Burnley v Stoke - Player Ratings

[ClaretTony]

Please leave ratings for all players who have played 20 mins or more.


Scoring is from 3 to 10 as follows:

10 - Out of this World
9 - Excellent
8 - Very Good
7 -Good
6 - Average
5 - Below Par
4 - Poor
3 - Abysmal

[Milltown1882]

From 8s/9s for everyone last week to this, so disappointing.

Trafford - 8 - did what he had to do well, more than can be said for a few others.
Pires- 5 - totally do not understand the hype
Roberts - 5 - bang average
Esteve - 7 - standard performance
CJ - 7 - some sloppy distribution but solid defensively
Cullen - 6 - under the radar for not doing much today
Brownhill - 6 - has to bury the chance before the Laurent miss
Koleosho - 4 - do we have the receipt for the Wolves offer
Sarmiento - 4 - wouldn’t be missed if he got sent back tomorrow
Anthony - 4 - 4s all around for a slow, laboured performance from the 3 behind the striker
Jay - 3 - anonymous

Special 1 out of 10 for Hannibal for the stupidest decisions I’ve ever Turf Moor has seen since the Akinbiyi headbutt.

Serious concerns for Ewood after that.

[fidelcastro]

Trafford 7
Roberts 7
Esteve 7
Egan-Riley 8
Lucas Pires 6
Brownhill 7
Cullen 7
Anthony 6
Sarmiento 7
Koleosho 4
Rodriguez 5

Flemming 6
Hannibal 4

[sjb]

Trafford 8
Roberts 7
Egan Riley 8
Esteve 7
Pires 5 Will never be half the player Humphries is
Anthony 6
Brownhill 6
Cullen 6
Sarmiento 5
Rodriguez 5 Time to call it a day Jay
Koleosho 5 absolutely frustrating player

Laurent 5
Flemming 3 Contributed the square root of nothing
Humphries 7
Foster 6

[LincsWoldsClaret]

Trafford 7
Roberts 7* - created most of our chances which shows huw ineffective some performances were
Esteve 7
Egan-Riley 7
Lucas Pires 5
Brownhill 6
Cullen 4
Anthony 7 - far better on the right
Sarmiento 5
Koleosho 5
Rodriguez 5

Flemming 4
Hannibal - whatever the lowest score is

[HahaYeah]

Trafford 7
Roberts 7
Egan Riley 7
Esteve 7
Pires 7
Cullen 6
Brownhill 6
Koleosho 6
Sarmiento 6
Anthony 7
Rodriguez 7

Subs:
Flemming 4
Laurent 6
Hannibal 3
Humphreys na
Foster na

[RVclaret]

Trafford 8 - actually called upon today, distribution too slow
Roberts 7 - main creator
CJ 7 - generally fine
Esteve 9* - won almost everything
Pires 3 - not good at all, again
Cullen 5 - tired performance
Brownhill 4 - nowhere near as effective deeper today
Koleosho 4 - does something amazing then terrible
Sarmiento 5 - couldn’t get into it
Anthony 4 - this was his 1 in every 4 complete stinker
Rodriguez 3 - ponderous

Flemming 5 - wasted a good 2 on 1 opportunity
Hannibal 4

Appreciate it’s been a tough festive period for us in terms of games, and so changing the system & personnel from something thats been working was never ideal. Everything we did well v Watford in the last home game was missing today and up against a hard working Stoke we rarely had the answer. Our final pass, shot or whatever is quite painful to be honest.

[BurnleyFC]

Trafford 6
Roberts 5
Egan Riley 7
Esteve 7
Pires 6
Cullen 6
Brownhill 6
Koleosho 5
Sarmiento 5
Anthony 6
Rodriguez 5

Flemming 5
Hannibal 3

[cockneyclaret]

Trafford 7
Roberts 7*
Egan Riley 7
Esteve 7
Pires 5
Cullen 6
Brownhill 6
Koleosho 4
Sarmiento 6
Anthony 7
Rodriguez 4

Subs:
Flemming 5
Laurent 6
Hannibal 4
Humphreys 6
Foster na

[Overseascricketer]

Trafford- 5. Has no idea when to speed a game up. Never known a goalkeeper slow it down as much as him with time running out

Roberts- 6. Did okay
CJ- 8. Man of the match. Enough said.
Esteve- 7.
Pires. 4. Doesn’t look like a footballer

Cullen- 7. How we take him off is beyond me
Brownhill- 5. Tries to do far too much. If you give him the gloves he’d want to play in goal too

Anthony- 6. Needs to beat a man.
Sarmiento- 6. Quiet
Koleosho- 3. God awful. Hope he gets rested for the season now.

