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Subject: Ireland Vs...
wow what a showdown against NZ today !
Congrats on a draw, even though you deserved to win. NZ players were superior i felt (Hird's tech must be 15+) but you did a great trick by pushing your defense up, which exposed you a few time but prevented their wings to cause much more damage. Hanrahan was a rock today !
Terry's brilliance when he slotted the equalizer after a tremendous solo was breathtaking ! Then Cully had one shot on goal and he scored, pity he missed the penalty. Then the red card, things like that happen but you should still be proud. Great job!
(edited)
Congrats on a draw, even though you deserved to win. NZ players were superior i felt (Hird's tech must be 15+) but you did a great trick by pushing your defense up, which exposed you a few time but prevented their wings to cause much more damage. Hanrahan was a rock today !
Terry's brilliance when he slotted the equalizer after a tremendous solo was breathtaking ! Then Cully had one shot on goal and he scored, pity he missed the penalty. Then the red card, things like that happen but you should still be proud. Great job!
(edited)
Ok, we've finally got a game set for Saturday. Canada it is. Any thoughts?
Has there ever been a player more injury-prone than Jim Caffrey? I'm fairly confident that he's had 3 injuries in the last 2 months, putting him out of action for around 60 days
I've not watched the game yet but i wrote out a long preview last night so i may as well use it.
Right, Canada.
The formation I’ve picked is nothing new, it’s the usual 4-4-2 that’s worked pretty well for us this season. It’s always a risk playing a predictable formation but (despite what some people think) it’s never the same formation. I always personalise little bits and pieces.
I was tempted to go with a 5-4-1 or 4-5-1 with a covering defender/defensive midfielder but playing 1 upfront against Canada wont work. They have a very mobile defence that plays deep in their own half but also moves high up the field when they’re in possession. The effect of this is that any attack by us that isn’t a counter attack would leave Matthews having to get past 4 defenders and he cant do that every week.
Instead I’m going to make use of their lack of cover on the wings. By having their defence so deep, it leaves acres of space for our wings to run down with no little risk of being caught offside. We played with some extra width last week and it worked pretty well, this week I’m stretching that a bit further. In addition to this I’ve set the team up to counter attack within reason, I had the option to free up our wingers even more but chose to have them keep their defensive duties. What I’m looking for from my backs and midfield is for them to basically play the ball over the top of the Canadian defence when they advance. I’ve also noticed that Canada don’t always keep a flat back line, sometimes preferring to play 1 wingback a stepup at corners. I plan on taking advantage of this. Our forwards will be starting from wider postions when the ball is deep in our half. Should a through-ball be played, the wide defender will have to play catchup and we have reasonably quick forwards.
In terms of defence it’s the usual thing. We’re playing a team with 1 very good wide player in Iginla and to negate him, we’re playing high up the field so he doesn’t have the space to run and the forwards cant get into the box quickly without being offside. To be honest he didn’t look that quick last week against Slovenija which is why I’ll stick one of our quickest defenders on him. I am very pleased that Sean Amado is not available for this game, I quite possibly wouldn’t have picked this game had he been available because I don’t think our defenders could deal with him. The only thing we’re not setup to deal with is their attacking midfielder (Omar in their last game) Hopefully by pushing the defence up he wont have the space to operate and should be surrounded by Armstrong, MacKeamish, Hanrahan and Brunton. In anything I think our problems may come from their other two mids who will likely have space to play balls from deep but nothing we can do about that. Of course all this counts for nothing if they decide to spring a surprise on us and play an entirely different formation but the 4-4-2 is reasonably well setup to deal with any changes.
My feeling is this game will come down to the intelligence of our players. If they can follow what I want them to do I believe we’re very capable of winning this game. Generally though they don’t follow my instructions, Matthews in particular is a wannabe midfielder and insists on not holding his line (another reason why I didn’t play 1 upfront) and if Canada decide not to advance, our forwards could have a very hard time breaking through their defence.
I’d quite like peoples opinions on our midfield in the last 2/7ths of the pitch. I’m not entirely happy with their positioning but not sure how to improve it either.
Oh and as it’s possible that this could be my last game, I wouldn’t mind some luck for once.
Right, Canada.
The formation I’ve picked is nothing new, it’s the usual 4-4-2 that’s worked pretty well for us this season. It’s always a risk playing a predictable formation but (despite what some people think) it’s never the same formation. I always personalise little bits and pieces.
I was tempted to go with a 5-4-1 or 4-5-1 with a covering defender/defensive midfielder but playing 1 upfront against Canada wont work. They have a very mobile defence that plays deep in their own half but also moves high up the field when they’re in possession. The effect of this is that any attack by us that isn’t a counter attack would leave Matthews having to get past 4 defenders and he cant do that every week.
Instead I’m going to make use of their lack of cover on the wings. By having their defence so deep, it leaves acres of space for our wings to run down with no little risk of being caught offside. We played with some extra width last week and it worked pretty well, this week I’m stretching that a bit further. In addition to this I’ve set the team up to counter attack within reason, I had the option to free up our wingers even more but chose to have them keep their defensive duties. What I’m looking for from my backs and midfield is for them to basically play the ball over the top of the Canadian defence when they advance. I’ve also noticed that Canada don’t always keep a flat back line, sometimes preferring to play 1 wingback a stepup at corners. I plan on taking advantage of this. Our forwards will be starting from wider postions when the ball is deep in our half. Should a through-ball be played, the wide defender will have to play catchup and we have reasonably quick forwards.
