Two sides to tonight. Firstly, incredibly frustrating as I really feel with a cutting edge we could have got something from that game - Stewart simply has to score that chance at the end. We need to be creating more than just balls launched forwards, and definitely looked more like it when McCleary was on and connecting with Horgan.
On the other hand it was an absolute joy to be back at AP tonight. To notice so many familiar faces, to see GA doing a pre and post match lap of honour to rousing applause and to hear the cry of "Chairboys" made me realise just how much I quite missed the place and in amongst some obscenities towards a pretty hopeless referee, I'm not sure even a 1-0 home loss on a Baltic Wednesday night could have wiped the smile away from under the face mask.
Cannot wait to see another 1000 more fans there next week, and hopefully more and more as this season goes on!
A but baffled why everyone is getting so upset tonight. I thought we played well and, but for a careless loss of the ball by Fred which ultimately led to him, Horgan & JJ bring taken out of the game and therefore the goal, on a different day all that pressure at the end results in a goal for us and 3 points against ex-Premier League Stoke.
Somewhere along the way we seem to have forgotten how much we have progressed since the start of the season and that our upgrade on Bayo has only played about 30mins all season.
Thank goodness for the comments by Twizz and Forest Blue. Disappointed by some of the unjustified negativity by some other posters.
Our entire first choice midfield was out injured, our regular strikers were rested, we were the victims of some very poor decisions by the referee, and we still came close to drawing with a team who were in the Premier League just two years ago.
Not a bad display overall but we need to find a more effective attacking formula. I’m not sure quite what it will be.
Maybe trying to get the full backs forward more? We very rarely get an overlap on the flank. Or try and get Horgan in a more central position. I’d also like to see us get a bit more pace into the starting 11 and encourage more runners in behind. Too often we fail to ask enough questions of opposition defenders by never really making them run back toward their own goal.
We also need to improve on our crossing. In most games our attacking opportunities will be limited and we must focus on better execution when we have a chance to deliver into the area. Too many crosses were wasted and we just can’t afford that.
Mustn’t complain too much. A scratch midfield again and some tired legs (Fred looked exhausted) but we still took a good Stoke team close. However, if we’re serious about staying up we need to find ways to be considerably more effective in attack.
Good individual displays from Knight and Grimmer especially I thought. And McCarthy did pretty well in the holding role before he went off. What did happen there?
Overall a very enjoyable night and wonderful to see a game live.
My only gripe actually was the Stoke goalscorer goading supporters behind the goal. It lacks class in any situation but I thought it was particularly poor taste in the circumstances.
@Glenactico said:
My only gripe actually was the Stoke goalscorer goading supporters behind the goal. It lacks class in any situation but I thought it was particularly poor taste in the circumstances.
We've done the same before (see Charles v Sunderland last season). I thought it was just a bit of fun.
Obviously it is a lot easier to enjoy to see it that way when it is the other way around. But if I’m honest I don’t think Charles should have done so. There is no need to incite paying spectators and frankly I think it is a bit childish for a professional athlete to behave that way.
We are so upset because we could have gotten something from that game, making it more frustrating than a comprehensive defeat imo.
I disagree with the view that we played poorly tonight but rather lacked an effective final ball. When we did shoot it was either blocked or leant back on, as if the pressure of not having scored many made us snatch at our chances.
The officiating has yet to improve although they are professional at this level I believe. Makes my theory that more training makes better refs seem wholly misguided. They just don't appear to "leave their bias at the door", over/under reacting accordingly.
It seems oddly predictable, reminding me of the phrase on my bingo card, "you know what you're going to get with Wycombe". I have to believe that it is subconcious and at the end of the day we just have to overcome, until and unless the playing field is even.
Right now it seems like we are playing up the slope at Loakes Park in both halves, but the boys are giving it a damn good go twice a week against quality opposition whose use of their own dark arts are both more subtle and more dangerous than ours.