Rodriguez- 4. Non existent

Subs
Flemming- 7. Got stuck in and got involved
Foster- 7. (+1) got stuck in
Hannibal- 4. Stupidity to get sent off
Humphreys- 6
Laurent- 6

Will we ever look like breaking a team down. Brownhill is not a holding midfielder. And I cannot believe we take our best ball playing midfielder off when we need to try and unpick a defence.

[Casper2]

Trafford 6
Roberts 5
Egan Riley 7
Esteve 7
Pires 5
Cullen 5
Brownhill 4
Koleosho 4
Sarmiento 4
Anthony 4
Rodriguez 3

Flemming 3
Hannibal 3

[RalphCoatesComb]

Trafford 7
Roberts 7
Esteve 7 *
Egan-Riley 7
Lucas Pires 5
Brownhill 7
Cullen 7
Anthony 6
Sarmiento 7
Koleosho 5
Rodriguez 6

Flemming 6
Hannibal 3
Laurent 6

No excuses please. Not good enough. We should be steam-rolling teams like Stoke. We even made them look good at times.

[Dark Cloud]

Trafford 6 (People say he's going to be an England cornerstone at some point, but he's going to have to buck up with the ball at his feet if he is!!)
Roberts 7
Egan Riley 8
Esteve 8
Pires 6 (Not as crap as some are making out imo)
Cullen 6
Brownhill 5 (Basically anonymous until he missed in the 96th minute!)
Koleosho 3 (Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear!!)
Sarmiento 7
Anthony 6
Jay 5

Flemming 5
Foster 6
Humphreys 6
Laurent 7

It's all sooooooo sloooooow! Yet again, we're the far better "footballing" team, but we can't make many genuine scoring chances against a workmanlike defence, we constantly find ways to give poor teams opportunities of their own and I'm desperately trying to see us as a top 2 team come May and I can't because we really aren't there! Ironically we carved the best chance in the 97th minute and could have nicked it, but then again they missed a free header on 95 minutes, so I'll not complain too much! I didn't see what happened with Hannibal other than their full back dived to win the initial foul, but tbf Hannibal didn't argue which possibly tells its own story. And as for Koleosho, that's got to be one of the worst displays I've witnessed in a long time. Make it clear we're open to offers from today!!!

[Hipper]

From TV.

Trafford - 7 MoM - The only player to perform consistently well - except for one loss of concentration.

Roberts - 7 - One of our better players.

Egan-Riley - 5 - A bit shaky, weak and some poor passing as well.

Esteve - 7 - Also a bit shaky from what we are accustomed to but generally held things together.

Pires - 5 - Doesn’t seem to be making any progress. Sloppy, not too effective in attack either.

Brownhill - 6 - Didn’t seem to have his usual drive.

Cullen - 6 - Good in the first half but a poor second.

Sarmiento - 6 - Tidy play, not very effective. Poor shooting.

Koleosho - 5 - Oh dear. He tries hard enough and he had a shot but after beating three men he lost it, then works hard and gets it back, then loses it again. Is he ever going to improve?

Rodriguez - 5 - Offered practically nothing.

Anthony - 6 - Down from recent dizzying heights. Crosses good, Shooting awful.

Subs.

Hannibal - 0 - Luckily he wasn’t on long enough to mark but offered little whilst on and then, after a few disciplined games, reverts to type and gets the most stupid of reds. I don’t want to see him again.

We had lost the plot by the time the last four subs came on and none made that much difference.

Laurent - 6 - I didn’t expect him to score at the end anyway but it was difficult and if he had got it on target the goalkeeper had it covered.

Flemming - 5 - Offered very little. Why didn’t he shoot first time when he had the chance (again!). We and he know he can hit the target from that distance.

Not on Long enough.

Humphreys - Got a few late crosses in.

Foster - 10! - He actually got a shot on target. It was a pleasure to see after all the awful attempts by his colleagues.

