Bournemouth (A) - Saturday 11th March 3pm

Hantshammer

I think it's times like this that make us appreciate when it all goes right and we do win! Bring on Leicester, hope we start with Byram he seems ok to me.

MIAHammer

Very frustrating. I don't think any one of our outfield players played really well today.
I thought our last substitution was strange. Antonio was just injured so thought we might have brought him off for Byram and moved Kouyate into the midfield.

WHU_Champo_league_in_7_years

In slavens defence Antonio was our biggest route to goal

OldCastleSwift

Actually, I'm not done.

Bournemouth haven't won all year. We rock up, offer them two penalties, which they sportingly miss, and decide to play with no defence for the majority of the game. What is wrong with us? We can't win when play well, and when we don't play well we get turned over altogether.

Last season was one of the most exciting I can remember. This season has been horrible. Once again we're looking down rather than up with Southampton and Leicester showing some form and even top half looks like a pipedream.

And for the love of all that is good and pure, BUY A DECENT RIGHT BACK

Ok, now I'm done.

Barney

We need a captain who can drive the team. Noble does not stand out when the chips are down, he needs to be much more vocal and influential. He also should not be getting booked for dissent. Personally i think he is past his best and is not a good captain. Also beginning to doubt Bilics team selection. Snodgrass, Ayew and Byram should have been on at the start with Noble on the bench - just my opinion.

IronHerb

While your at it buy a left back too.

Vorselaarhammer

How about we start our 20m striker also....

TwistandShout

Major investment needed in the squad in the summer -

WHU_Champo_league_in_7_years

Yea Cresswell has been awful all season..... and he's normally the guy we have running for Hammer of the year come end of the season.......

Noble needs to be droppes, go with 2 DMS in Kouyate and Obiang and try to keep a damn clean sheet

It's an embarrassment it really is

Also Carrolls overall game isn't good enough, too often he just mistimes his jumps and gives away free kicks

Antonio, Lanzini, Obiang and Randolph the only guys who can hold their heads up this season

steve

Twist need to get to the summer first ;

tomkinsworldclass

Symptomatic of our entire season in one 90 min performance; scratchy, momentum stalled and lack of conviction. It's easy to be OTT straight after the game when emotions are running high, I have no doubt Bilic will read the riot act because IMO a good chunk of it is down to the players not taking individual responsibility or a even a professional responsibility-to concede the 3rd goal was unacceptable at any level.

thornburyiron

Bilic can't be totally absolved. How many of our 28 games have we started at a high tempo. I would guess 5 or 6 at the most. We keep saying he needs to give them a rocket at half time but why doesn't he give them some kind of motivation at the start because if he does then the team are ignoring him. He also keeps saying Nobes is his number one man but he's not doing anything at the moment.
I think we need to change our coaching staff because they don't seem to be doing much and I personally can only name Dicks as one of them and we all know what our full back situation is like.

OldCastleSwift

Two transfer windows we've had to sort out the right back position. So far under Bilic we've tried Antonio, Byram, Tomkins, Arbeloa, Nordtveit and Kouyate and too a man they've not been good enough.

Whether you blame the manager or the board, it's simply not good enough.

Fortuneseeker

It's a dreadful feeling when it dawns on you that the season is over unless a few teams in the relegation zone suddenly find form, well we have still got to play Hull & Sunderland away plus Swansea at home! Continue to get results like today and we can start to have a sense of impending doom! ;angry

MrsGrey

thornburyiron said:

I think we need to change our coaching staff because they don't seem to be doing much and I personally can only name Dicks as one of them and we all know what our full back situation is like.

Not sure of the relevance of you knowing the names of the coaching staff, or how that relates to how good or otherwise they are.

;hmm

WHU_Champo_league_in_7_years

Thing is the defensively issues were apparantly last year but offensively we could outsourcing our opponent's whereas we can't now

thornburyiron

Mrs G their names are irrelevant but my point was have we ever been told who they are as I'm beginning to doubt they actually exist.

Moore_than_a_nick

The most frustrating thing is seeing people playing out of position. Much of this seems to derive from Slav's reluctance to drop his captain - and I can appreciate that is a tougher decision, given the strong bond they have (which is great), for Slav than it is for one of us.

However, I think as a minimum we need:

1. Kouyate not at RB;
2. Antonio starting but not RB;
3. Lanzini central;
4. Ayew starting; and, with this match the final straw,
5. Cresswell dropped.

