West Brom (H) 11/02 - 15.00 k/o

Dodger58

It will be interesting to see how Gabbiadini performs over the rest of the season and first half of next. He was an unknown who appears to be making a name for himself. He'll probably find it a lot more difficult now others will be recognising the threat ...

chicagohammer

All in all I enjoyed the game today, all we really ask is that the team give everything and I think they all did just that.

We were unlucky not to take the three points but I am more focused on the performance, and I am very proud of how they played, especially in the second half.

For me, our disallowed goal was probably justified as I think that Antonio did impede their keeper when coming back from an offside position, for their first goal, a foul could have been given but we did not help ourselves after that.

Thought the the tactics were spot on, I stand behind the decision to go for it and then to try to close the game out at the end.

We did not get the run of the green in any of the major decisions today but the result will not really impact us, but performances like that, certainly will.

COYI

FlorinRaduclious

OCS - I cannot deny that at the minute he seems to be flying in this league. Let's just hope we can reinforce better in the summer. ;ok

thornburyiron

That's the 4th time this season we've conceded in stoppage time.

claretandbluesky

If anyone hasn't yet seen the Slav interview for me this is why Slav is our man, absolutely hurting over the injustice of it all, if he is passing on this attitude to even half the players we can only go upwards.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/38865237

MIAHammer

thornburyiron said:

My point was had we not made defensive changes they may well not have been in that attacking situation anyway. Who knows. We'd played very very well until that point and were pinning them around their penalty area.
They had taken their best attacker off.

Had we not made the changes and they had scored, we would have said why didn't we make changes to see out the game. Even worse, if we hadn't made the changes, what if they scored 2 goals? We've already lost season from a winning position with a few minutes to play.

MIAHammer

My only complaint is Callieri and why Slav insists on playing him. I really don't understand why we are keeping Fletcher if Slav refuses to play him. He has got to be better than Callieri.

IronHerb

Calleri looks better than Fletcher to me. He linked up well and has a decent touch. He is still coming up to match fitness but still he gets slaughtered on here.
Same goes for Slav. Last year he took grief for making attacking substitutions when we were leading and now he makes more defence minded changes he still gets it.

There's too much overreaction on here. Oh! What are we going to do without AC ;wahoo Well, we were 60 seconds from rounding off a decent performance without him against a well drilled team.

Come on people, support the team.

COYI

NEoldiron

Just watched MOTD and in fact the refs did get it right, Antonio pushed Foster just as Feg took his shot, and Antonio (again) touched the ball to give WBA the throw-in ;angry

tomkinsworldclass

Thought we played really well and one of the few times we have genuinely looked at ease playing at the OS. A bit unfortunate with the decisions and other factors, but against a tough team, we played some nice stuff and were able to keep the tempo going which bodes well for us. I think the 1st WBA goal is a foul on feghouli; soft yes but consistently given in modern football, whilst for the equaliser Randy does get blocked off and with that amount of pressure and bodies, the keeper should be given more protection and the advantage. Also plenty of other decision which wernt shown on MOTD throughout the 90 mins to annoy Slaven.

Obaing was excellent again, really pushing his passing range and trying to play the progressive pass. Lanzini back to the levels we know he can get to, 2nd half in particular he was outstanding against a very defensive side. Winston Reid was my MOTM; outstanding on the ball, great defensively and dd superbly well out of position after cresswell went off. Hopefully the break in Dubai will do us good, get some good work done over there and with some more players back we can get the 3 points off watford as we are playing well and looking much more like last season.

P,S Calleri did well off the bench, looks better physically ;thumbsup

Hamstew

I cant agree re Calleri. Just my opinion but I don't think he's any good.

Lukerz

The good thing about the game is that it's not going to have a massive impact, results wise, on the season. We will finish between 8th-12th. It's not like those two points dropped will be costly in our relegation battle or top 7 push. So we can just take the point and focus on the performance.

Positive elements of the game was how mature we were in how we chased the game against a very solid, stable, in-form PL team. Going 1-0 down after 4 was the perfect start for them, as they could sit back the rest of the game and protect it, and we had to be careful that they wouldn't break and go 2-0. How we went about looking to get back into it was very encouraging. Patience, inventiveness, control and all this with a few players filling in. To then manage, after 65 minutes with no joy, to score and then increase the level of our display to seek the winner, was excellent. Players were all up for it and never let their heads drop. The officiating was questionable to say the least but I don't think it was terribly shocking.