Very disappointing. We have now come down to earth after a couple of good results and performances and are back where we were in October - unable to beat average/mediocre opposition. In fact it’s worse as Stoke probably should have won it.

Firstly, although Stoke were awful against Leeds they played quite well today, did not park the pass but tried to win.

Our line-up. I can only assume that with another game on Saturday, the four players missing from what seems to be our best starting eleven (Flemming, Humphreys, Laurent, Hannibal) were resting. If it was tactical it was a failure.

The first half was quite frustrating but entertaining to some degree. I had a naive belief we could score. Unfortunately whilst we created reasonable but not clear cut opportunities, no one seems to know how to hit the target - eight shots, mostly high over the bar. Very poor. Stoke weren’t much better when they went forward and our defence seemed a bit shaky. Things should get better in the second half after a chat with SP.

They got worse. As the game wore on we lost control of it and Stoke were able to create a couple decent opportunities where they should have done better, notably Cannon’s effort straight at Trafford. By the time the subs were made it seemed obvious we weren’t going to score even though there’s always hope isn’t there. I should have known better.

The positive. We didn’t lose and we so easily could have.

A note about the television coverage. It was not good. Some poor camera work but my main complaint was the editing. Too often we had a view of some individual - Walters, Shawcross, or a player - or a replay of some incident, and meanwhile play had moved from one end of the pitch to the other. I was getting more annoyed with that then I was by our poor shooting. And I was pretty annoyed about that!

[Swizzlestick]

Trafford 6 - in his own world sometimes
Roberts 7 - tried to be dynamic
Egan Riley 8 - excellent
Esteve 8 - as above
Pires 4 - not good enough
Cullen 5 - not great
Brownhill 5 - not great
Koleosho 5 - infuriating
Sarmiento 6 - tried a bit
Anthony 5 - tried a bit, didn’t help that he was moved back to the left
Rodriguez 4 - nowhere near the required standard now

Flemming 5 - put himself about, wasted a huge opportunity
Hannibal 3 - moron

I mean, we’re second, but it’s not a good watch. Just seems like we’re going through the motions. Stoke up for it with new manager coming in. Need a lot more if we want auto. Certainly need to play better next game.

[bumba]

Trafford 6 so slow when we need to get a move on!
Roberts 6
Pires 3 seriously can't remember a weaker left back that we've had
Egan-Riley 7
Esteve 8
Cullen 5
Brownhill5
Anthony 6
Koleosho 4
Sarmiento 6
Rodriguez 3

Laurent 5
Hannibal 3
Foster 6
Flemming 5

Poor starting 11, poor use of the subs.
Nerves have cranked up ten fold now before Saturday

[Hedontplayforyou]

Trafford - 6
Roberts - 6
CJ - 7
Steve - 7
Pires - 4 being generous with 4, Humphreys from here on in
Cullen - 6 not great
Brownhill - 5 nowhere near as effective from deep
Sarmiento - 5 nothing came off for him at all.
Koleosho - 3 please learn to release the ball.
Anthony - 6 moved to accommodate others , wrong decision
Jay - 5 hard to get more when he got zero service

[PhiladelphiaChris]

Trafford 7
Roberts 7
Egan Riley 8
Esteve 7
Pires 5
Cullen 6
Brownhill 6
Koleosho 4
Sarmiento 6
Anthony 7
Rodriguez 5

Subs:
Flemming 6
Laurent 6
Hannibal 3

[Hipper]

I didn't see what happened with Hannibal other than their full back dived to win the initial foul, but tbf Hannibal didn't argue which possibly tells its own story.

You are right, it was not a foul by Hannibal but he'd already had an incident when this defender, Tchamadeu, got a yellow. After the 'foul' Hannibal stepped on Tchamadeu's chest. Of course he made a meal of it but.......

[helmclaret]

Too many changes to the starting line up. Same old story in the last third - we’ve got absolutely nothing up there.

Trafford 6
Roberts 5
Egan Riley 7
Esteve 7
Pires 5
Cullen 6
Brownhill 4
Koleosho 4
Sarmiento 5
Anthony 6
Rodriguez 3

Flemming 3
Hannibal 3

[Steve-Harpers-perm]

Trafford 6 constantly slowed the game down.
Roberts 6 below his usual best today.
Pires 4 not good enough
Esteve 7 - usual self
Egan -Reilly 8 excellent again
Cullen 6 looked leggy today
Brownhill 6 as above
Sarmiento 5 bright start but faded
Jay Rod 3 miles off it.
Kolesho 3 he really has zero footballing brain
Anthony 6 looked better when we moved him onto the right.

