by opposing fans as a bit neanderthal - that is unfair, but substitutions like the ones we made yesterday really don't help his reputation in that regard. Quite why the first change wasn't to keep the same system but bring on JBG and give him licence to play high and wide to stretch the game is anyone's guess.

smudge wrote:And Liverpool this season.

Liverpool wasn't 0-0.

smudge wrote:And Liverpool this season.

Getting a draw away against Man U or Liverpool is a world apart for getting a draw against a team like us. It’s perfectly reasonable for us to celebrate the former like we’d won a cup, I’m not sure we’d have celebrated a draw away at Huddersfield quite as much.

We need to remember that it’s all about baby steps for us. I’d prefer to carry on as we are rather than spend a load of cash trying to change our style in one go. Look at palace to see where that gets you!

thatdberight wrote:I don't know what you're talking about. First 60 minutes we did nothing but push it around and look for openings,

Aye, there was a spell in the first half where Huddersfield couldn't get the ball.

It was all quite lovely but really frustrating when we got near their box.

The sooner we stop this unbeaten run, the better!

The footballs pretty hard to watch, even when we pass it around its still boring with no intensity and more players behind the ball.

I'll be happy if we stay up but it will be an absolute uninspiring bag of tosh until then and I have to just accept that. I just don't enjoy Dyches football at all but I like his results, no enjoyment watching us play but I enjoy looking at the league table. Its a hard balance

Just stay in the division and improve year after year. I don't care if we play crap and stay up

I'm embarrassed that they shouted "Hoof" Do they not know that it was us that invented the term "whoosh" for this very thing.

I think it showed that Wood is not as effective a target man as Vokes is. The ball didn't stick with him. He's probably better with an end product than Sam though. It does suggest not playing the long ball but getting wide to put crosses in.

NRC wrote:I think it showed that Wood is not as effective a target man as Vokes is. The ball didn't stick with him. He's probably better with an end product than Sam though. It does suggest not playing the long ball but getting wide to put crosses in.

I agree with that, but it requires Brady, Arfield or JBG to run at or behind defenders and get into the corners, instead they turn back and pass it to the halfway line.
Very bloody frustrating.

Vegas Claret wrote:Just stay in the division and improve year after year. I don't care if we play crap and stay up

Just exactly what I have been thinking. It's the only way to the top.

It's clear we need some pace, someone to make the defenders turn and get them running towards there own goal. The best we can do is play Defour further forwards and hope his passing can find gaps for Brady/JBG/Ward/Lowton.

Our best chances are going to be from crosses, let's get some in the box.

I like the Defour and Cork partnership and think Defour is best playing deeper but at home only maybe it is worth playing him further forward to inject some creativity.

The way we played against Chelsea away should be the style we are looking to replicate, was an amazing attacking team performance so it's in them!

.

There really isn't that much wrong with us. Perhaps a bit predictable?
One thing I would like to see is a bit more shooting from around the outside of the penalty area.

It's not a change of style really; more a change of personnel.

If we're going to hit long balls to a lone front man then we simply have to start Vokes. Wood isn't a target man in the same way as Sam, not at all. However, if we play less long balls and concentrate more on playing the ball through the midfield and out wide then I think Wood works.

It all comes from good ball retention and the only way you can have that is by playing your best footballers. Therefore Westwood has to start. You need 3 midfielders who can play one and two touch football quickly in little triangles to create the space to make chances. Hendrick isn't as quick as the other options we have.

You then need full backs who will get on the overlap and put in first time crosses for the striker and more advanced midfielder. It's not rocket science. We have options this season and I'd like to see SD use them.

Something like this would be interesting from an attacking sense. Taylor and Lowton would both be able to support the wingers and in Arfield, Defour and Brady you have three players capable of playing first time or running on. The only issue I have is it's not a very physical 11, but is that the trade off when wanting to enhance your game a little?

Pope
Lowton Tarky Mee Taylor
Westwood Cork
Arfield Defour Brady
Wood

boatshed bill wrote:There really isn't that much wrong with us. Perhaps a bit predictable?
One thing I would like to see is a bit more shooting from around the outside of the penalty area.

We tried that against WBA.

We probably should have done something like buy a striker who could play.