Thing is we we defended well against Huddersfield and just lacked a bit up front - Derby were poor in general as soon as the second goal went in, heads just dropped. Gareth won't allow any complacency and might talk about it as another 'cup tie', but we should be winning this game. Certainly got to be braver than we were on Tuesday from the off.
I think braver is a good way to describe the next step we need to take. On Tuesday it looked like we would be happy to just stay tight rather than be braver on the ball or in movement.
Last season we would have found a goal to win and we seem quite happy to assume it didn't happen because we are in the Championship.
Derby seems like a classic banana skin to me. Lots of talk of a game we should win. Fingers crossed it goes ok.
The most important results are going to be against the teams around us. We did what we needed to do against Wednesday, a win on Saturday would pull us six points clear of Derby (which feels ridiculous to say), and we've got Coventry (picking up but still in the scrap) and out-of-sorts Cardiff and Preston coming up. Huge next few weeks.
I don’t understand this rhetoric about the Huddersfield game. Yes, it was a poor spectacle but have people forgotten that they still have many of the players from their Premier League days only two seasons ago?
Every point is hard to earn in this division and we shouldn’t be downbeat about ‘only’ drawing with a club like Huddersfield.
@glasshalffull said:
I don’t understand this rhetoric about the Huddersfield game. Yes, it was a poor spectacle but have people forgotten that they still have many of the players from their Premier League days only two seasons ago?
Every point is hard to earn in this division and we shouldn’t be downbeat about ‘only’ drawing with a club like Huddersfield.
While this is correct, they looked the poorest team we've faced this season.
Improbably poor for this division.
These are the games that are critical to win if we have any chance of staying up.
However, we now look as good defensively as we ever have in Ainsworth's time. That gives us a chance every week now. Early season there were a couple of games that were as good as over at 1-0 down.
I must admit even when I was in AP, I cannot recall marvelling very often at the spectacle even when we won. Like most of the games so far I quite enjoyed it myself...but obviously lock-down has seriously undermined my critical faculties!
@glasshalffull said:
I don’t understand this rhetoric about the Huddersfield game. Yes, it was a poor spectacle but have people forgotten that they still have many of the players from their Premier League days only two seasons ago?
Every point is hard to earn in this division and we shouldn’t be downbeat about ‘only’ drawing with a club like Huddersfield.
That's pretty irrelevant; only four of their starting 11 played for them in the Premier League, and only Schindler and Hogg played a significant amount. It's great to beat teams with 'stature', but that alone counts for nothing in footballing terms.
It is far from irrelevant. They had four players with extensive PL experience, we had none. They have also had PL parachute money to strengthen their squad, we had none. They have come down from a higher division, we have come up from a lower division. I agree that ‘stature’ counts for nothing and that is why we should treasure every point, irrespective of who it comes against.
@glasshalffull said:
I don’t understand this rhetoric about the Huddersfield game. Yes, it was a poor spectacle but have people forgotten that they still have many of the players from their Premier League days only two seasons ago?
Every point is hard to earn in this division and we shouldn’t be downbeat about ‘only’ drawing with a club like Huddersfield.
Most people on here I think realise and accept that. But we’re football supporters and we are naturally evolved to moan about something. Ideally with a pint straight after the game only sadly we can’t do that at the moment.
We have been over-performing so well recently (in my opinion) that the Huddersfield game was the first time since (I think) Swansea that we could put our foot in the door and be critical of some aspects of our performance (obviously not the defence).
So we barged straight in and went over-the-top with a good, old-fashioned whinge. So what if it’s not justifiable. Just indulge us.
And to be fair to compete at the higher levels we do need to get some practice in. Sunderland and Peterborough fans are in a different class to us. At the moment our star ‘player’ is @trevor. He’s good but he’s little more than a Sunday League moaner.
I guess you’re right, but I still find it frustrating when people don’t take a more realistic view.
I heard a guy on TalkSport last night say that Klopp has taken Liverpool as far as he can and they are now going backwards!
For all the validity of the "realism" debate, if we'd been "realistic" back in non league days we'd still be there now.
You have to have dreams to keep pressing on.
They deliberately put people on with foolish views to provoke a reaction. Looks like it's worked.
As for the other night I don't think there is too much harm in pointing out it was a stinker. I don't think many went into the game demanding 3 points. I don't think we will for any game this season.