Fleming 5
Foster 5
Humphries 6
Hannibal 3

Just another rerun of previous dismal home games we’ve not won. Thought 4 changes was a lot and the ones who came in aren’t good enough. It’s pretty obvious what needs to happen by the end of this month in terms of attacking additions.

[quoonbeatz]

Another frustrating, pedestrian, unincisive performance, bizarrely one they we should have won at the death. It briefly came to life when the wide players decided to go round the outside - instead of the constant cutting in on their weaker foot - and fizzed some dangerous crosses in, before being promptly withdrawn.

It’s drill football and it’s largely boring. It’s as though the players don’t understand how to get up the pitch quickly.

Trafford 8 a couple of good stops, need to speed up a bit late on

Roberts 7 standard

Egan-Riley 8 very good again

Estève 7 rolls Royce defending on the floor, he could do to improve in the air

Pires 5 constantly coming inside, massively frustrating and not great defensively today

Cullen 7 metronome

Brownhill 6 not as effective when he’s deeper, as we know but he still found some good positions

Sarmiento 6 on the deceive side of flattering today

Anthony 6 looks way out of place in the left

Koleosho 5 see Pires, constantly coming inside and not remotely effectively

Rodriguez 5 barely in it up top, little change from their giants

Flemming 4 another really bad decision to try playing in someone else when he was better positioned

Laurent 4 as off the pace as he was last night and missed a massive chance at the death

Hannibal 3 moronic. Unfortunately we knew what we were getting with him, will always be a liability.

[KlyBfc]

What kind of manager drops their top scorer (by a distance) deeper into a role where he needs to be dictating play, moving the ball accurately and quickly. Absolute clown.

Trafford 7
Roberts 6
Pires 4
CJ 7
Esteve 7
Cullen 6
Browny 5
Sarmiento 3
Koleosho 4
Anthony 4
Jay 3

Flemming 5
Hannibal 0

Unfortunately our manager has one ethos, method and his only idea is to tweek that. Its working alright away but he is clueless in the main at home. That was utterly pathetic today in any attacking sense.

[winsomeyen]

Wonder why nobody has rated the manager ?

[warksclaret]

Trafford 7
Roberts 6
Esteve 6
ER 7
Pires 5
Koleosho 5
Cullen 7
Brownhill 6
Anthony 6
Sarmiento 6
Rodriguez 5


Appreciate my scores are low but it really was a poor display-not testing the keeper seriously all game and Stoke are 19th

Jays days are well over Foster showed more aggression in 8 minutes, Why does Fleming not take the direct free kicks

[MeeActon1]

Trafford 5 Slooooow
Roberts 4 Sloooower
Egan Riley 6 Adequate
Esteve 6 Adequate
Pires 3 Awful
Cullen 3 Even slooooower
Brownhill
Koleosho 4
Sarmiento 3 Abysmal
Anthony 3 Abysmal
Rodriguez 3 Doesn’t deserve a 3

Flemming 3
Hannibal 3

[KlyBfc]

Wonder why nobody has rated the manager ?

Cant give minuses or swear.

[MeeActon1]

Brownhill 4

[Bosscat]

Trafford 7
Roberts 7
Esteve 7
Egan-Riley 8* MotM
Lucas Pires 6
Brownhill 7
Cullen 7
Anthony 6
Sarmiento 7
Koleosho 5
Rodriguez 6

Flemming 6
Hannibal zero

[Vim Fuego]

Trafford 6
Roberts 7
Egan Riley 7
Esteve 7
Pires 5
Cullen 7
Brownhill 6
Koleosho 5
Sarmiento 5
Anthony 6
Rodriguez 4

Flemming 6
Hannibal 3

It was correct to use the squad and rotate. It should have been enough, but in an attacking sense, it was so lacking. Need to solve the problems that we clearly have at home

[Bigvince]

Trafford- 6 takes an absolute eternity on the ball at times, I’d like to see us mix it up and go long sometimes, not just in the last 10 minutes.
Roberts- 7 thought he had a decent game, tried to get forward.
Egan Riley 6 not one of his better displays, seemed nervous on the ball at times.
Esteve- 7 decent enough.
Pires 5 had a couple of shakey moments.
Cullen 6 steady
Brownhill 6 needs to play higher up the pitch where he’s more dangerous.
Anthony-6 saw a lot of the ball, but final ball or shot let him down, but continued to work hard.
Sarmiento-5 needs to slow it down a bit sometimes, seems hectic at times.
Koleosho- 4 poor today, has pace and trickery but never looks up and more often makes poor decisions.
Jay-4 didn’t see enough of the the ball, and when he did he had to come deep to get involved.

