Sporting CP (A) | CL | Post Match Thread

applejuice said:
if u don't play pacy fullback then you are vulnerable to counters.

if u play with too many short players you are vulnerable for set pieces

no defensive coach can fix it if pep keeps to play his way
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We've always had a relative short team under Pep until the last couple of seasons, Dealing with set pieces has never been an issue, Scoring from them has been a problem but that also boils down to the delivery which is always poor.

I remember Peps Barca team, Everyone used to say "You can hurt them from set pieces they are tiny"...They were incredible at defending set pieces, Very rarely they'd concede from a set piece.

At the minute full backs without pace isn't the problem, Gvardiol is no slouch, Akanji is a quick centre back too. Giving the ball away in silly areas of the pitch and getting exposed is a bigger problem, We are constantly doing it this season, We have wide men now that take risks with the ball which is great as personally I love to see a winger try take his man on, But with our system we are more suited to Grealish and Bernardo out wide two players who can hold onto the ball and keep possession and less chance for opposition to break on us which was a massive part the year we won the Treble..
 
HelloCity said:
I don’t recall that happening.

I recall losing due to injuries, exhaustion, loss of form and confidence.

We’re in a tough period and people need to hang tight.
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Then you haven't watched us have you. Lewis wasn't tracking back last night. There was an occasion where Nunes was behind Lewis trying to get back to fight for the team. By the time the ball got to our area Lewis wasn't even in the picture and Nunes was. That is effort. Our starting 11 against Bournemouth was more than enough to at least put up a fight. Same as last night. lets not make excuses. This has been coming.
 
We can blame the defence all we want, but you cant be missing penalties and chances like haaland has. He cant hold the ball up, he cant pass to a blue shirt, he cant shoot it seems at the minute. Dreadful. May aswell play with 10 men. he needs to step up in games like this, but he doesnt.
 
I think we take a deep breath and look at the overall game, objectively. The football we played in the first half was some of the best i've seen this season, we were toying with them at times. I think although we fucked around too much, any of those chances go in and we are looking at the same result as the last time we played them at theirs. I thought overall, the Simpson-Pusey was ok and did as much as you can expect but in the second half he really lacked protection. Pep playing Rico and Pusey on the same side was wrong, if he can't play the left side then it's just better not to play him because they were targeting him a lot and Rico just doesn't have the defensive strength to cover him. They didn't batter us in the second half, we just had big lapses in concentration and gave them simple opportunities, just like Pep said.

First half i thought Foden was amazing, the best football we've seen him play since last season. I thought Bernardo was just ok, moments of class and then moments where he would just hit the pass too hard or give it away - we really need him to step up again like he has in the past.

If we can use the first half performance as a base and learn from errors in the second, i think we'll be ok. But Pep has a lot of work to do there.
 
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