It was actually a positive thing that we picked up a point in a game when we weren't at our best. We kept a clean sheet, and whilst we didn't really create any chances as long as you haven't conceded you're always in with a chance of nicking something from a set piece or something.
We'll play better and lose this season (in fact we've already done that) and we might even play worse and win.
I remember a game in our first season in the league. It was towards the end of the season and we had Walsall at home. We were dreadful, completely outplayed, managed to keep it at nil nil for about 70 minutes and ended up winning 3-0.
@glasshalffull said:
I don’t understand this rhetoric about the Huddersfield game. Yes, it was a poor spectacle but have people forgotten that they still have many of the players from their Premier League days only two seasons ago?
Every point is hard to earn in this division and we shouldn’t be downbeat about ‘only’ drawing with a club like Huddersfield.
That's pretty irrelevant; only four of their starting 11 played for them in the Premier League, and only Schindler and Hogg played a significant amount. It's great to beat teams with 'stature', but that alone counts for nothing in footballing terms.
Five of the starting 11 played for them in the Premiership with four of them having well over 20 appearances in 2018/19. One of the other players was in the Champions League playing for one of the eventual semi finalists.
One of the subs played in 14 games in the Premiership in 2018/19, the other was playing for a promoted Championship team from 2018/19.
We played against a team with a lot of Premiership/high end Championship experience
Well said wwfcblue, and turning to tomorrow’s game, I hope people don’t look at Derby’s position in the table and assume that this is a game ‘we should win’. They have made a poor start, but they still have some very talented players with much more experience at this level (and above!) than we have.
The thing Derby haven't got but we have, is team unity. Tomorrow I hope we show that unity from the second the players walk out, in big, ostentatious displays of togetherness and team spirit.
@glasshalffull said:
I don’t understand this rhetoric about the Huddersfield game. Yes, it was a poor spectacle but have people forgotten that they still have many of the players from their Premier League days only two seasons ago?
Every point is hard to earn in this division and we shouldn’t be downbeat about ‘only’ drawing with a club like Huddersfield.
That's pretty irrelevant; only four of their starting 11 played for them in the Premier League, and only Schindler and Hogg played a significant amount. It's great to beat teams with 'stature', but that alone counts for nothing in footballing terms.
Five of the starting 11 played for them in the Premiership with four of them having well over 20 appearances in 2018/19. One of the other players was in the Champions League playing for one of the eventual semi finalists.
One of the subs played in 14 games in the Premiership in 2018/19, the other was playing for a promoted Championship team from 2018/19.
We played against a team with a lot of Premiership/high end Championship experience
Half of the division will have that kind of experience, doesn't make them a good team now.
@drcongo said:
The thing Derby haven't got but we have, is team unity. Tomorrow I hope we show that unity from the second the players walk out, in big, ostentatious displays of togetherness and team spirit.
The performance of the Derby team tomorrow will be largely dependent on whether the squad overall want Rooney to become full time manager. Hopefully for us he doesn't have the players unqualified backing. If he does, we could have problems, as on paper they have some high quality players.
I am surprised that someone with your statistical knowledge would judge a team on one game. Huddersfield have 15 points this season and they have won away to Swansea and Nottingham Forest.
There’s not much difference between any of the teams in the Championship, so none of them can be taken lightly.
@glasshalffull said:
I am surprised that someone with your statistical knowledge would judge a team on one game. Huddersfield have 15 points this season and they have won away to Swansea and Nottingham Forest.
There’s not much difference between any of the teams in the Championship, so none of them can be taken lightly.
Not judging them on one game, just judging their performance in that particular game - and based on that, we're entitled to feel a bit disappointed with only a point.
Don’t agree, as I’ve said before we should treasure every point in this division because they are very hard to come by. We looked the team most likely to win, but we could easily have lost as well.
@glasshalffull said:
Don’t agree, as I’ve said before we should treasure every point in this division because they are very hard to come by. We looked the team most likely to win, but we could easily have lost as well.
Quite snippy at the moment.
For what it is worth I think as a group we need to get less grateful for every point and see it's ok to be disappointed by only getting a point in a game we probably should have won.
We need to get 50 points
@glasshalffull said:
Don’t agree, as I’ve said before we should treasure every point in this division because they are very hard to come by. We looked the team most likely to win, but we could easily have lost as well.
My heart says we can stay up but logic & comparison on paper of our squad to every other squad in the division says we do not have a hope in hells chance.
