Nottingham Forest - Cardiff City

[Salvatore Matrecano]

Taylor put a shift in and at least tried first half. He just looks short on quality, in other words exactly like a striker who has played the majority of his football in the lower leagues. You could see his confidence is dropping though and thats when he falls over and pulls faces.

[DR Forest]

Radio Notts (Brian Laws) post match were talking about our midfield getting overrun.
I'd argue that a lot of this comes from not being able to hold the ball up at the front- if it comes straight back then the ball keeps bypassing our midfield anyway.
Cardiff were able to win the ball up front, hold it for a few seconds and then lay off the their midfield who had time to get up to support.
I still think a tank up front is what we need more than anything else.

[ozzyten10]

Cardiff completely by passed midfield. It was more a time to percentage football and looked more like rugby- kicking for touch. There is an art to that type of football and they were very good at it when they bought the subs on…

[Paplane]

Cardiff completely by passed midfield. It was more a time to percentage football and looked more like rugby- kicking for touch. There is an art to that type of football and they were very good at it when they bought the subs on…

To be fair to CH, it's not just his sides that struggle against that type of football. Every season I can remember we've been turned over by a big physical side who launch it into the box. That Pants performance against Millwall a few years ago will live with me for a long time. I cant remember the score, but I can remember 7' tall Pants being completely intimidated by a bunch of ruffions.

And also, Cardiff are a good side, we dont need to forget that. It may be direct football they play but they execute it very well. We wont be the only side to get turned over by their approach this season.

[Strawberry Avenger]

Cardiff completely by passed midfield. It was more a time to percentage football and looked more like rugby- kicking for touch. There is an art to that type of football and they were very good at it when they bought the subs on…

To be fair to CH, it's not just his sides that struggle against that type of football. Every season I can remember we've been turned over by a big physical side who launch it into the box. That Pants performance against Millwall a few years ago will live with me for a long time. I cant remember the score, but I can remember 7' tall Pants being completely intimidated by a bunch of ruffions.

And also, Cardiff are a good side, we dont need to forget that. It may be direct football they play but they execute it very well. We wont be the only side to get turned over by their approach this season.

A rational post mortem, Pap'.

And they've been doing that 'Plan A' a lot longer than our 'Plan B' approach, too.

Their well oiled at it.

SA.

[Strawberry Avenger]

Radio Notts (Brian Laws) post match were talking about our midfield getting overrun.
I'd argue that a lot of this comes from not being able to hold the ball up at the front- if it comes straight back then the ball keeps bypassing our midfield anyway.
Cardiff were able to win the ball up front, hold it for a few seconds and then lay off the their midfield who had time to get up to support.
I still think a tank up front is what we need more than anything else.

Well, we're still waiting for that 'target man' style striker.

Yes.  A 'tank.'  Yes please.

SA.

[Strawberry Avenger]

During the Clough years although he talked of pure football played on the ground he was well aware that we had to be strong in the air both upfront and at the back. Lee Chapman and Peter Withe both, in their time, provided the power for the brilliant Robertson to target. When we were struggling during the early days of his reign he bought in Barry Butlin and Neil Martin. Neither were exceptional on the ground but both were fighters, goal scorers who definitely were not bullied. My point is that strength, power and nastiness has to be part of the winning formula especially in the lower leagues which is where we're going. The stories of the past remain true today because football is a simple game, another quote from BC.

:cool:

Cool post.

Had me at 'Hello.'

SA.

[GaribaldiRED]

Cardiff completely by passed midfield. It was more a time to percentage football and looked more like rugby- kicking for touch. There is an art to that type of football and they were very good at it when they bought the subs on…

To be fair to CH, it's not just his sides that struggle against that type of football. Every season I can remember we've been turned over by a big physical side who launch it into the box. That Pants performance against Millwall a few years ago will live with me for a long time. I cant remember the score, but I can remember 7' tall Pants being completely intimidated by a bunch of ruffions.

And also, Cardiff are a good side, we dont need to forget that. It may be direct football they play but they execute it very well. We wont be the only side to get turned over by their approach this season.

Agree Pap. It's difficult to defend against so you have to limit their time on the ball. We didn't do that. We actually gave them the ball unnecessarily by playing the long ball ourselves. A tactic we don't master at all. My root cause for the issues we have is that we are not able to push up and press efficiently as ONE team with real purpose and urgency. We try to press but we are not doing as one coordinated team and the defense are not pushing up and thus giving the opposition too much room between our lines. That to me is why we get overrun.  Getting a big target man won't fix that.

[Salvatore Matrecano]

Cardiff completely by passed midfield. It was more a time to percentage football and looked more like rugby- kicking for touch. There is an art to that type of football and they were very good at it when they bought the subs on…

To be fair to CH, it's not just his sides that struggle against that type of football. Every season I can remember we've been turned over by a big physical side who launch it into the box. That Pants performance against Millwall a few years ago will live with me for a long time. I cant remember the score, but I can remember 7' tall Pants being completely intimidated by a bunch of ruffions.

And also, Cardiff are a good side, we dont need to forget that. It may be direct football they play but they execute it very well. We wont be the only side to get turned over by their approach this season.

Agree Pap. It's difficult to defend against so you have to limit their time on the ball. We didn't do that. We actually gave them the ball unnecessarily by playing the long ball ourselves. A tactic we don't master at all. My root cause for the issues we have is that we are not able to push up and press efficiently as ONE team with real purpose and urgency. We try to press but we are not doing as one coordinated team and the defense are not pushing up and thus giving the opposition too much room between our lines. That to me is why we get overrun.  Getting a big target man won't fix that.