And finally. So good to have fans back at Adams Park. The chanting was loud for a time, helped perhaps by the lack of chit chat and the acoustics of the "away end". Second half the levels were muted until we went a goal down ironically. Double that crowd next home game and keep getting behind the boys for 90+ minutes and we can collectively be the proverbial 12th man.
I thought several players were disappointing this evening and I’d have to include Anthony Stewart in that. As @bluntphil pointed out on commentary he has had to move from his preferred right side of central defence and, despite that, he has been imperious in virtually every game.
We were all delighted when Fred returned for a third spell but, this season in particular, he has not reached the heights that we know he is capable of.
Alex Samuel produced very little this evening but he was up against several gargantuan defenders and got little (if any) change out of them (or the referee).
But most controversially, Bayo seems to me to be doing very little lately apart from attracting the attention of at least two defenders whenever he gets into the box.
I’m sure this uncharacteristic feeling of frustration on my part will soon pass. To be without three key midfielders was always going to make life difficult but to lose Jason McCarthy, filling in very capably in midfield, to an off the ball “incident”, was the last straw.
@NorsQuarters said:
We are so upset because we could have gotten something from that game, making it more frustrating than a comprehensive defeat imo.
I disagree with the view that we played poorly tonight but rather lacked an effective final ball. When we did shoot it was either blocked or leant back on, as if the pressure of not having scored many made us snatch at our chances.
The officiating has yet to improve although they are professional at this level I believe. Makes my theory that more training makes better refs seem wholly misguided. They just don't appear to "leave their bias at the door", over/under reacting accordingly.
It seems oddly predictable, reminding me of the phrase on my bingo card, "you know what you're going to get with Wycombe". I have to believe that it is subconcious and at the end of the day we just have to overcome, until and unless the playing field is even.
Right now it seems like we are playing up the slope at Loakes Park in both halves, but the boys are giving it a damn good go twice a week against quality opposition whose use of their own dark arts are both more subtle and more dangerous than ours.
And finally. So good to have fans back at Adams Park. The chanting was loud for a time, helped perhaps by the lack of chit chat and the acoustics of the "away end". Second half the levels were muted until we went a goal down ironically. Double that crowd next home game and keep getting behind the boys for 90+ minutes and we can collectively be the proverbial 12th man.
COYB!?
The slope went from side to side at Loakes Park !!
@Glenactico said:
My only gripe actually was the Stoke goalscorer goading supporters behind the goal. It lacks class in any situation but I thought it was particularly poor taste in the circumstances.
We've done the same before (see Charles v Sunderland last season). I thought it was just a bit of fun.
Yes. For me, the most unattractive bit of player behaviour tonight was our surrounding the referee after the foul on Fred. This collective faux outrage, designed only to bring about the worst possible outcome for the offending player in a manner that would have had commentators plying their trade in European games in the eighties and nineties clucking about continentals and dodgy latin temperaments, is insincere and without honour. Had the position been reversed, this forum would have been full of (well-justified) indignation.
I thought we did a very fair job of managing without the midfield trio tonight but should not have lost and share the disappointment expressed on the matter by others, largely for the same reasons. Unless the correct thinking is still that we are the plucky underdogs just marking time until our single season in the Championship inevitably comes to an end rather than the ones who have somehow, somewhat miraculously, come to terms with the league and have a chance to survive if they can develop a cutting edge, this seems a wholly justified position.
The referee was fine - broadly consistent, even if I might have given more free kicks for some challenges (by both sides). Not a meaningful part of the reason we lost unless we think we should have referees that reward every fall by a player in line with its artistic qualities rather than its causes in which case watch out because, as we've already seen this season, there are some good exponents of that on other teams, too.
Firstly it was just wonderful to be back. All credit should go to the club who had obviously put in an awful lot of hard work to plan it. The organisation was brilliant, and the atmosphere inside the ground was special. Fans realised what an honour it was to be there and just being able to interact as fans with the players and what was going on on the pitch made you realise just how much you'd missed it.