Flemming- 5 had the same problem as Jay, we are just slow and laboured getting the ball forward.
Humphries- 5
Laurent- 5 would have been 6 had he not fluffed his lines for his miss
Foster looked sharp when he came on, need him to start
Hannibal WOW what an idiot

[Stproc]

Trafford 6
Roberts 5
Esteve 6
Egan-Riley 6
Lucas Pires 5
Brownhill 5
Cullen 5
Anthony 7. The only attacking intent on the pitch.
Sarmiento 5
Koleosho 5
Rodriguez 3. Sorry Jay your time has been & gone. Great player but he was done 2 years ago. Shouldn’t really be making the bench nowadays.

Flemming 5
Hannibal 3. Idiotic stamp. He is a red card waiting to happen in most matches so there’s absolutely no surprise it happened today.

This side will not make the top 2 based on the many games just like today. Even a care taker manager can stop us playing. The whole front-line needs upgrading as does the tactics against sides like stoke.

[jlup1980]

Pick the bones out of that! File alongside Derby, QPR, Preston, and several other rank bad home performances this season. We're a good away team, but a god awful home one! Make no excuses, we should have been soundly beaten today. Stoke were better than us in every single area. The pressed better, picked up the loose balls and created the better chances. We were utterly hopeless for 96 minutes.

Trafford 8 - MoM - kept us in the game with his saves
Roberts 4 - played like a man with one foot out of the camp
Pires 3 - as bad a left back performance as you'll see. Offered nothing as an attacking threat and allowed their winger to walk past him several times
CJ 6 - standard
Esteve 6 - standard
Cullen 5 - poor by his standards
Brownhill 6 - seemed to play in a few positions today. The only one who looked likely to produce anything
Sarmiento 5 - one or two nice touches, but created nothing
Anthony 4 - sacrificed on the wrong side to accommodate Koleosho and surprise surprise he has a stinker
Koleosho 3 - get him in the academy and teach him the basics, he's a liability
Jay 4 - thanks for the memories. Maybe I'm being harsh, as we didn't even give him scraps to feed off

Flemming 4 - anonymous
Hannibal 3 - a total brainfart, what was he thinking? Misses some big games now.
Laurent 4 - didn't impose himself at all

[MDWat]

Amazed Esteve is getting 6s and 7s. Thought he was imperious.

Otherwise, utter guff.

Trafford 7
Roberts 7
Egan-Riley 7
Esteve 9*
Pires 4
Cullen 6
Brownhill 5
Anthony 4
Sarmiento 5
Koleosho 4
Rodriguez 4

Laurent 5
Flemming 4
Hannibal 3

[Stacks]

Trafford 6 he has got to come out and claim that at the end
Roberts 6
Egan Riley 7
Esteve 7
Pires 4
Cullen 7
Brownhill 6
Koleosho 3 offers nothing…dribble dribble
Sarmiento 5
Anthony 6 soft
Rodriguez 3 three better options to start than Jay

Flemming 5 rugby player
Hannibal 3 moron

Foster has to start Saturday

[Luppy]

Trafford - 7 - one top save, I think, that bizarrely got given as a goal kick

Roberts - 5 - didn't work for him today but can't fault the effort
CJER - 8* - Another good game
Esteve - 7 - the odd shaky moment but in the main good
Pires - 4 - some truly awful defending today - Wayne Dowellesque. The one he let the lad cut inside and shoot that Traff tipped onto the bar was non league standard, and the one he tried to let it go out for a goal kick was Sunday league standard!

