Only one word sums up this game "PREDICTABLE"
Over the past few weeks my reports on games have run along a similar theme, warning of the complacency of a few home wins and a somewhat fortuitous win at Notts County did not a solid team make, I pointed out the failings of certain players, that although adequate against the lower teams, when put under pressure they were found wanting, some agreed, some didnt and some even accused me of having something against those players, I questioned the fact that the manager always seemed to get it wrong with the starting line up, sadly all of these things and more came home to roost on Saturday at Carlisle and with interest.
Firstly the line up was all wrong, why did we immediately offer Carlisle the chance to put us on the back foot by playing 4-5-1, the official website described it as 4-3-3 but I didnt see it that way and neither did anyone I spoke to in the away section,, what they saw was loan striker Rickie Lambert struggling to do anything, he isnt fast enough to run channels so the only other option was to try and get it into his feet, this frequesntly failed with lambert having to drop deeper to pick up the ball and too often all he was getting was balls pumped up to him to try and flick on to no one, if a loan striker is going to be deployed then Im afraid that SRL is not the man to play that role, Barnards workrate makes him a more obvious choice.
But perhaps more worryingly was the defence, all the goals were gifts, the first caught Saints flat at the back and to be blunt although Harding had to offer some cover to Fonte, he left a gap that enabled them to get a spare man to fire across Davis, it would be harsh to blame Harding for this, but you also have to say a good full back would have done better and thats the difference between a goal being scored and not. To be blunt and this has been the case on more than one goal scored against us this season, Harding doesnt get a tackle in, look at the goal on BBC Sport, as the ball is played wide and the Carlisle man shoots, Harding is on his feet and doesnt get a foot in, where is the sliding block tackle ? You can accuse me of having a vendetta against Harding, its nothing of the sort, its merely questioning why a defender cannot tackle.
But if Harding could be absolved a little on the first goal the second was a nightmare, like the first he was caught ball watching, didnt know where his man was and panciked, in truth the keeper plays a big part in these situations and the ball was in the six yard box, should Davis have collected ? possibly certainly he didnt help Harding and was in no mans land that meant that the ball could loop above him.
But Saints defending in general was dreadful and the second goal was once again a free header, a look at the replay shows the keeper still on his feet and Harding should maybe have cleared off the line, harsh ? maybe.
Sadly this game followed a similar pattern as other games, we make the wrong starting selections, pick up when subs are made but finish it rueing missed chances and poor defending with more shots on & off target than the victorious team and more possession, more to the point though, individually the same players let us down as have done in previous weeks and now need to pay the price, I have always chanted the same mantra in football and that is "you do the same things and you get the same results" and away from home thats been the case fo Nigel Adkins, we are fast becoming a side that wins at home but crumbles on the road, and before someone points out Notts County to me I would counter that for 70 minutes up at Meadow Lane we were awful and it took a penalty and sending off to change the game.
Our record on the road since NA's arrival is played 6, won 2, drew 1, lost 3 , firstly that is poor for a side that fancies itself for promotion and secondly those three defeats all came at clubs who are our rivals for going up, games we really need to be getting something out of, in truth even the draw was a porr result considering it was at Yeovil, a side now second from bottom with a poor home record.
We have played a quarter of a seasons away games since Adkins took over and somethng is not right on the road, the time for excuses is over, we are not good enough and something has to be done.
1. We cant defend set pieces, the opposition know that we have a keeper that doesnt leave his line and play on this, the last two games have seen goals from free headers, if we know the keeper isnt going to get a ball then we have to make sure that we do, Adam Lallana has been the culprit in both of these goals, why do we have him marking up in our own box, he is not that sort of player ? This does go back to my point about the type of keeper needed to get out of this division, in the dying minutes of injury time we pumped a ball into the box and their keeper came and caught it on the penalty spot and took the pressure right off them, would ours have done the same, I think we all know the answer to that one, Carlisle had four shots on target, three of them went in, look back at any game we have lost and its a similar story, we command games for long periods but let in soft goals due to individual errors and lack of concentration.
2. The manager has to make a few strong decisions with regard to the line up, Harding has to go and Ryan Dickson given his chance, up front we seriosly have to consider dropping Lambert, for strikers its all about goals and Lambert is a player who is not scoring from open play, if this was any other forward he would be on the bench, we have three other forwards and to be frank, he is fourth in line at present on form yet is still the first to be picked and that has to change.
We have an important week ahead of us with two home games, we are quite capable of winning them and pushing ourselves back into the promotion frame, but we need to rectify the problems from Saturday and not as we have been doing let a home win gloss over the fact we are fragile on the road for the aforementioned reasons. If we had beaten Carlisle we would have been third with a decent chance of going joint top by next Tuesday, certainly 2nd.
At this point I could say I told you so ! but Im not going to im merely going to point out that its the same problems we have been having all season, football is a harsh game, Nigel Adkins has to now do his job, its not about bad luck or bad starts to the season, its about dropping points now, I dont want to be saying the same things about the same players week in week out, I want to see us beating sides as we should be doing end of !!