As for the game, as feared, the lack of our three first choice central midfielders proved too steep a mountain to climb. It's a shame, because I didn't think Stoke were anything special and if we'd been able to at least get close to putting out our strongest team I think we'd have been in with a chance.
We were crying out for someone who could put their foot on the ball and use it better and to that end I was surprised Mehmeti didn't make an appearance.
Anyway, let's just hope Thompson, Gape and Adeniran are all back soon
@chairboyscentral said:
I'm not sure we'd have made it count, but I'm still absolutely baffled how that wan't a red for them. Leg-breaking stuff.
I had a terrible view of this one, as from my angle it looked very standard yellow card material. But the crowd did seem to be going mad. But then Fred seemed to be smiling after when play re started.
(Presuming it was the Fred foul not something else!)
Anyone else surprised, and amazed, when someone turned the lights up to 11, seconds before the match started? They are magnificent, so bright, we can now see a midweek game properly for the first time ever.
The referee was fine - broadly consistent, even if I might have given more free kicks for some challenges (by both sides). Not a meaningful part of the reason we lost unless we think we should have referees that reward every fall by a player in line with its artistic qualities rather than its causes in which case watch out because, as we've already seen this season, there are some good exponents of that on other teams, too.
I presume you didn’t see McCarthy being wrestled to the ground which caused him to be injured, the brutal challenge on Onyedinma that led only to a yellow card (same punishment as Samuel’s alleged ‘dive’), the possible foul on Jacobson that led to Stoke’s goal and the possible hand ball in Stoke’s penalty box at the end?
But yes, apart from those incidents, the referee was fine and broadly consistent.
And you’re right, why should we regard ourselves as underdogs when we field a weakened line up against a team with players worth millions of pounds who were in the Premier League just two years ago and lie just one point behind the play off places this season?
My point Eric, is the madness of the same punishment being dished out for what the referee deemed to be a dive and a ‘late and high tackle’ on Fred to use the words of the report on Stoke’s own website. The punishment did not fit the ‘crime’.
It was a dive. That's why the referee "deemed" it to be a dive. He fully deserved his yellow card and hopefully it will give him cause to have a think about this aspect of his game that has crept in this season.
I've only seen the challenge on Fred once, at the ground from behind the goal but at the time I did think it was a red card
While Fred may have disappointed going forwards he put in a hell of a defensive shift last night, providing a lot of cover for JJ and repeatedly tracking runs and snuffing out threats.
The lights up to 11 mentioned by @Steve_Peart was immense. I thought they were good already but then at kick off, another 50%?
I think people are missing the point here. What I’m trying to say (obviously not very well) is how wrong it is that two offences of such differing seriousness should carry the same punishment. Also, I haven’t seen the same criticism directed at the Stoke player who was booked for diving then did the same thing again a few minutes later.
That's fine, your issue is that the challenge on Fred should have been punished with a red card. I probably agree on that.
It doesn't mean that Samuel shouldn't have been booked though. He absolutely should have been. As should the Stoke player (McLean?) who was also rightly booked (I don't remember seeing a 2nd dive)
I suspect the reason people have focused on Samuel more is because he's a Wycombe player.
I think I reacted to you calling it an "alleged" dive and the referee "deemed it" to be a dive. Your use of language indicated some doubt as to the decision, particularly since you brought it up in a post in which you were arguing that the referee had not had a good game
I was relatively close to the foul on Fred, and as ive seen it only once, I thought it was one of those 'yellow' bordering on Red card decisions. As we had got very little from the ref all night, didn't think he would issue a red.
I hate diving and cheating in football, it makes an already difficult job of refereeing considerably harder.
Personally I was hoping that the introduction of video technology at the top level, would stamp out diving. Where the 4th official could clearly see a dive to try and hoodwink a ref into giving a penalty, then inform the ref to issue a straight red.
@arnos_grove said:
While Fred may have disappointed going forwards he put in a hell of a defensive shift last night, providing a lot of cover for JJ and repeatedly tracking runs and snuffing out threats.