Cullen - 6 - no complaints
Brownhill - 6 - Different player when not in the number 10 role and the effect on the team as a whole showed
Sarmiento - 5 - it just didn't happen for him

Koleosho - 4 - devoid of all confidence
Jay - 5 - So isolated it was ridiculous. Summed up when he won a header first half and had to go and chase it down himself!
Anthony - 6 - improved when back on right

Fleming - 5 - huffed and puffed
Hannibal - 3 - abolsute bell end

Strange one. I totally understand rotating the squad and expected it, so no complaints there. It just didn't work first half and should have been changed in some way at the break - Koleosho was having a mare for a start.

Bit of credit to Stoke - they worked their socks off, got themselves to half time level and then had something to fight for - something we saw and praised so many times under Dyche, so a bit of credit where due.

The real negative - Hannibal. You just can't do that. Clearly no f**k given to his team mates, his Club, the fans. Should be getting a hefty fine off the Club and it needs to be made clear it won't happen again - he's not good enough to be a liability waiting to happen, despite hos own ideas of grandeur.

[CoolClaret]

Trafford 7
Roberts 7
Egan-Riley 7
Esteve 8
Pires 4
Cullen 6
Brownhill 5
Anthony 4
Sarmiento 5
Koleosho 4
Rodriguez 5

We need more quality in the final third.

[ChristheViking]

Trafford 7 - a little casual at times but it's another clean sheet for him

Roberts 7 - could maybe do better with the lob that he had
Esteve 7
Egan-Riley 7
Pires 5 - not keen especially with his ball-watching on our byline


Brownhill 6
Cullen 7
Anthony 6
Koleosho 3 - the old Steve Kindon description springs to mind. The speed of a racehorse and the brains of a rocking horse.


Sarmiento 5 - started off really well but faded just as quickly
Rodriguez 4 - feeding off scraps

Flemming 4
Hannibal 3 - anyone surprised? Really? That's been coming. He's been playing very well recently but that was unacceptable. Playing on "the edge" is one thing but it's a fine line to complete stupidity.

The fixtures are coming thick and fast and he's absolutely right to utilize the squad. The problem is that those coming in are showing exactly why they don't start.

A game we could have easily lost today. It's a good point given it was an awful display.

[Pickles]

It's games like today - when everyone is pretty dire - where Estéve stands out even more than he does week in, week out. Lacklustre all over the pitch except for Estéve who is just so composed and imposing on a consistent basis. He's far too good for this league. Doubt he's been less than 8/10 at any point so far this season.

[Boss Hogg]

Trafford 6
Roberts 6
Egan Riley 7 mom
Esteve 7
Pires 6
Cullen 7
Brownhill 6 more effective further forward
Anthony 6
Sarmiento 6
Koleosho 5
Rodriguez 4 doesn’t offer remotely enough

Subs
Laurent 6
Flemming 4
Hannibal 4

Weaker starting 11 and it showed. Dire in the final third. We can have all the possession in the world but have very few shots on target and cannot unlock well drilled defences. An expected rinse and repeat performance. Need a quality striker in the transfer window.

[jdrobbo]

Trafford 7
Roberts 7
Egan-Riley 8
Esteve 8
Pires 5
Cullen 6
Brownhill 4
Anthony 5
Sarmiento 5
Koleosho 5
Rodriguez 4
Laurent 4
Flemming 4

[Cirrus_Minor]

Trafford 7
Roberts 6
Egan-Rily 7
Estéve 7
Pires 5
Cullen 6
Brownhill 6
Sarmiento 5
Koleosho 4
Anthony 7
Rodriguez 4

Laurent 6
Flemming 4
Hanibal 3

[colne-claret]

Trafford - 7 some good saves
Roberts - 6
CJ - 6 - some sloppy passes today
Esteve - 7
Pires - 5 offers very little
Cullen - 6
Brownhill - 5
Sarmiento - 6
Koleosho - 5
Anthony - 6
Jay - 5

Flemming - 5
Laurent - 5

[Buxtonclaret]

Trafford 7
Roberts 7
ER 8
Esteve 8 ***
Pires 5
Cullen 6
Brownhill 6
Anthony 5
Sarmiento 5
Koleosho 4
Rodriguez 5

Laurent 5
Flemming 4

As for Hannibal, that's been on the menu for a good while.
There was nothing petulant about that stamp. It was just downright nasty.

