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From the team that was smashing the opposition in the first half of the season to what we have now?

Do you think it's the pressure?

I don't think it is pressure.

Combination of factors. Lack of a regular centre back pairing due to injuries and suspensions, Yaya's absence and form since his return, Silva's injury (I'm convinved he has one) and three of out four forwards not doing their job properly/at all.

There's possibly some fatigue as well but that shouldn't be an excuse. There are smaller squads who have played as many games as us in far better form.

for me teams have figured out how to deal with us and we have a manager that is too inept to change our style

And i might add, beside what CityGer said, we looked like we started the season at full power, but couldn't keep the level so high and didn't knew how to handle that downfall.

Teams have figured out how to play against us, thats the nub of it.

We have been quite narrow all season and especially when we play away from home opponents tend to let us have the ball all we want until we get 30 yards from goal; then the full-backs on both sides play tucked right in towards the corners of their own 18 yard box, and we see a bank of 9 players slung across in two lines when we get within 10 yards of the opposing teams penalty area. Teams effectively then challenge us to break that down and we cant; we go sideways sideways sideways a lot, then try to pass through very small windows and end up giving the ball away, and often find teams then hitting us on the break as we throw more men forwards when we get frustrated at not being able to break them down despite having the ball for 80 minutes, eg Sunderlands goal on New Years Day, Gibsons goal for Everton, Moore's for Swansea, Larsson's 3rd goal yesterday.

Teams know we have no standout pacey player who can just run past people like Bale, Lennon, Walcott or Robben and they can defend accordingly, playing slightly higher up from their 18 yard box leaving a little more space behind as we have no-one who can run past them into this area, either to the byeline or even over the top.

Dont laugh, but for all his perceived inconsistencies, Theo Walcott would really add to our squad and give us something we currently dont have.

Goaters 103 wrote:Teams have figured out how to play against us, thats the nub of it.

We have been quite narrow all season and especially when we play away from home opponents tend to let us have the ball all we want until we get 30 yards from goal; then the full-backs on both sides play tucked right in towards the corners of their own 18 yard box, and we see a bank of 9 players slung across in two lines when we get within 10 yads of the opposing teams penalty area. Teams effectively then challenge us to break that down and we cant; we go sideways sideways sideways a lot, then try to pass through very small windows and end up giving the ball away, and often find teams then hitting us on the break as we throw more men forwards when we get frustrated at not being able to break them down despite having the ball for 80 minutes, eg Sunderlands goal on New Years Day, Gibsons goal for Everton, Moore's for Swansea, Larsson's 3rd goal yesterday.

Teams know we have no standout pacey player who can just run past people like Bale, Lennon, Walcott or Robben and they can defend accordingly, playing slightly higher up from their 18 yard box leaving a little more space behind as we have no-one who can run past them into this areas, either to the byeline or even over the top.

Dont laugh, but for all his perceived inconsistencies, Theo Walcott would really add to our squad and give us something we currently dont have.

This is just about it I think.
Bob has had months to work out what to do about it, but has failed to find the solution.

Piccsnumberoneblue wrote:

Goaters 103 wrote:Teams have figured out how to play against us, thats the nub of it.

We have been quite narrow all season and especially when we play away from home opponents tend to let us have the ball all we want until we get 30 yards from goal; then the full-backs on both sides play tucked right in towards the corners of their own 18 yard box, and we see a bank of 9 players slung across in two lines when we get within 10 yads of the opposing teams penalty area. Teams effectively then challenge us to break that down and we cant; we go sideways sideways sideways a lot, then try to pass through very small windows and end up giving the ball away, and often find teams then hitting us on the break as we throw more men forwards when we get frustrated at not being able to break them down despite having the ball for 80 minutes, eg Sunderlands goal on New Years Day, Gibsons goal for Everton, Moore's for Swansea, Larsson's 3rd goal yesterday.

Teams know we have no standout pacey player who can just run past people like Bale, Lennon, Walcott or Robben and they can defend accordingly, playing slightly higher up from their 18 yard box leaving a little more space behind as we have no-one who can run past them into this areas, either to the byeline or even over the top.

Dont laugh, but for all his perceived inconsistencies, Theo Walcott would really add to our squad and give us something we currently dont have.

This is just about it I think.
Bob has had months to work out what to do about it, but has failed to find the solution.

Agreed Piccs. By the turn of the year we had started seeing teams defend against us like this and we have simply made no adjustment.

Its like the kid who keeps dipping his hand in the cookie jar and keeps getting a slap, we continue to go away from home, line-up the same way and continually keep getting the same result - either scoring zip or 1 goal, and dropping points galore, and then wondering why it happens.

We had the January window to get some pace into the final third and we sadly didnt do it, and Mancini still has to demonstrate he can show he has a Plan B that we can revert to when the original pattern isnt working, as it often hasnt since the turn of the year.

His press conference yesterday was like a tick list of excuses and straw clutching on Utd dropping points. Not impressed and the manager needs to raise his game too next season, otherwise he needs to be replaced if we want to win the bigger prizes, which I am sure our owners intend for us to do.

I don't think that's entirely it - at some point around the same time as Silva stopped performing we changed how we played our matches - the tempo dropped and we started doing a LOT of aimless passing hoping something would develop instead of forcing things to develop. I mentioned in another thread we stopped playing English football and started playing continentally.

We stopped going fast, stopped shooting from relatively far outside the box (i think we had a stat like most goals and/or on target shots from outside the box), injuries, Silva's drop in form for whatever reason, and we lost the element of surprise and teams now know how to prepare and play vs. us, whereas when the season started they didnt.

Plus, now we appear to love doing tippy-tappy Arsenal shit. Even Arsenal have gone away from that...sort of.