Cheltenham

Anything yellow and blue
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Jimski
Mid-life Crisis
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Joined: Fri May 12, 2006 6:50 pm
Location: Oxford

Cheltenham

Post by Jimski »

Judging by that, we need an entirely new defence. Just horrible defensively (though some good attacking play). I left at 90 minutes, because I could see there was only one side winning it from there...
Werthers Original
Dashing young thing
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Location: Oxford

Re: Cheltenham

Post by Werthers Original »

Ah well, new team that got more and more disjointed with the subs. No one looked great but they're an athletic bunch who can only get better. I was concerned that we didn't get hold of the midfield at all - enter Swedish bloke.
Old Abingdonian
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Re: Cheltenham

Post by Old Abingdonian »

Ugh! One of the worst displays I have seen in really quite a long time. Ribeiro fell apart in the second half, there was no movement off the ball and we looked clueless for quite long periods.

On the credit side, I thought Obika did well, and Payne looked good.

Not too negative, because early days.

I thought Pep was pretty good on Rad Ox, and answered the Johnson question really well. The answer did suggest that Johnson's head has been 'turned', either by the hype or by offers from higher clubs that OUFC have rejected.
Matt D
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Re: Cheltenham

Post by Matt D »

i thought cheltenham worked extremely hard, were very organised (parachute them from a plane blindfold and I reckon they'd land and form a rigid 4-4-2 formation...), had a couple of reasonable finishers in their team, but most of all kept going as a squad. so fair play, no complaints about the result.

that said, we should have had more than enough to deal with them as we showed in the first half. cheltenham's set pieces were always dangerous, but having gone behind we were 3-1 up by half time without playing particularly well or noticeably shifting gear. a soft penalty to concede, a mistake well-capitalised on, and a wonderful pass from ruffels for xemi to finish was all it took.

did we decide the game was won and that we should try a few people out/rest others? I was most annoyed at conceding the second goal. we needed to take the pace out of the game, it was end-to-end at that point. I think a foot on the ball, putting the ball out, slowing things down, and we would've approached the last five minutes with a two goal cushion. game management of course. instead we faced the last five minutes with the robins giving it a real go to secure an equaliser, and getting their (just) reward. awful to throw away a two goal lead against an effective side, but one that we should be (and were) able to unpick.

we really missed obika when he went off. I thought he was solid, not spectacular, but enables us to vary our play. once he went off we were continually playing from the back, and cheltenham pressed hard and we kept misplacing passes. I was disappointed payne and henry didn't have more of an impact when they came on, particularly after hearing what those who were at the oldham game had to say.

otherwise: martin gave the ball away too much under little pressure, ribiero had a disappointing night in terms of defensive positioning and poor passing, johnson wasn't as effective or dangerous as we saw him be last season, xemi scored a good goal but otherwise seemed caught out by the action and physicality of the game. ledson had a solid game I thought, nelson played well, eastwood was as per last season, and ruffels has really become a very good player.

early days as others say and I guess I'm just disappointed that the only game i'll see over a few weeks was a poor performance after saturday's plaudits. but work to be done I guess and this result only says as much about how we'll do as saturday's.
Shoobedoo
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Re: Cheltenham

Post by Shoobedoo »

When playing a 4-2-3-1 you need to have the left and right attacking midfielders maintain wide positions so the two defensive midfielders have more of an outlet than just the full backs or the 10. The full backs also need to be ready to support the wide midfielders.

None of that happened last night - neither Ribeiro or Johnson (or Canice when he came on) were prepared to get forward enough, and Hall and Rothwell were continually too narrow, thus crowding the midfield and removing the space for Xemi / Payne to work in.

I thought Lego and Ruffs did their jobs pretty well and it really wasn't their fault that there was no one to pass it to. If I had a quid for every time the ball went Eastwood - Ledson - Ribeiro - Martin - Eastwood - hoof, I'dve certainly had enough dosh to thoroughly drown my sorrows in the pub.

Positives - Eastwood (despite letting in 4); Hall looked lively and at least tried; and Obika looked far more of a handful up front than we've been used to since Hylton left - at least until he tired.

Negatives - Martin just doesn't look up to it; he reminds me of Phil Whelan but without the pace; Ribeiro clearly can't manage two games in four days; Thomas might as well have stayed on the bench for the amount of effectiveness he was able to offer; I can't help but think they all thought the whole lot of them thought the job was done at half time and just handed the initiative to a committed Cheltenham side - and never looked like getting it back - and that's very worrying.

I'll save the last word for Johnson though; talented though he may be, he can take that attitude and feck off elsewhere if he can't wait for Ricardinho to get match fit.
Boogie
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Re: Cheltenham

Post by Boogie »

The Bad

The defence - Johnson clearly not a left back, Martin/Nelson not working well together
The playing it across the back when we needed to attack, attack, attack. This happened even when we had a free kick in the Chelts half in the last 2 minutes and had a chance to get it into the box.
Our throw ins taking even longer than Chelts when they were time wasting.
The room our midfield gave Chelts when they broke.

The Good

Obika including his goal. Hold up play very good.
Xemi's goal
Ruffles best of a poor set of displays in midfield
A few good runs from Hall
Flashes of Payne's composure and skill when he came on
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