[Jakubs Tash]

Trafford 7

Roberts 6
Egan-Riley 6
Esteve 7
Pires 3

Cullen 5
Brownhill 5
Sarmiento 6

Anthony 5
Koleosho 3
Rodriguez 3

Flemming 5
Hannibal 3
Laurent 5

[Vino blanco]

From tv
Trafford 6 a couple of good saves but his judgment and slow distribution were poor
Roberts 7 okay
CJER 8 He and Esteve were fine
Esteve 7 took everything in his stride
Pires 4 going backwards in his development
Koleosho 4 why was he on the right? He might need some coaching with the Under21s
Brownhill 6 best attacking midfielder in the club plays ultra defensive role, why?
Cullen 7 too isolated in that set up
Sarmiento 4 you can't play him, Koleosho and Anthony in the same team, all too lightweight
Anthony 5 why was he on the left? Back to his normal weak and ineffective performance after playing well for the last few games
Jayrod 4 His future is behind him. He should be nowhere near the starting eleven
Flemming 6 played up front against three big Stoke lads, enough said
Laurent 6 I genuinely didn't know what position he was playing when he came on

Parker got the starting 11 totally wrong today : Koleosho, Sarimiemto and Anthony are all lightweight fancy dancers and weaken the whole balance of the team, Brownhill our best attacking midfielder playing alongside the back four was nonsense, Koleosho and Anthony on the wrong wings, Jayrod starting is hard to explain. As for Hannibal... words fail me, does he have any grey matter between his ears. I was going to say it was disappointing, but that would be to kind, that was poor.

[Walton]

Trafford 7 - kept us in it, which is a shocking thing to have to say when playing dross like that Stoke team
Roberts 6 - average, not much else to say.
Egan-Riley 6 - an ok defender but looks so wooden on the ball. No wonder teams let him have it to hoof it
Esteve 7 - always looks the best player on the pitch
Pires 5 - overlapped fine in the first half, but head dropped 2nd and reaction to being subbed was pathetic. Get off the pitch you pillock.
Cullen 6 - did what he does, but that counts for nothing if his teammates are having nightmares.
Brownhill 4 - completely anonymous until he fluffed his lines again late on
Anthony 6 - late crosses were miles better than his previous attempts, but was the only one with any forward thinking about him.
Sarmiento 5 - does a whole lot of nothing
Koleosho 5 - not helped by the instruction to hug the touchline giving him nowhere else to go than inside, and with no midfielder with the brains to play a quick 1-2 and send him down the line. Why the hell aren't we using him for an out-to-in run as was so successful with Tella?
Rodriguez 3 - exceptionally ineffectual today, but that's the Parker Number Nine way
Laurent 5 - tried to get us on the front foot, just wasn't very good at it. Has to score.
Flemming 3 - see comment for Rodriguez. We really do need to start utilising the striker otherwise we're playing with 10 men.
Hannibal 1 - speaking of 10 men, what an absolute knob. He's been doing well for both him and the team on the left from a starting berth and has now knackered that up for two of the biggest games of the season. Brainless.
Foster 6 - needs to be starting soon, cos bloody hell he can't be less effective than the other two playing striker recently (unless the tactics again get in the way)

[bfcjg]

Trafford 7 couple of amazing saves, distribution laboured
Roberts 6
Egan-Rily 8 mom
Estéve 8
Pires 4
Cullen 5 poor by his standards, Stoke targetted him.
Brownhill 6 grew into game,unlucky not to score.
Sarmiento 4
Koleosho 4 started improving but woeful.
Anthony 6
Rodriguez 4 tried but way off it.

Laurent 7 made a difference, if only at the end
Flemming 4 summed him up when he passed instead of shooting.
Hanibal 3 because it's lowest score. Only thing in the stadium with less braincells are the idiots who clapped him off.

[claretspice]

A hugely frustrating afternoon.

Trafford - 7 - I thought his goalkeeping was fine, but his distribution needed to be quicker and more purposeful at times - he sets the tone for the team and it was too lackadaisical times, most obviously when for the second game in a row he was nearly dispossessed dwelling on the ball.

Roberts - 5 - way below his best in all departments and in particular his distribution was far too slow and laboured, and too often under hit. Needs taking aside for one incident in the first half when he appeared to try and shift blame for his own badly underhit pass onto the recipient (Koleosho) rather than take responsibility himself. We can do without senior players making a scapegoat of young players.

