Thoughts v Cardiff

Waz afcb said:
Nobodies saying that we will never conceding a chance. Just that on the balance of the chances created in the first half by both sides then we probably deserved to be behind. It’s not the first time this season we have gotten away with it either. I think it’s okay to both be happy with the win but also acknowledge that until the red card we really weren’t very good.
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It’s like those XG stats though, it’s meaningless. If they have a striker that can’t finish and we have a goalkeeper that pulls off wonder saves then they won’t convert those chances into goals and…. They didn’t. It’s part of why we are better than them.

Similarly, when we lost at Middlesbrough all we got here was moaning. Nobody pointing out if we had converted the three sitters we missed we would have.been out of sight so everything was ok. Probably because we miserably missed them all and lost the game!
 
Neil Dawson said:
It’s like those XG stats though, it’s meaningless. If they have a striker that can’t finish and we have a goalkeeper that pulls off wonder saves then they won’t convert those chances into goals and…. They didn’t. It’s part of why we are better than them.

Similarly, when we lost at Middlesbrough all we got here was moaning. Nobody pointing out if we had converted the three sitters we missed we would have.been out of sight so everything was ok. Probably because we miserably missed them all and lost the game!
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I do think XG is a complete pile of tosh.
 
…job done scrappy in the main v 11 but exploited the wings when v 10…and wore them down well enough to win easily..Phil Bill my man of the match..Solanke class again…Christie works so hard…Lerma is a beast! (glad he is our beast!)…Stacey looked better in the second half..
 
Neil Dawson said:
It’s like those XG stats though, it’s meaningless. If they have a striker that can’t finish and we have a goalkeeper that pulls off wonder saves then they won’t convert those chances into goals and…. They didn’t. It’s part of why we are better than them.

Similarly, when we lost at Middlesbrough all we got here was moaning. Nobody pointing out if we had converted the three sitters we missed we would have.been out of sight so everything was ok. Probably because we miserably missed them all and lost the game!
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That’s because I’m the course of the 90 minutes Middlesbrough also missed countless chances, we were in no position after that game to say that we created the better opportunities. We could have easily had 2 or 3 but they could have easily had 4 or 5. Had they scraped a win from their only attack and we had missed all of those chances you can for sure bet that the general opinion would have been that we deserved to win and that if we play like that then we will be fine.
 
AFCB_Liam said:
Some of this is fair. They did have a good chance before we scored and we were sluggish and a bit static first half. Never looked like creating a chance is nonsense though, Cook had a great chance, we had a couple of good openings in the first 5 minutes, and, more importantly, we actually scored.

The post red card bit is harsh. We were excellent 2nd half and squeezed the life out of them, creating multiple good chances.

We can improve for sure but lots of positives to take from that. Cardiff were unbeaten in their previous 4 away games and certainly didn't look like they gave up.[/QUOTE

It did take us a long time to work out how to use the extra man.

Overall too much passing along the back four. At this rate we will wear out the grass either side of the half way line.

Well worked second goal between Billing and Solanke. We should have scored more. We don;t work the opposition keeper enough
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First half was quite dull but I thought we were the better team in both halfs. The passing in the first half was quite poor though although the workrate was very good and the reason we comfortably won the game.

Christmas is always about results over performances, especially when you need to turn around a bad run. We've been comfortably good enough to win both games and got exactly the results we've deserved despite people trying to suggest we were lucky.
 
Waz afcb said:
That’s because I’m the course of the 90 minutes Middlesbrough also missed countless chances, we were in no position after that game to say that we created the better opportunities. We could have easily had 2 or 3 but they could have easily had 4 or 5. Had they scraped a win from their only attack and we had missed all of those chances you can for sure bet that the general opinion would have been that we deserved to win and that if we play like that then we will be fine.
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But if you were consistent you'd say that Boro were lucky to not be losing at half time and that they were very fortunate to go 1-0 up - they were well behind on chances until they got handed a fortunate penalty.

The truth is we deserved nothing out of that first half and Cardiff deserved nothing out of this one.
 
It looks as though Lewis Cook has taken over from Phil Billing as pantomime villain.
Is Lewis Cook the new Andrew Surman I wonder?
Rather enjoyed it last night.
Billers and Lerma were outstanding as was the menacing Solanke.
Oh and a word for young Travers.
A number of fine saves in that first half. His contribution a tad underrated.
This was a game that showed we are coming back into form.
Rejoice!
 
We weren't great but we're comfortably good enough to beat what was in front of us. Yes they had the odd chance but our keeper did his job when called upon.

No-one played badly but there was the odd blooper e.g. Kelly misplaced passes, moments of miscontrol etc. I'm not sure why people are complaining about Lewis as I thought he had a decent game.

Biggest positive for me was that we came out in the 2nd half and put them under sustained pressure for pretty much the entire 45 minutes. Kept it up even after our excellent 2nd goal and deserved the third at least.

Of course there will be games when we need to play better but QPR showed we can when we need to so I think we can look forward to the rest of the season with a high degree of optimism
 
Neil Dawson said:
It’s like those XG stats though, it’s meaningless. If they have a striker that can’t finish and we have a goalkeeper that pulls off wonder saves then they won’t convert those chances into goals and…. They didn’t. It’s part of why we are better than them.

Similarly, when we lost at Middlesbrough all we got here was moaning. Nobody pointing out if we had converted the three sitters we missed we would have.been out of sight so everything was ok. Probably because we miserably missed them all and lost the game!
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But Neil / others, are xG stats more meaningless as clear chances / chances / red cards / penalties / possession etc etc ? If people only want one stat, the scoreline, (which is ultimately the only thing that matters for that one game) they should equally disregard anything else. I'm bemused as to why xG get the stick whereas other stats don't, so I am interested in people justifying the distinction.

I suspect it is because they were used out of context to predict that AFCB weren't that good, and as Cherry fans we were never going to like that. The underlying principle of that thread which was 'if we stop being as clinical, and the opposition start being more clinical we won't do as well', is hard to dispute, but is not the best foundation for predictions with different quality players.

For future predictions, that do consider how many points have been won to date I prefer 538. Encouraging predictions are below.

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Responding to other comments, we were unlucky not to be in front against Middlesbrough at half time (it was the second half where we didn't turn up). The xG was 0.67 vs 1.51. The Christie miss still makes me wince.

I'll put the timeline up shortly, but it resembles the comments in the match thread that Cardiff had two big chances before we really got going, and then we were in control.
 
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