I think what most people are trying to say in this thread is that if we take our dream outcome of staying up then Tuesday felt like 2 points dropped, as Huddersfield were poor on the night and there for the taking.
Pre-match logic would dictate they should beat us and we should be happy with a point.
Having played the match and you take it into account with how difficult our task is going to be over the season to stay up, then a point (whilst welcome) may not be a good enough return on Tuesday.
I think we are not going to get many of these opportunities to take all 3 points, my heart says I'm wrong. When we miss out on such an opportunity it hurts a bit more because it makes the remaining games tougher and heaps more pressure on to try and narrow the gap above.
I feel if we take the attitude to treasure every point and not criticise/feel hard done by when three were there for the taking we are arguably accepting relegation already as a likely outcome for the season.
I hope Gareth believes he can win every game, as that is what got us up last season and I think if we set the bar high enough we may just pull off the impossible and stay up.
Going into a majority of the games this season I would hope we are looking to secure one point minimum but when the opposition is having a bad day, we have to push for all three.
We will need different tactics to win those matches, I think we got it horribly wrong at Forest and were too attacking from the start. I do not think we can start away matches with only one proper centre mid (Thompson) and I'm not a huge fan of finishing matches like that either. (I know we won at Birmingham like that!)
Comments
Looking at the Derby highlights I would expect at least a point if not a win!
I would imagine Derby would be thinking they would be expecting at least a point as well if they saw the ‘highlights’ of the Huddersfield game
Thing is we we defended well against Huddersfield and just lacked a bit up front - Derby were poor in general as soon as the second goal went in, heads just dropped. Gareth won't allow any complacency and might talk about it as another 'cup tie', but we should be winning this game. Certainly got to be braver than we were on Tuesday from the off.
I think braver is a good way to describe the next step we need to take. On Tuesday it looked like we would be happy to just stay tight rather than be braver on the ball or in movement.
Last season we would have found a goal to win and we seem quite happy to assume it didn't happen because we are in the Championship.
Derby seems like a classic banana skin to me. Lots of talk of a game we should win. Fingers crossed it goes ok.
The most important results are going to be against the teams around us. We did what we needed to do against Wednesday, a win on Saturday would pull us six points clear of Derby (which feels ridiculous to say), and we've got Coventry (picking up but still in the scrap) and out-of-sorts Cardiff and Preston coming up. Huge next few weeks.
Without any doubt Derby will be licking their lips playing us too!
Playing a team with 2 wins out of 13 who have only scored 6 goals?! Yes please.
I don’t understand this rhetoric about the Huddersfield game. Yes, it was a poor spectacle but have people forgotten that they still have many of the players from their Premier League days only two seasons ago?
Every point is hard to earn in this division and we shouldn’t be downbeat about ‘only’ drawing with a club like Huddersfield.
While this is correct, they looked the poorest team we've faced this season.
Improbably poor for this division.
These are the games that are critical to win if we have any chance of staying up.
However, we now look as good defensively as we ever have in Ainsworth's time. That gives us a chance every week now. Early season there were a couple of games that were as good as over at 1-0 down.
I must admit even when I was in AP, I cannot recall marvelling very often at the spectacle even when we won. Like most of the games so far I quite enjoyed it myself...but obviously lock-down has seriously undermined my critical faculties!
That's pretty irrelevant; only four of their starting 11 played for them in the Premier League, and only Schindler and Hogg played a significant amount. It's great to beat teams with 'stature', but that alone counts for nothing in footballing terms.
It is far from irrelevant. They had four players with extensive PL experience, we had none. They have also had PL parachute money to strengthen their squad, we had none. They have come down from a higher division, we have come up from a lower division. I agree that ‘stature’ counts for nothing and that is why we should treasure every point, irrespective of who it comes against.
Most people on here I think realise and accept that. But we’re football supporters and we are naturally evolved to moan about something. Ideally with a pint straight after the game only sadly we can’t do that at the moment.
We have been over-performing so well recently (in my opinion) that the Huddersfield game was the first time since (I think) Swansea that we could put our foot in the door and be critical of some aspects of our performance (obviously not the defence).
So we barged straight in and went over-the-top with a good, old-fashioned whinge. So what if it’s not justifiable. Just indulge us.
And to be fair to compete at the higher levels we do need to get some practice in. Sunderland and Peterborough fans are in a different class to us. At the moment our star ‘player’ is @trevor. He’s good but he’s little more than a Sunday League moaner.
