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Arsenal 1-0 Everton.

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RadioFriendlyUnitShifter said:
Vellios' starts are misleading though because on both occasions he's been provided with absolutely no support in the slightest.

In fact I'm not even taking issue with Saha's performances of late, because he's being asked to do the impossible. And he is 33 and highly experienced. Vellios I really can't fault.

Saha seemed to excel last year in a deeper, Cahill-like role alongside Beckford for a while. Why not try putting him there and maybe Vellios up top? A bit more guile and more support really.

I'm at a loss as to why Cahill is playing at all at the moment, never mind lasting the 90 minutes. He offers nothing. I remember writing in great detail about him on here a year or so ago, saying how all he offers is goals which is great for him, but we as a team play worse as he can't link attack and midfield at all.

Now he isn't even scoring.
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There's no service to the forwards. If you were Saha or Cahill, in the middle of one of the longest goalscoring droughts of your career, and you were asked to chase hopeless balls into the corners and defend from the front how long would it be before you just gave up? It sounds like Tim is sticking to task better than Louis, but it can't be enjoyable for either of them.

I don't blame the forwards. They're isolated. Stats this week pointed out that Cahill is towards the top of the charts for fewest touches of the ball in the division. I think we need to adapt his position now and play him in a more defensively-minded role. More mobile, tricky players like Drenthe or Barkley should be given the free role to link our midfield and attack.
 
We never really threatened them. Not much encouragement to be taken from that.

People will say that this is harsh but Jags could have done better on their goal IMO. He was ball watching, if he'd been closer to Van Persie when he received the ball, then he might have had a chance to stop him.
 
I think Magaye contributed more to the game as sub than Bily did as a starter. For me Magaye should be getting subbed on much earlier when Bily (or Coleman but he was doing more than Bily) puts in a performance like that.

Our formation is not working at all. Didn't matter that Saha was lazy and didn't press at all because he hardly got a pass. However McAleny was a great sub for Saha and should've been brought on earlier, he was gutsy, full of energy, and had really good movement which is the only way to nick a goal when your teammates are not playing you in. And who knows maybe Magaye could've made our first through ball of the season with McAleny playing up front? I'm really excited about our youth and I wish they were getting more time than Nevillie, Bily, and Cahill. I'm not sure whether to be sad or happy when Neville or Cahill gets injured 'cause then the youth get more of a chance but then squad is even more threadbare. :/

Heitinga = man of the match. He was only player that rose to the occasion with maybe the exception of maybe Baines. I think it is a given that we lose when Moyes puts Neville in the midfield so I didn't expect anything else for this match.
 

Having just seen the highlights I'm surprised to see how open we were. Can we really have planned to play such a high defensive line against Arsenal? The back four got lucky with a couple of offside calls and some profligate Arsenal finishing. We were all over the place.
 
billycopper said:
Having just seen the highlights I'm surprised to see how open we were. Can we really have planned to play such a high defensive line against Arsenal? The back four got lucky with a couple of offside calls and some profligate Arsenal finishing. We were all over the place.
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I forgot about the high defensive line. What was that about?

Doing that away to arguably the quickest team in the league is odd. But doing it with Heitinga and Jags at CB and Distin on the bench is kamikaze crazy. If they were even slightly clinical they'd have been 3 or 4 goals up at half time.
 
Moyes surely can't have told everyone to push right up. Arteta playing Walcott, Gervinho and Van Persie in to run at goal is exactly what they'd want.

It started off as a joke, but if Moyes was a plant sent to sabotage us, he couldn't do much more than leave our quickest centreback on the bench and then choose to play a highline against the best passing side in the country, substitute his only striker for a defender and use his two most inexperienced subs rather than a player in goalscoring form.
 
I also noticed that Baines did play offensively. The problem was that Arsenal had a line of defenders already in place along the 8 yard line, giving him a small strip in which to try and plant a cross, and our forwards were stood with them rather than dropping off into space or timing their run to meet the ball.
 

But Moyes said: “The high line wasn’t necessarily the plan but we wanted to limit Arsenal and that means midfielders have to go and get close to Arsenal’s midfielders. If you do that then the back four have to move up too. We wanted to disrupt Arsenal’s passing and win the ball early.

Wrong! When teams come to Goodison they sit tight and that limits our chances. If they come out chasing after the ball it would allow us to pull them out of shape and to create space. What's the point of winning the ball early when we can't keep it or do anything with it? We might as well let them have it infront of us and save our energy.
 
BigBlueBalls said:
Howard - no chance with the goal, made a good save from Gervinho and although I don't like keepers punching the ball out he did ok.
Hibbert - strong challenges, good covering and tried to get forward - its just that the team dont trust him to cross it properly from wide (or anywhere else)
Jags - solid
Heits - did well
Baines - had a torrid time vs Walcotts pace, had little or no protection from Bily. Crosses werent up to usual high standard.
Fellaini - poor, lost the ball to much, and sometimes just gave it away for free. Also made some bad decisions.
Neville - just not up to covering enough ground to be a midfielder, his brother knew when he couldn't cut it, so whats the story.
Coleman - bad decisions, bad crosses, did look to make a break but then the play got slowed down around him and he got repeatedly crowded out.
Bily - Awful, woeful, is he playing drunk? does he need to be able to be drunk to play well? crossing was the worst ever, not even pub league standard. How did he get offside so much? wouldnt move his feet, just a lazy swine. Time to go, Radzinski was a knobhead but at least he moved his legs.
Saha - expected him to have a broken arm or collarbonewhen he took a tumble on around ten minutes, was uneffective. Past it.
Cahill - tries hard, shouldnt have been allowed to play through injury earlier in the season, and doesnt have the passing to help others help him with decent service.
Subs - not enough time to judge.
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Harsh on Bily that. He was gashington stanley last week but fair play to him he was (shockingly) one of the better players on the pitch today. Though, that is not saying much.

Cahill, Coleman, Saha, Neville (did he even touch the ball aside from his "shot"?) were all worse.
 
As for Moyes and his "tactics"

If you are playing against pace - you defend DEEP

If you are playing against the likes of Denis Bergkamp or Zinedine Zidane, you play HIGH because they can punish you from in and around the box but don't have the legs.

****ing amateur.
 

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