Three main negative points. First is Randolph. Another game goes by where I feel a slightly better keeper would've done better on both WBA goals. Think he caused an air of panic in the box with the last minute goal. Which was the second negative; the way we shot ourselves in the foot with the second goal, by almost mentally going into defence mode, when we had played them off the park in the second half. That mentality created a panic mentality where, for the last five minutes, players seemed to stop doing the things they were doing before. I think there's a difference to be defensively cautious after going 2-1 up and full on retreat.

The final negative is the replacement for Carroll, or lack of. As baracks put it perfectly earlier, your main man is unavailable, and the gaffer refuses fo pick the two specialist replacements. The same man who said he was happy with what he had.

alderz

If Slav thinks that Antonio is a good enough CF to replace Carroll then it makes sense for him to be happy with the squad. Personally, I don't agree, but I believe that he is happy with it.

Brother_Sledge

Enjoyed the game and our performance generally - bit unlucky /naïve to miss out on 3 points but ref got most things right and he could easily have sent Obiang off . ;scarf

MunichHammer

It is strange how Slaven takes all the wrobg decisions on the chin throughout a season but the one time he flips his switch the media are able to show the ref got it right after all, although I thought we should have had a pen.

thornburyiron

Luke that was basically what I was saying yesterday although maybe a little too strongly. I think the last two substitutions did smack of a "let's defend what we've got" mentality and we just dropped back. This gave the initiative to them who would obviously chase an equaliser but knew that we no longer posed an attacking threat when we'd been at them all game. I think had Fletcher gone on instead of Fernandes at least one of McAuley or Evans would have stayed back, maybe not we will never know now.
I was surprised watching it again that two of the most contentious decisions were actually correct and had Antonio not completely missed his kick when he was on the goal line we would have gone on to win.
Strange that WBA have scored in the 6th minute three times.

Pengeman

I think Randolph had a poor game yesterday though he did not have that much to do. He was at fault for both goals and was badly caught out of position when WBA hit the bar.
Overall, the team played well and I wonder who would make way for Carroll or Byram for the next game.

grey_til_I_dye

NE

Pretty sure on our comms that at HT they said it had been confirmed as not given for offside.

Pearces_Left_Foot

It was given for a push on goalkeeper by Antonio I think it was a foul on feghouli for their first but we should have defended it better. I thought the performance was great we played the 2nd half without a recognised left back and right back but we kept going and played some decent stuff seeing as it was weakened team we have lots of players to come back

thornburyiron

They did but Bilic said that they were originally told that it was offside and then later changed to a foul but watching it again last night the linesman had his flag held aloft indicating a foul and not straight out indicating offside. Antonio did impede Foster.
In fact he showed yesterday that he is not naturally a striker or for the most part a footballer but he does give it his all and is very very strong.

OutcastLondoner

grey_til_I_dye said:

NE

Pretty sure on our comms that at HT they said it had been confirmed as not given for offside.

I'm sure comms I had said it was given for offside...

MrsGrey

I was shouting at the telly so much I couldn't hear any comms.

IronHerb

What was Antonio doing there? His lack of a football brain shone through. Why touch the keeper in that situation. ;doh

Penge, I've just seen the Rondon strike again and Randy could have stood wherever he wanted to and wouldn't have got close to the ball.

ASLEFshrugged

I think it is safe to conclude that despite being our top scorer Antonio is NOT a centre forward

MrsGrey

At first glimpse, I thought Antonio's foul on the GK was accidental. He was trying to get back on side and the 'keeper was on the floor and he sort of tripped over him/bumped into him. But I'd have to see t again to be sure(r).

ASLEFshrugged

Did I hear on MotD that Edin Terzic got sent to the stands at half time? There's going to be plenty of room on the bench against Watford......

#manspreading

grey_til_I_dye

ASLEF

Yes, when the goal was disallowed he was right down by the corner flag bending the lino's ear.

thornburyiron

He got sent off arguing about the disallowed goal with the linesman.

IronHerb

ASLEF, yes. he was sent off for joining in the discussion, of the Hammers offside goal, down by the corner flag. A tad outside the technical area. ;lol

grey_til_I_dye

Sorry, Outcast, negative confusion:

I was agreeing with you

i.e. the comms said the goal was disallowed because of offside.