Papering over the cracks?

I thought king played well second half. The commitment overall was impressive second half. Far too many errors all round.

But, the quality we have seen so far isn’t great. Bristol looked well organised and had a great first half, and lost.

We haven’t played well so far this season, we’re second.

The chopping and changing of the team may be necessary, but it doesn’t help. The key will be partnerships, like it always is. Need a clear strong spine through the team. So far it looks like Begovic, Cook, Lerma and Solanke. Keep that spine and build around it.

Can’t wait for Reading.
 
Describing the first half as dire really isn’t over the top, what you can’t forgive is the lack of intensity that we showed in this half of football. If you go full throttle and get outplayed then fair enough, but to just sit back like we did and offer no intensity whatsoever isn’t acceptable given the resources at our disposal.

I can see where you are coming from but I think dire is even a bit strong for the first half. I thought we were OK for the opening 20 mins and then let them dictate. We completely bossed the second though, even if we struggled to create chances. We certainly deserved all the points.
 
I think as a game the first half was dire. Too much giving the ball away, no creativity, solid defence from both sides, does not make a good spectacle.
Second half very tough. Much more intensity but the longer it went on I didn’t think we had the quality to unpick their defence. Then a moment of brilliance. We’ll meet many much worse sides as we go so let’s put them to the sword.


:utc:
 
Massive over-reaction of a post.

Bristol City are 6th, was always going to be tough. We were very poor first half but picked up 2nd half and picked up a tough 3 points and a clean sheet. This feels like the kind of post Liverpool or Man United fans make when they 'only' beat someone like Bournemouth 1-0.

We sold 4 of our regular team from last year, have had key players out injured, have a number of players not firing on all cylinders and yet are 2nd. First to admit I was sceptical of JT but so far am impressed with the ability to dig out points he has shown.
 
Massive over-reaction of a post.

Bristol City are 6th, was always going to be tough. We were very poor first half but picked up 2nd half and picked up a tough 3 points and a clean sheet. This feels like the kind of post Liverpool or Man United fans make when they 'only' beat someone like Bournemouth 1-0.

We sold 4 of our regular team from last year, have had key players out injured, have a number of players not firing on all cylinders and yet are 2nd. First to admit I was sceptical of JT but so far am impressed with the ability to dig out points he has shown.
Ignore it, the o/p is prone to overreacting and histrionics.
 
If we had lost then Bristol city would be 2nd. So a decent team.

People expecting us to roll over opponents in the champ but that doesn’t happen against top 8 or so sides. You hope the quality we have will make a difference at key moments eg Arnie’s goal.
 
I was a bit disheartened but looking at the table. Half of our games have been against the teams 5th - 8th. If that doesn't point towards the difficulty of our opening schedule I don't know what does. Derby and Sheff Weds next, this could turn into 10 games unbeaten pretty quickly
 
A lot of football is dire at the moment, it's not just us.
We were very good second half tonight and to be unbeaten after 8 games is superb.
I don't think JT knows quite what his best formation and line up is. I think King has been poor so far but I guess he'll be playing on reputation and hopefully he'll start firing at 100% soon.
He certainly tried but definitely isn't quite with it just yet.
 
If we had lost then Bristol city would be 2nd. So a decent team.

People expecting us to roll over opponents in the champ but that doesn’t happen against top 8 or so sides. You hope the quality we have will make a difference at key moments eg Arnie’s goal.
That is the key difference, three times his quality has won tight games.

Up front we have that extra quality generally. Solanke frustrates me, but has laid off perfectly weighted balls that led to 3 key goals. Brooks in the one half he really played this season, produced a number of 1 2s before unleashing a shot that was unbelievably saved. If and when he is back, he should tear it up at this level. King is getting back to match fitness. Stan was poor last jight, but unlocks defences for fun, after a run of a few games etc etc

In summary, we will always have hope in 0-0 games, that someone will produce the extra quality that makes the difference, often it will be 2/3 players suddenly clicking to create the chance.

With a solid defence (and by the way well done Begovic (humble pie from me)), we will generally be in most games, to allow that to happen.

We all know, in any league that is the foundation to success.

We have also played a harder set of fixtures than most, so to be unbeaten, is pretty impressive.
 
Takes about ten games for the table to shape up. So far we have played 8 and 5 are in top half and 4 of in top 8.

It’s a very good start. The championship is a very different division to the premier league. We have found our feet, results and resilience wise, very well.

Our PL experience is really paying off. Many mistakes in the first half, misplaced passes in particular, but the team played through it. Just like they did at Watford.
Some were saying we’d go on a slide and go down into league one. We’re already 11 points from the bottom 3.

My glass is three quarters full.
 
Can’t believe we’re not really playing to our full potential and are still 2nd
Waiting for things to really click or our luck to run out not sure which will come first
 

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