That is a very fair point @arnos_grove. Fred did indeed put in a hell of a defensive shift; also, there is a fine distinction (and an element of lucky guessing on the part of defenders) between a successful piece of fancy footwork and a thwarted piece. The trickery rarely came off last night but, as the season progresses, I’m sure it will lead to many attacking opportunities and, hopefully, a good few goals !
Agreed. Diving and cheating needs stamping out of the game and if Alex Samuel needs a couple of yellows to concentrate his mind, I’m ok with that. His tumbling over is getting more embarrassing by the week.
And yes, for the avoidance of doubt, I apply that to all diving players.
Comments
Thompson and Adeniran had late assessments, so hopefully at least one is back for Saturday. Crossing everything I physically can.
Two sides to tonight. Firstly, incredibly frustrating as I really feel with a cutting edge we could have got something from that game - Stewart simply has to score that chance at the end. We need to be creating more than just balls launched forwards, and definitely looked more like it when McCleary was on and connecting with Horgan.
On the other hand it was an absolute joy to be back at AP tonight. To notice so many familiar faces, to see GA doing a pre and post match lap of honour to rousing applause and to hear the cry of "Chairboys" made me realise just how much I quite missed the place and in amongst some obscenities towards a pretty hopeless referee, I'm not sure even a 1-0 home loss on a Baltic Wednesday night could have wiped the smile away from under the face mask.
Cannot wait to see another 1000 more fans there next week, and hopefully more and more as this season goes on!
A but baffled why everyone is getting so upset tonight. I thought we played well and, but for a careless loss of the ball by Fred which ultimately led to him, Horgan & JJ bring taken out of the game and therefore the goal, on a different day all that pressure at the end results in a goal for us and 3 points against ex-Premier League Stoke.
Somewhere along the way we seem to have forgotten how much we have progressed since the start of the season and that our upgrade on Bayo has only played about 30mins all season.
We are going toe to toe with some top teams...well done lads, we do not look out of place in this league!
Thank goodness for the comments by Twizz and Forest Blue. Disappointed by some of the unjustified negativity by some other posters.
Our entire first choice midfield was out injured, our regular strikers were rested, we were the victims of some very poor decisions by the referee, and we still came close to drawing with a team who were in the Premier League just two years ago.
Good to see some of our longer supporting fans quoted in reports tonight.
Lynden Finch and Dave Peatey (a Gasroom regular, not sure I should reveal his moniker, and this is the correct spelling) are in the Mail.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-9011683/Wycombe-Wanderers-0-1-Stoke-City-Michael-ONeills-men-claim-late-winner.html
Ian Monk, a regular home and away since the 60s, is in the BBC report.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/55168211
@DJWYC14 on the Channel 4 pre-match report.
https://www.channel4.com/news/football-fans-welcomed-back-to-stadiums-in-limited-numbers
Not a bad display overall but we need to find a more effective attacking formula. I’m not sure quite what it will be.
Maybe trying to get the full backs forward more? We very rarely get an overlap on the flank. Or try and get Horgan in a more central position. I’d also like to see us get a bit more pace into the starting 11 and encourage more runners in behind. Too often we fail to ask enough questions of opposition defenders by never really making them run back toward their own goal.
We also need to improve on our crossing. In most games our attacking opportunities will be limited and we must focus on better execution when we have a chance to deliver into the area. Too many crosses were wasted and we just can’t afford that.
Mustn’t complain too much. A scratch midfield again and some tired legs (Fred looked exhausted) but we still took a good Stoke team close. However, if we’re serious about staying up we need to find ways to be considerably more effective in attack.
Good individual displays from Knight and Grimmer especially I thought. And McCarthy did pretty well in the holding role before he went off. What did happen there?
Overall a very enjoyable night and wonderful to see a game live.
My only gripe actually was the Stoke goalscorer goading supporters behind the goal. It lacks class in any situation but I thought it was particularly poor taste in the circumstances.
We've done the same before (see Charles v Sunderland last season). I thought it was just a bit of fun.