That is about a perfect summary in my opinion Gari of where we go wrong.
Do you think a new manager/better coaching can solve that with this team though?

[Strawberry Avenger]

It must be a joy for teams playing against Forest these days. Just press hard when Forest are trying to build up an attack and they will start playing the long ball. As Forest have no players that can win the long ball it will be easy to win it back.

This happens every single game but I don't believe CH is instructing the team to play like that. It would be madness to deliberately play the long ball against Cardiff with Taylor and Grabban on top. To me it seems like CH is not trying to solve this tactical challenge presented to him but rather wait for better players to be available. I'm not so sure that will work.

Ha oh dear if even you've given up we must be bad!  :D

:D

It's very difficult to see any type of progress. As I said above if you start playing the long ball against Cardiff you are doomed to fail and it's not like we don't have the players to really play football. I believe we have a good squad. Team movement and cooperation seem for the most part to be lacking and that is the manager's responsibility. Currently it is very difficult to see that any drastic changes would happen on the field. We won't get relegated but progress will be minimal at best. As you know I tend to try to stay positive but with CH I find it more and more difficult to see where Forest as a team are heading.

Well, we've had one game with 'his' players (and at least two of 'his' players are elsewhere and we still have no new younger striker). And taking the 1st half, you'd think a win may have been a possibility with some bright football played.  That's where 'I see' Hughton's Forest going if they get the players in over the next couple of windows.

So, 1 game with his players.  If we can get to Christmas with some points picked up and pull away from the relegation zone, we should be targeting a striker and one or two more quality players who can handle themselves and the likes of Cardiff. Our 'younger team' got 'old manned' (Was it ever so?)

To be fair, Cardiff are the land of Giants and they thumped quite a few teams last season when Mick arrived before they caught on to this kick and rush stuff.  Forest have never really dealt well with these kinds of sides going back to Wimbledon or the Blades.

Yes, it collapsed 2nd half when Cardiff's subs and rugby kicks overloaded our back line for the 1st goal.  (I felt that could have been dealt with.). They're good at what they do but Mick's one dimensional football would get found out in the Premier (and has been.)

But no, you can't 'long ball it vs Cardiff' you'll doom yourself.  We do lack some 'Mr. Nasty' players along the spine in CM, probably ACM and 'that' option up front.  Just players who can handle themselves and play a bit.

As for the 'press.'  I hear what you're saying.  Forest are a fledgling team (having torn up the old play book for the oopmteenth time...) and for a 1st outing with a new defence, I don't think we did too badly 1st half.  But Forest had no answer to Forest turning up the heat.

What players did we have on the bench to change that?

You can't help but feel had Billy Davies been here, that some muck and nettles players would have order of the day. Fighters. Leaders. And 'intensity' would have been mentioned and 'playing for the badge.'

SA.

[GaribaldiRED]

Cardiff completely by passed midfield. It was more a time to percentage football and looked more like rugby- kicking for touch. There is an art to that type of football and they were very good at it when they bought the subs on…

To be fair to CH, it's not just his sides that struggle against that type of football. Every season I can remember we've been turned over by a big physical side who launch it into the box. That Pants performance against Millwall a few years ago will live with me for a long time. I cant remember the score, but I can remember 7' tall Pants being completely intimidated by a bunch of ruffions.

And also, Cardiff are a good side, we dont need to forget that. It may be direct football they play but they execute it very well. We wont be the only side to get turned over by their approach this season.

Agree Pap. It's difficult to defend against so you have to limit their time on the ball. We didn't do that. We actually gave them the ball unnecessarily by playing the long ball ourselves. A tactic we don't master at all. My root cause for the issues we have is that we are not able to push up and press efficiently as ONE team with real purpose and urgency. We try to press but we are not doing as one coordinated team and the defense are not pushing up and thus giving the opposition too much room between our lines. That to me is why we get overrun.  Getting a big target man won't fix that.

That is about a perfect summary in my opinion Gari of where we go wrong.
Do you think a new manager/better coaching can solve that with this team though?

Good to know that I'm not alone SM. 

What you need is intelligent players that both can and will run their socks off for the team. I believe we have that in the squad assuming the new players can perform. We maybe lack a bit of pace at CB to push the defense too high up the pitch but both McKenna and Worrall are good at reading the game so should be able to handle it. So with the right manager I believe this squad could be drilled into one well oiled pressing machine. It will take some time but then again Valerian Ismael didn't need much time at Barnsley and West Brom and neither did Bielsa at Leeds.

[Salvatore Matrecano]

Thats why I was optimistic that lowering the age of the team would give us a bit of pace and energy to press consistently throughout the game rather than a bunch of ageing donkeys that ran out of steam last season.
Its not happened yet though, Garner in particular looks nothing like last seasons player yet and as you say the space between our lines was awful last year but doesnt look any better this. I saw some stats that said we played more long balls than Cardiff yesterday which is ridiculous given our lack of strength for that.

You make a good point about Bielsa and Ismael, I thought Bielsa in particular in the space of one preseason turned an utterly clueless team into an absolute machine, he is one of a kind though and I admit they had some money to spend. Could Hughton make that sort of transformation? I am sceptical.