Pires - 7 - he's no world beater but he's fine as an alternative to Humphreys at this level and he did OK today - his distribution was the most purposeful of any of our defenders and he gave as good as he got in his one on one duel with Koumas. Surprised at the low marks for him, not for the first time.

Egan Riley - 7 - Defended resiliently and used his pace to get us out of trouble more than once, but he was one of several players who were unable to match recent high standards in his distribution, and like Roberts he underhit too many passes.

Esteve - 7 - Steady enough and carried the ball forwards to decent effect on a couple of occasions.

Cullen - 6 - looked a bit laboured after the exertions of recent games and was unable to set the tempo as he does at his best.

Brownhill - 6 - another to look leggy.

Sarmiento - 5 - very disappointing. A couple of nice early shimmying runs, but rapidly became ineffective and was ultimately outmuscled in that central area.

Koleosho - 7 - a mix of frustrating moments of naivety and some really bright moments, and I thought he was our most dynamic and creative attacker on the day despite oddly being deployed on his less favoured side. Really surprised that he was removed first, particularly as he'd just produced our two best crosses of the second half, beating the full back one v one on both occasions. We didn't create more down that side after he went off.

Anthony - 5- he's had 3 excellent games over the past 10 days, and perhaps this was a game too many, but until a couple of moments late on when the game became stretched he was peripheral to the game and struggled to create much. Surprised he started on the left because he's looked far more effective on the right recently.

Rodriguez - 5 - None of our attacking players were helped by the laboured passing from deep, but he struggled to get involved in the game and apart from one nod down from a corner I can't recall him influencing the game in the Stoke box.

Flemming - 5 - a couple of tidy moments but he also struggled to get involved at centre forward.

Laurent - 5 - I didn't think the game was crying out for his brand of athletic industry - we needed more creativity and precision in our passing, and those aren't his strengths - and until the game became very stretched late on, he found it hard to impose himself on the game.

Hannibal - 4 - Again, the substitution seemed surprising and it was his frustration at being unable to impose himself on the game which doubtless caused his frustration to boil over for a stupid, needless and inexcusable red card.

Humphreys - 6 - I still don't quite understand the logic of the change but he did fine.

Foster - not on long enough but added a bit of bite to our attack, particularly once he drifted to the left side.

In isolation, this was an understandable aberration. We've had a run of difficult games in a short period over the christmas period, and with tired legs this was always likely to be a tricky game in which to take the initiative. So it proved, and our build up from deep was particularly stodgy and laboured - at times it almost seemed like the grass was longer than normal (which given the weather, might even be the case!). As a result we were slower to get our attacking players into the game and we struggled to get up a head of steam. The problem is that this is a trend and against teams that come primarily focused on staying in a defensive shape, our current method looks incredibly suspect at home.

I thought the starting eleven made sense, given the recent games and the need to get more creativity on the pitch, but there were still clearly some tired legs out there and the decision to deploy Koleosho on the right seemed surprising given (i) he prefers the left, and (ii) Anthony has been effective from the right recently. It didn't really work and it seemed surprising that firstly, the two weren't swapped over in the search for a bit of extra penetration, and secondly that when changes came, the decisions were to revert to a set up which has been effective against teams that have attacked us, but been less effective against the likes of Derby who, like Stoke, came with a first thought to being organised and hard to break down. Perhaps the thought was that tired legs would result in the game getting stretched (and it did to an extent, partly because Stoke showed a resasonable amount of enterprise) but if that was the theory it didn't work, and we ended up cycling through three or four different formations in the space of 20 minutes in the search for a breakthrough without ever giving any the chance to really work - Brownhill played in a central two, then as a two, and then went back to a deeper role as we searched for a breakthrough and every change of plan seemed to make us less coherent.

It all felt like there is a concerning lack of confidence in our method at home and, ironically, it took the sending off to open up the game and to inject some urgency into our play. Once we did that, and loaded the box on a few occasions, we began to create openings. Not for the first time you were left wondering if an earlier move to a front 2, with Flemming as the second striker and someone stretching behind, might just simplify the game and make us more effective. Once it came today, frustration had set in.

[ClaretTony]

Trafford 7
Roberts 7
Egan-Riley 8
Estève 8
Pires 4
Cullen 6
Brownhill 4
Koleosho 4
Sarmiento 5
Anthony 5
Rodriguez 5

Flemming 5
Laurent 4
Hannibal 3