Obviously it is a lot easier to enjoy to see it that way when it is the other way around. But if I’m honest I don’t think Charles should have done so. There is no need to incite paying spectators and frankly I think it is a bit childish for a professional athlete to behave that way.
We are so upset because we could have gotten something from that game, making it more frustrating than a comprehensive defeat imo.
I disagree with the view that we played poorly tonight but rather lacked an effective final ball. When we did shoot it was either blocked or leant back on, as if the pressure of not having scored many made us snatch at our chances.
The officiating has yet to improve although they are professional at this level I believe. Makes my theory that more training makes better refs seem wholly misguided. They just don't appear to "leave their bias at the door", over/under reacting accordingly.
It seems oddly predictable, reminding me of the phrase on my bingo card, "you know what you're going to get with Wycombe". I have to believe that it is subconcious and at the end of the day we just have to overcome, until and unless the playing field is even.
Right now it seems like we are playing up the slope at Loakes Park in both halves, but the boys are giving it a damn good go twice a week against quality opposition whose use of their own dark arts are both more subtle and more dangerous than ours.
And finally. So good to have fans back at Adams Park. The chanting was loud for a time, helped perhaps by the lack of chit chat and the acoustics of the "away end". Second half the levels were muted until we went a goal down ironically. Double that crowd next home game and keep getting behind the boys for 90+ minutes and we can collectively be the proverbial 12th man.
COYB!?
I thought several players were disappointing this evening and I’d have to include Anthony Stewart in that. As @bluntphil pointed out on commentary he has had to move from his preferred right side of central defence and, despite that, he has been imperious in virtually every game.
We were all delighted when Fred returned for a third spell but, this season in particular, he has not reached the heights that we know he is capable of.
Alex Samuel produced very little this evening but he was up against several gargantuan defenders and got little (if any) change out of them (or the referee).
But most controversially, Bayo seems to me to be doing very little lately apart from attracting the attention of at least two defenders whenever he gets into the box.
I’m sure this uncharacteristic feeling of frustration on my part will soon pass. To be without three key midfielders was always going to make life difficult but to lose Jason McCarthy, filling in very capably in midfield, to an off the ball “incident”, was the last straw.
The slope went from side to side at Loakes Park !!
Yes. For me, the most unattractive bit of player behaviour tonight was our surrounding the referee after the foul on Fred. This collective faux outrage, designed only to bring about the worst possible outcome for the offending player in a manner that would have had commentators plying their trade in European games in the eighties and nineties clucking about continentals and dodgy latin temperaments, is insincere and without honour. Had the position been reversed, this forum would have been full of (well-justified) indignation.
I thought we did a very fair job of managing without the midfield trio tonight but should not have lost and share the disappointment expressed on the matter by others, largely for the same reasons. Unless the correct thinking is still that we are the plucky underdogs just marking time until our single season in the Championship inevitably comes to an end rather than the ones who have somehow, somewhat miraculously, come to terms with the league and have a chance to survive if they can develop a cutting edge, this seems a wholly justified position.
The referee was fine - broadly consistent, even if I might have given more free kicks for some challenges (by both sides). Not a meaningful part of the reason we lost unless we think we should have referees that reward every fall by a player in line with its artistic qualities rather than its causes in which case watch out because, as we've already seen this season, there are some good exponents of that on other teams, too.
Firstly it was just wonderful to be back. All credit should go to the club who had obviously put in an awful lot of hard work to plan it. The organisation was brilliant, and the atmosphere inside the ground was special. Fans realised what an honour it was to be there and just being able to interact as fans with the players and what was going on on the pitch made you realise just how much you'd missed it.
As for the game, as feared, the lack of our three first choice central midfielders proved too steep a mountain to climb. It's a shame, because I didn't think Stoke were anything special and if we'd been able to at least get close to putting out our strongest team I think we'd have been in with a chance.
We were crying out for someone who could put their foot on the ball and use it better and to that end I was surprised Mehmeti didn't make an appearance.
