Why Dougie got it spot on yesterday tactically...

This quote seems to reflect the opinion of most Bolton fans regarding yesterdays game.

Natasha Whittam wrote:As soon as Birmingham got their first goal it was obvious we would let in another. We played too deep, effectively inviting them to bombard us. More shit tactics from a clueless manager

However, I want to counter the popular opinion by explaining why I think the manager got everything right yesterday.

We will start at the point of us being 2-1 up.
At this point, we knew Birmingham had to, and would, throw everything at us, they had to get a point and were likely to go gung-ho in order to get what they needed. Two major reasons why we stopped playing 442 came into play at this point. Firstly, despite our 2-1 lead, 442 was not offering us a real threat up front. As they threw more men forward we ran just as much risk of conceding by not adapting as they did by going gung-ho. So we adapt by bringing off our most ineffectual player and putting Knight on. But that is a minor point.

The main point is that in doing so and by introducing Kellet we were going to expose them more and more as they became more desperate. So we sit deep. It wasn't by accident that our players were not closing down, it was by design. The fans are all yelling OUT OUT OUT, PUSH OUT - and frankly it's the talk of silly folk (who just don't get tactics). The players stood firm and for all the crosses and pushing forward they did, most of the time, the threat was nullified easily because we stuck to it as a team. And that is where the next phase comes in.

They have pushed so many players into advanced positions and they are making themselves tired by closing down, closing down, closing down that they can't cope when we break... And we did break. Four times, and it should have been more...

I know everybody is remembering it in terms of us being penned in our own box, but that's not because they were hammering us, like most people will see it, that was purely by design.

The fact is, BOLTON had the best chances in the last ten minutes. For all the pressing, closing down, and "pushing us back" that they did in those final ten minutes it was US who created the four best chances. What Dougie asked them to do was working. The fact that Juke misses one, and Danns skies another, and then misses another is Doug's fault. The tactic was working and we should have seen ourselves 3 or 4 up by that point. And if we had broken forward better on a couple of other occasions we would have had more chances.

It WAS a tactical master class. The exact same masterclass the Jose Mourinho was hailed for recently when Chelsea beat Liverpool. The fact that they got a goal in six mins of added on time isn't because the tactic doesn't work or because Freedman cocked up. It's just that sometimes teams score. And Birmingham got one when we failed to deal with a cross.

We can't deny that Dougie was within his rights to think that we could defend properly considering we have only conceded about 13 goals in the last 18 games. And only lost twice in the last 14 games (both against the top two).

Natasha will love this.

Especially this bit:

"The fans are all yelling OUT OUT OUT, PUSH OUT - and frankly it's the talk of silly folk (who just don't get tactics).

 

There must be some merit to the style, otherwise he wouldn't have done it.

I'm not saying it's the way I would definitely go, just trying to point out that it is a valid approach to winning a game. Chelsea wouldn't be doing it if it wasn't effective.

I'm never actually sure if my Admin colleague posts such stuff because he lives most of his time in some sort of la la land or if he's simply trying to wum.  Unfortunately I tend to think its the former.

As a rebuttal to the opening post, the tactic of reverting to three centre backs clearly doesn't work with the personel we have in our squad, so comparisons to Mouriniho and Chelsea are spurious.

Throughout the whole of the season Freedman as set up the team to be defensive at home, in the early part by constantly only playing one striker and more recently by defending a lead with some half an hour or less to go by going to three centre backs.  The results show the effectiveness of this strategy.

I'm not a Freedman hater and do think he isn't half as bad as many make out but clearly his defensive nature at home, with the players he has at his disposal, as been a failure and it worries me that he doesn't seemed to have learned and adapted from that.

The obvious thing to do when we they got one back, was to crowd out midfield to prevent them getting the ball into the penalty area in the first place.

It is clear Zigic's height was not seen as a threat, otherwise Knight would have started, so we simply had to defend higher up the pitch and compress the midfield, rather than what Freedman in effect does, which is to cede midfield and defend in and around the box instead.

It's not rocket science really is it?

QED

Admin Fight !!!!!!!!!!!

We don't have anyone in the middle who can hold onto the ball anyway, I get that packing the mid could have simply been a spoiling tactic, and may have worked better, but no doubt brum would have bypassed the mid altogether and hit Zigic anyway. 

the lad IBE that came on was a real game changer, direct and quick and caused loads of problems.

Hipster_Nebula wrote:We don't have anyone in the middle who can hold onto the ball anyway, I get that packing the mid could have simply been a spoiling tactic, and may have worked better, but no doubt brum would have bypassed the mid altogether and hit Zigic anyway. 

the lad IBE that came on was a real game changer, direct and quick and caused loads of problems.

The theory behind pushing the defence up and compressing the midfield is that the best way to attack it is by playing balls over the top of it, in to the greater gap left between the keeper and the more 'advanced' back four.

