BWooley wrote:
banduan wrote:
We set up the right way but did all the wrong things. In the kind of conditions we were playing in deft touches on the run won't work.
I would agree except that Brighton showed exactly that today - lots of flicks to get their players into space. The key difference being their off-the-ball movement, which we had none of, and our midfield (Odegaard and Lokonga in the first half) completely switching off defensively leaving us 2 men down when we didn't have the ball.
Brighton were definitely doing quick 1-2s but from standing positions on the build-up, not on the break. Absolutely agree about the difference in movement, it does seem like they are much better conditioned.
I believe we'd set out to exploit the gaps in their flanks by using Ramsdale to send kicks out wide to bypass their press. However with the conditions as they are it was never going to work as intended consistently, and to not adapt was naive.
The main disappointment was that the wayward passing from the Burnley game was back in full view, with players like Tierney and Partey both really off on their distribution. Not that those passes weren't on, as the offside through ball to Auba would not have come without those risks being taken, but we needed to be much better doing it.
For all of ESR and Saka's qualities, the performance does show how big a factor good performances from Thomas and Martin are. Both were poor on the day.