Anyway, let's just hope Thompson, Gape and Adeniran are all back soon
I had a terrible view of this one, as from my angle it looked very standard yellow card material. But the crowd did seem to be going mad. But then Fred seemed to be smiling after when play re started.
(Presuming it was the Fred foul not something else!)
The problem with the balls to Bayo was the age old one of lack of quality and from the wrong areas.
Long straight balls aimlessly punted in the air ask a lot at the best of times but many seemed to land well in front and give him no chance.
Oh well, at least we have got in for a game. So many people seemed to relish saying there was no chance.
Anyone else surprised, and amazed, when someone turned the lights up to 11, seconds before the match started? They are magnificent, so bright, we can now see a midweek game properly for the first time ever.
I presume you didn’t see McCarthy being wrestled to the ground which caused him to be injured, the brutal challenge on Onyedinma that led only to a yellow card (same punishment as Samuel’s alleged ‘dive’), the possible foul on Jacobson that led to Stoke’s goal and the possible hand ball in Stoke’s penalty box at the end?
But yes, apart from those incidents, the referee was fine and broadly consistent.
And you’re right, why should we regard ourselves as underdogs when we field a weakened line up against a team with players worth millions of pounds who were in the Premier League just two years ago and lie just one point behind the play off places this season?
Nothing alleged about the dive from Samuel Alan
My point Eric, is the madness of the same punishment being dished out for what the referee deemed to be a dive and a ‘late and high tackle’ on Fred to use the words of the report on Stoke’s own website. The punishment did not fit the ‘crime’.
Samuel's dive was a blatant attempt to cheat, I have no sympathy for whatever card is shown to those that inflict such damage on the beautiful game.
It was a dive. That's why the referee "deemed" it to be a dive. He fully deserved his yellow card and hopefully it will give him cause to have a think about this aspect of his game that has crept in this season.
I've only seen the challenge on Fred once, at the ground from behind the goal but at the time I did think it was a red card
While Fred may have disappointed going forwards he put in a hell of a defensive shift last night, providing a lot of cover for JJ and repeatedly tracking runs and snuffing out threats.
The lights up to 11 mentioned by @Steve_Peart was immense. I thought they were good already but then at kick off, another 50%?
I think people are missing the point here. What I’m trying to say (obviously not very well) is how wrong it is that two offences of such differing seriousness should carry the same punishment. Also, I haven’t seen the same criticism directed at the Stoke player who was booked for diving then did the same thing again a few minutes later.
That's fine, your issue is that the challenge on Fred should have been punished with a red card. I probably agree on that.
It doesn't mean that Samuel shouldn't have been booked though. He absolutely should have been. As should the Stoke player (McLean?) who was also rightly booked (I don't remember seeing a 2nd dive)
I suspect the reason people have focused on Samuel more is because he's a Wycombe player.
I think I reacted to you calling it an "alleged" dive and the referee "deemed it" to be a dive. Your use of language indicated some doubt as to the decision, particularly since you brought it up in a post in which you were arguing that the referee had not had a good game
I was relatively close to the foul on Fred, and as ive seen it only once, I thought it was one of those 'yellow' bordering on Red card decisions. As we had got very little from the ref all night, didn't think he would issue a red.
I hate diving and cheating in football, it makes an already difficult job of refereeing considerably harder.
Personally I was hoping that the introduction of video technology at the top level, would stamp out diving. Where the 4th official could clearly see a dive to try and hoodwink a ref into giving a penalty, then inform the ref to issue a straight red.
That is a very fair point @arnos_grove. Fred did indeed put in a hell of a defensive shift; also, there is a fine distinction (and an element of lucky guessing on the part of defenders) between a successful piece of fancy footwork and a thwarted piece. The trickery rarely came off last night but, as the season progresses, I’m sure it will lead to many attacking opportunities and, hopefully, a good few goals !
Agreed. Diving and cheating needs stamping out of the game and if Alex Samuel needs a couple of yellows to concentrate his mind, I’m ok with that. His tumbling over is getting more embarrassing by the week.
And yes, for the avoidance of doubt, I apply that to all diving players.