I guess you’re right, but I still find it frustrating when people don’t take a more realistic view.
I heard a guy on TalkSport last night say that Klopp has taken Liverpool as far as he can and they are now going backwards!
For all the validity of the "realism" debate, if we'd been "realistic" back in non league days we'd still be there now.
You have to have dreams to keep pressing on.
They deliberately put people on with foolish views to provoke a reaction. Looks like it's worked.
As for the other night I don't think there is too much harm in pointing out it was a stinker. I don't think many went into the game demanding 3 points. I don't think we will for any game this season.
It was actually a positive thing that we picked up a point in a game when we weren't at our best. We kept a clean sheet, and whilst we didn't really create any chances as long as you haven't conceded you're always in with a chance of nicking something from a set piece or something.
We'll play better and lose this season (in fact we've already done that) and we might even play worse and win.
I remember a game in our first season in the league. It was towards the end of the season and we had Walsall at home. We were dreadful, completely outplayed, managed to keep it at nil nil for about 70 minutes and ended up winning 3-0.
Five of the starting 11 played for them in the Premiership with four of them having well over 20 appearances in 2018/19. One of the other players was in the Champions League playing for one of the eventual semi finalists.
One of the subs played in 14 games in the Premiership in 2018/19, the other was playing for a promoted Championship team from 2018/19.
We played against a team with a lot of Premiership/high end Championship experience
Well said wwfcblue, and turning to tomorrow’s game, I hope people don’t look at Derby’s position in the table and assume that this is a game ‘we should win’. They have made a poor start, but they still have some very talented players with much more experience at this level (and above!) than we have.
The thing Derby haven't got but we have, is team unity. Tomorrow I hope we show that unity from the second the players walk out, in big, ostentatious displays of togetherness and team spirit.
Half of the division will have that kind of experience, doesn't make them a good team now.
The performance of the Derby team tomorrow will be largely dependent on whether the squad overall want Rooney to become full time manager. Hopefully for us he doesn't have the players unqualified backing. If he does, we could have problems, as on paper they have some high quality players.
I suppose it could count in our favour that the media will be sucking up to
DerbyWayne Rooney's Derby even more so than usual.Nor does it make them a poor team now.
Looked that way on Tuesday
I am surprised that someone with your statistical knowledge would judge a team on one game. Huddersfield have 15 points this season and they have won away to Swansea and Nottingham Forest.
There’s not much difference between any of the teams in the Championship, so none of them can be taken lightly.
Not judging them on one game, just judging their performance in that particular game - and based on that, we're entitled to feel a bit disappointed with only a point.
Don’t agree, as I’ve said before we should treasure every point in this division because they are very hard to come by. We looked the team most likely to win, but we could easily have lost as well.
Rarely can such a nondescript game have provoked so much debate
Quite snippy at the moment.
For what it is worth I think as a group we need to get less grateful for every point and see it's ok to be disappointed by only getting a point in a game we probably should have won.
We need to get 50 points
Oh yeah - getting 50 points, it's exactly what we need to do
My heart says we can stay up but logic & comparison on paper of our squad to every other squad in the division says we do not have a hope in hells chance.
I think what most people are trying to say in this thread is that if we take our dream outcome of staying up then Tuesday felt like 2 points dropped, as Huddersfield were poor on the night and there for the taking.
Pre-match logic would dictate they should beat us and we should be happy with a point.
Having played the match and you take it into account with how difficult our task is going to be over the season to stay up, then a point (whilst welcome) may not be a good enough return on Tuesday.
I think we are not going to get many of these opportunities to take all 3 points, my heart says I'm wrong. When we miss out on such an opportunity it hurts a bit more because it makes the remaining games tougher and heaps more pressure on to try and narrow the gap above.
I feel if we take the attitude to treasure every point and not criticise/feel hard done by when three were there for the taking we are arguably accepting relegation already as a likely outcome for the season.
I hope Gareth believes he can win every game, as that is what got us up last season and I think if we set the bar high enough we may just pull off the impossible and stay up.
Going into a majority of the games this season I would hope we are looking to secure one point minimum but when the opposition is having a bad day, we have to push for all three.
We will need different tactics to win those matches, I think we got it horribly wrong at Forest and were too attacking from the start. I do not think we can start away matches with only one proper centre mid (Thompson) and I'm not a huge fan of finishing matches like that either. (I know we won at Birmingham like that!)