So, given I don't think we have a reliable RB, but Byram or Antonio can probably do a good job at RWB, and assuming that it is just too damaging for Slav to drop Nobes, I suggest:

AC (but give Fletcher some time)
Ayew
Masuaku; Noble, Lanzini, Obiang; Antonio (Byram to come on if a change needed)
Reid, Fonte, Kouyate
GK

Then when Nobes has had his minimum honour minutes, put on Collins and move Kouyate into midfield (or leave Kouyate in defence and bring on Fernandes for some pace in midfield).

Then, if this is not working, switch to a 3-4-3, using more attacking/defensive wide players as per the game scenario:

Ayew, AC, Antonio
Snodgrass/Masuaku, Lanzini, Obiang, Feghouli/Byram
Reid, Fonte, Kouyate/Collins
GK

When Sakho comes back, I'd like to see a diamond with two up front - I think we could get away with more attacking full-backs with Obiang protecting the back four:

----------Sakho, Ayew
------------Lanzini
--------Kouyate, Antonio
------------Obiang
--Masuaku, Reid, Fonte, Byram
-------------GK

I don't know if AC is suited to this formation. And I still think Sakho is our best striker when all are fit and in form.

I really hope this worrying defeat (bearing in mind Bournemouth missed two penalties) prompts some major changes as per the above suggestions.

steve

not heard to much about Fonte on here ,was quite happy when we got him but have not seen him have a good game for us in fact our defence looks worse for him being in there .would like to hear what others think not writing him off by any means and I know it will take time to settle but have not been impressed so far

Moore_than_a_nick

P.S. I said recently Byram should be given a run of games for the rest of the season. I still would like to see this. But even more importantly than this, I think Antonio, Ayew and Lanzini all need to be on the pitch in our starting line-up. That's why I most like the idea of the last (diamond) formation. The conundrum I'm left with (please help) is how best to accommodate Snodgrass - the way he was playing at Hull suggests he should be starting for us - why has his crossing not been good enough in the last couple of games? How do we best fit him into the team and at whose expense?

grey_til_I_dye

If 'major investment' means more than a RB and CF, then Bilic needs to go. He's bought a lot of players, and if they aren't good enough, or he can't get them playing well enough, then why trust him with any more money?

And if the argument is that they are DS signings then he needs to go because we need a manager with more courage.

Or, and this is my take, we step away from the panic button and calm down a bit.

Hammerwombat

Some perspective is possibly required. That must have been a great game to watch. Pity we didn't save a point but onwards we go. Not much to play for. But I think with some quality signings in the summer, we are not far from a top 8/6 side with a bit of luck.

thornburyiron

I'm not sure people are panicking per se just sick and tired of the kind of performances we keep putting in. We know we are not a top 4 team or top 6 or even a top 10 team at the moment but we don't seem to learn from mistakes and that is what gets people.
Nearly every week we hear Slav saying "we got punished for our mistakes which you can't make at this level because the finishing is clinical" but every week we make the same mistakes. Any team that has players that can run faster than a gentle jog knows that they can have a field day against us. We don't seem to have any kind of a game plan unless we fall behind and it hits them that we need to do something.
Slav mentioned getting to 40 points and going on from there this week but I think 40 points is going to be a struggle to get at the moment and our goal difference is worse than most teams below us. It cost us dearly in 2003.

Vorselaarhammer

Btw we need a RB....

TwistandShout

I'm actually looking forward to this season being over. Just need to scrape a few points together and finish as high as possible.

Need a RB, CM, Winger, Striker all ready to come into the XI

grey_til_I_dye

Sorry, Twist, if we need a CM and winger we need a new manager. He's had his go at getting those.

Yeoldhammer

5 out of 10 games against top 10 opposition? So 5 games really to try get those 5 or so points.

I think we have built a team around a guy who can't play more than 20 games a season.

thornburyiron

Well Slav seems to think we played really well but for conceding the late goal so don't expect any major changes to approach to games.

TwistandShout

grey_til_I_dye said:

Sorry, Twist, if we need a CM and winger we need a new manager. He's had his go at getting those.

With low funds though? Hardly spent anything

MrsGrey

Hammerwombat said:

That must have been a great game to watch.

It was awful to watch ;weep ;sofa