Clearly Zigic is not the type of player to run on to through balls over the top, so I'm not sure of why you think this tactic would still allow Birmingham to somehow 'hit Zigic anyway'?

With Birmingham committed to attack - they needed a goal to stay up - we didn't need anybody in midfield to hold the ball, all that was required was for the ball to be played forward everytime we had it for Beckford mainly, or Juke, to run for - and thus necessitating the Birmingham defence to at least be wary of everyone pushing forward for fear of conceding a third 'killer' goal.

It's all irrelevant now anyway.

Like you say it's irrelevant, but what I meant is long angled balls over the mid towards Zigic's head and on the diagonal, looking for the knock down to that lad Ibe.

Dougie got it spot on? We drew with a team that finished 4th from bottom after being two in front.

Biggie, you remind me of a poster I once knew called Jayjay23. He was an utter bellend as well.

The formation up to the hour mark was 4-5-1 (or 4-2-3-1 if you like). We had been playing 4-4-2 for all of 20 minutes when Freedman took off a winger for a centre half to go 5-3-2, then a striker for a winger five minutes later to go 5-4-1. By this point, Birmingham were frantically chasing the game, so it's hardly surprising that we had some great chances. It's conceivable that we'd have wrapped the game up in that time frame playing 4-4-2 when Birmingham were unconcerned with defending.

For me there are just times where it's common sense to "push out" and make it harder for attackers to get onside, and our team had no concept of this yesterday. By sitting deep, you're just asking for a cross to come in, and it fall on a plate for somebody. That's what happened yesterday, and it will happen time and time again next season.

Freedman, masterclass = FUCK OFF????

doffcocker wrote:The formation up to the hour mark was 4-5-1 (or 4-2-3-1 if you like). We had been playing 4-4-2 for all of 20 minutes when Freedman took off a winger for a centre half to go 5-3-2, then a striker for a winger five minutes later to go 5-4-1. By this point, Birmingham were frantically chasing the game, so it's hardly surprising that we had some great chances. It's conceivable that we'd have wrapped the game up in that time frame playing 4-4-2 when Birmingham were unconcerned with defending.

For me there are just times where it's common sense to "push out" and make it harder for attackers to get onside, and our team had no concept of this yesterday. By sitting deep, you're just asking for a cross to come in, and it fall on a plate for somebody. That's what happened yesterday, and it will happen time and time again next season.

I understand your point and in the past i may have tended to agree. But now I don't. 90% of the time that we sat back resulted in them attempting to breach our box but instead they would misplace a pass, miss cross, or somehow lose the ball. In my opinion it takes discipline and control to have all the players stick to their roles like that, its the easiest thing in the world to get sucked towards the ball or get tempted to break ranks and attempt to close down, but in reality that expends energy and creates gaps and confusion. It might not be to everyone's taste but i am pleased to have a manager who is at least demonstrating that we have a system, we have tactics and we are thinking with our heads.

Like I said earlier, it is a FACT that we created a number of glorious chances toward the end that should have been scored. WE created better chances than they did. Yes you do run the risk that one of their crosses results in a goal, and that's what happened yesterday but its a measured risk and judging whether the tactic should have worked I believe it should have. We caused them to lose possession several times, we broke fast, and we created clear cut chances to score, and should have done. Its not Dougs fault that we missed them.

The trouble with our tactical genius of a manager is that everything is always reactive, he never makes a change unless its forced on him by an injury or the inevitable equaliser for the opposition. The negative way we play at home will drive fans away and next seasons crowds will be down by a good number i would bet.

Norpig wrote:The trouble with our tactical genius of a manager is that everything is always reactive.

You mean like when he went 442 at half time last week?

that was after we hadn't had a shot on target for the entire first half so yes it was reactive

Surely in that case every change ever made is reactive?

Natasha Whittam wrote:Dougie got it spot on? We drew with a team that finished 4th from bottom after being two in front.

Biggie, you remind me of a poster I once knew called Jayjay23. He was an utter bellend as well.

Right you are Nat .....

None of the above tactics explains to me how a professional footballer can't pass a ball ten feet.

But anyway sitting back will never succeed over the course of a season.  You provide just too many chances to the opposition.  Norwich pulled it off yesterday at Chelsea...so occasionally it will work but 9 times out of 10 it's a losing tactic.

Well you know that I'm going to agree with Biggie here as I've been saying it all season, however there is one huge caveat - our strikers/advanced midfielders aren't good enough to take the chances created.

The system is fine IMO and if we'd buried the chances and scored 4 or 5 nobody would be complaining, but as has often been the case this season we didn't.

It is very Mourinhoesque but Mourinho has Eto'o Torres Ba etc to finish the job whereas we have Beckford who has missed a shedload of decent chances this term.

Nice to see a manager putting faith in his strikers, but there comes a point when the manager has to realise that the system needs better quality ruthless finishing up top for it to work properly. Still, our results since Reading  make it difficult to argue against the system.