In terms of defence it’s the usual thing. We’re playing a team with 1 very good wide player in Iginla and to negate him, we’re playing high up the field so he doesn’t have the space to run and the forwards cant get into the box quickly without being offside. To be honest he didn’t look that quick last week against Slovenija which is why I’ll stick one of our quickest defenders on him. I am very pleased that Sean Amado is not available for this game, I quite possibly wouldn’t have picked this game had he been available because I don’t think our defenders could deal with him. The only thing we’re not setup to deal with is their attacking midfielder (Omar in their last game) Hopefully by pushing the defence up he wont have the space to operate and should be surrounded by Armstrong, MacKeamish, Hanrahan and Brunton. In anything I think our problems may come from their other two mids who will likely have space to play balls from deep but nothing we can do about that. Of course all this counts for nothing if they decide to spring a surprise on us and play an entirely different formation but the 4-4-2 is reasonably well setup to deal with any changes.
My feeling is this game will come down to the intelligence of our players. If they can follow what I want them to do I believe we’re very capable of winning this game. Generally though they don’t follow my instructions, Matthews in particular is a wannabe midfielder and insists on not holding his line (another reason why I didn’t play 1 upfront) and if Canada decide not to advance, our forwards could have a very hard time breaking through their defence.
I’d quite like peoples opinions on our midfield in the last 2/7ths of the pitch. I’m not entirely happy with their positioning but not sure how to improve it either.
Oh and as it’s possible that this could be my last game, I wouldn’t mind some luck for once.
Oh come on! Seriously, how many times are we going to be robbed like this?
Big lol. Haven't seen something like this for quite a time!
That's pretty sickening, because I thought for the majority of the game you had Canada under control.
It's mostly pointless anyway as they changed formation.
I've lost count of the ammount of times this season when we've not come away with the results we deserve. 9 shots to 2, won posession, won territory, lost 0-2. It's the same old story.
I'm not entirely sure what was wrong with our forwards today, they had countless chances to run through the defence but they seemed to have almost no pace. I was pretty happy with everything else, barring tthe two cock-ups by the defence to let them through.
I've lost count of the ammount of times this season when we've not come away with the results we deserve. 9 shots to 2, won posession, won territory, lost 0-2. It's the same old story.
I'm not entirely sure what was wrong with our forwards today, they had countless chances to run through the defence but they seemed to have almost no pace. I was pretty happy with everything else, barring tthe two cock-ups by the defence to let them through.
I've finally sorted the squad out for this season. Still waiting on a few updates but the ins and outs are done
Players Out
Martin Fairclough - He's 30, he's not getting any quicker and we've 8 or 9 better options
Mike Tilson - At club level he'd be great, at international level he's got too many weak points
Eddie Cregg - At club level hes lethal but doesnt have the pace at international level. His club are also now dead so he wont be getting any better.
Patrick Chawla - 29 and has been passed by our younger players
Jim Walsh - If defending was only about 1 skill he'd be a first teamer but its not.
Players In
Andrew McCauley
Derek Docherty
Jon McKeon
All 3 are good young defenders. I would have added a few more players to the squad but its the usual case of a great player having terrible stamina or lacking in 1 major skills.
Players Hanging On By The Skin Of Their Teeth
Paul Schaunig
Jared Hendrikx
Stephen Thornton
Terry Carpenter
Clayton Fahey
Ian Chaudet
Player "requirements" are up on the Ireland page. Theyre not strict but it's a rough idea
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Players Out
Martin Fairclough - He's 30, he's not getting any quicker and we've 8 or 9 better options
Mike Tilson - At club level he'd be great, at international level he's got too many weak points
Eddie Cregg - At club level hes lethal but doesnt have the pace at international level. His club are also now dead so he wont be getting any better.
Patrick Chawla - 29 and has been passed by our younger players
Jim Walsh - If defending was only about 1 skill he'd be a first teamer but its not.
Players In
Andrew McCauley
Derek Docherty
Jon McKeon
All 3 are good young defenders. I would have added a few more players to the squad but its the usual case of a great player having terrible stamina or lacking in 1 major skills.
Players Hanging On By The Skin Of Their Teeth
Paul Schaunig
Jared Hendrikx
Stephen Thornton
Terry Carpenter
Clayton Fahey
Ian Chaudet
Player "requirements" are up on the Ireland page. Theyre not strict but it's a rough idea
(edited)
I just found some old stats from when i took over.
When i started we were 45th out of 65
We're now 47th out of 78. Damn new countries pushed us down. Rough guess we're about 36th.
When i started our ranking points were 1277.11. Theyre now 1502.9 and should rise to about 1600 in the next 3 games.
When i started we were 45th out of 65
We're now 47th out of 78. Damn new countries pushed us down. Rough guess we're about 36th.
When i started our ranking points were 1277.11. Theyre now 1502.9 and should rise to about 1600 in the next 3 games.
I'm looking at the various tournaments going on this season and i wont be suprised if we dont end up with the full 16 games this time. A lot of teams are looking like theyre going to be tied up with the U-21 world cup. I chose not to compete because i think we'd get destroyed and so would our ranking.
My plan for this season is to be favourites for every game we play and if we cant find teams that fit that i'll likely choose not to play. I'd rather freeze the ranking than risk getting beaten and have it fall. It could be a boring season but i dont want to be in the 4th group of seeds for the next world cup.
(edited)
My plan for this season is to be favourites for every game we play and if we cant find teams that fit that i'll likely choose not to play. I'd rather freeze the ranking than risk getting beaten and have it fall. It could be a boring season but i dont want to be in the 4th group of seeds for the next world cup.
(edited)