Personally I don’t understand the stick Dom gets. Yes he has limitations but there’s no way he can be accused of being lazy. He’s been our hardest working player by far over past 2 seasons
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I thought that Jaissle got it wrong by putting Schärr on at that time. There were seconds to
play and he put him on. This allowed the referee to play extra minutes. 
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He was and I acknowledged it in my post but last night he was lazy, ineffective and appalling especially in the 2nd goal.
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No point being angry at them tbh. That´s just who they are as players.
Fans are kidding themselves if they think Iraola can fully change that. There are no magic tactics that completely change players away from what they are.
Hopefully he can get a system that negates their flaws. Likely with 3 midfielders or dropping one of them if he wants to play Wirtz.
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How the fuck did we let them score from there. 4 players behind the ball.
Horrendous.
Absolutely. He was very disappointing and after a full season with us you have to begin to question whether he’s been a good signing.
Strongly disagree. I thought he was terrible for both goals and really looked off the pace. Sure he hasn’t played much football and VVD wasn’t perfect and he deserves a good chance in the side to prove himself but his PL debut was not good and we looked much better once he went off.
Absolutely. The way we were cut apart is very concerning. The midfield was far too open and the CBs just let Newcastle run through them.
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I think for the goals, the CB pair didn´t react. Neither took charge. For the first, Van Dijk should have shuffled to cover Kerkez while Jacquet went to the man with the ball but neither of them made that decision.
For the second you can see Jacquet is uncertain if he should go to the ball or not because Van Dijk isn´t doing anything or being clear. Jacquet then turned the wrong way and didnt get in a position where Willock would be forced left.
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But if you go forward 1 second it’ll show that Szoboszlai has allowed Wissa to turn him before Wirtz engages in the challenge.
Szobo had a relatively easy job, all he had to do was stay still, stop Wissa from turning. Then Wirtz could come in and challenge for the ball.
Dom isn’t used to being the deepest player in midfield and he got over eager trying to pinch it, so he overcommits to his left and gets rolled right.
Hopefully this is something they’ll be covering in training this week. That was not intelligent ball pressure from him in that situation.
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Watch Virgil. It’s diabolical. Right from when he seems to try and play for offside, comically bad.
This!
I was thinking WTF was Szobo doing???
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Absolutely. Awful. He just did nothing. Didn´t take charge of the situation at all.
In that still we have 4 players behind the ball to their 2. How he got away from Szobo so easily was awful, Frimpong and Grav (Willock runs past him) didn´t get back either, or Wirtz. The two CBs did nothing to make it harder to score.
From that still there is no way they should score so easily. No tactics can make up for terrible on field actions.
I haven’t seen this match yet. I waited for the rediffusion, as the direct is so bad it finishes 2 hours after the final whistle,
Put the rediffusion on and it cut straight to the 2nd half. Really disappointed 
.
However it’s good to have scored. As expected there seems to be a lot of work to do. The clip I saw of the start of the second half indicated were not physically ready either which is a big worry even if fairly ‘normal’ after a WC summer.
I don’t know how Iraola is going to fare however it’s going to be hard imo. The squad seems to have lost it’s professional edge.
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My new tee shirt is going to read - ‘Put a Fucking Tackle In’. We are so soft. There’s no way Hendo or Millie are letting that second goal happen. Man up guys.
I am puzzled as well as to why no one commits to the tackle with so many people surrounding that runner???
This Neanderthalean idea that it’s a tackle that’s needed is a big part of the problem. Hendo didn’t tackle (almost couldn’t) yet he had the intelligence to slow the opposition down. This bought the time necessary for others to reorganize. When our present midfield defend it’s like watching under 11’s. Fool hardy or scared of the ball.
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Obviously a tackle likely has to be made at some point but you´re right that the key is the intelligence to read the situation and act.
Zoning players away from goal, slowing them down until bodies get back or in position, and communicating with your teammates to coordinate and work as a unit.
Nobody took charge in either of their goals.
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If you watched how Hendo, Gini and Fabinho worked Hendo hassled them to death and Gini would get an opportunity to nip in and take the ball. I would call it a tackle just a well timed interjection. Fabinho would make a few tackles though for me his main role was covering any errors Hendo made.
Hendo made it possible for us to get 3 or more players hassling the opposition man in possession cutting off all his outs. Our players now don’t look fit enough for this anymore and certainly haven’t the nous.
Yes that midfield was a different level.
Does help when you have a player with proper defensive instincts like Fabinho though
Fitness and maybe even desire missing.
I think there is a bit of an overreaction to yesterday’s game. There’s not much patience in modern day football but we’re gonna have to learn some. It will take time with the new manager.
Szobo, Grav, Isak, Wirtz and others getting slagged are all top players. Isak and Wirtz have hardly played together.
We need to strengthen the squad for sure, but let’s get behind them through this transition period rather than having weekly meltdowns
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