After watching every game from last night and mid weeks games of all teams, i have come to the conclusion that over all our squad is on par with 90% of the other squads. The problem seems to lie in game plans, tactics and fundamental excursions, plus the inability to do basic footballing plays (positioning, trap, pass, move and head). Major mistakes are not being held accountable by punishments (fines or dropping from game day squad).
Now while squad has the cattle, there is zero balance and partnership coercion. Example of this. Partnership was Gelthardt and Greenwood playing as a front pairing for u21 but then playing spot minutes in first team as individuals out of position. CB's or CM's not having a paring that understanding.
Someone needs to tie a 8m rope around the waist of our CB's and have them learn to move together. The same with the CM's. Every player needs to put on a pole on the left and right shoulders that is 1m and have them close down space drills which has them learn to position their body's to cut of both passings lanes and attacking angle. They learn how to be close enough to pressure but also far enough away not to be beaten easily (eample beings Ayling, Roca, Aaronson, Firpo). Pressure and pressing is best when angles and space is both restricted and not by being touch tight.
Again, do the basics and our squad is on par with others and in cases better.
There is no hiding the fact that we've got an unbalanced team/squad.
Just look at the number of wingers/attacking players we have, Gnonto, Summerville, Sinesterra, Harrison, Aaronson...
We usually have 2 or 3 of them in midfield and that's all very well when you're attacking and more importantly if you dominate the game.
But when these lightweights need to defend (nomatter how much they give chase back), they hardly recover any balls. The likes of Rodrigo & Bamford too aren't very adept at recovering possession.
Now of course it's not their prime job to recover possesion or track back.
But as you point out they should be able to close people down, shut down passing routes/lines, push opponents into a certain direction...
It's not that they don't try, but not to good effect.
As an example of players that get beating easily you mention Ayling, Firpo, Aaronson, Roca, but the major issue is that virtually all of our players get beaten with ease (lack of pace the most common factor).
Furthermore, how many ball winners have we got in the squad?
Have we got a true playmaker in the side?
Sure, we've certainly got talent and quality in the squad, but the right mix and balance is lacking. When things go against us, we don't have enough football knowledge, we haven't got a rigid structure or compact formation to fall back on either. In stead having strong partnerships or players that improve one an other, we seem to enlarge each other's shortcomings.
To make things worse, our confidence is shot.
Itmay help if we stopped playing guys out of position
I agree about the overall quality. The challenge is that we have steered too far into an attacking style and spent excessively on the final third - as a result we can't defend.
We need a balance and a reset, which to be fair to Javi he has pointed out. Wober and Adams offer some of that balance and their loss has been telling.
We might have appointed another attacking coach if we wanted to play to our squad's strengths - but then again you might say why sack the ones we had - after all 2 other clubs have also approached Marsch since we said goodbye and Bielsa is back in International management.
The bit that I keep coming back to is half time in the Palace game - something happened and since then our midfield has given up.
Don't forget Javi's first 6 games yielded 10 points and an adaptability we admired. We were also by far the better team until 45 mins v Palace.