I'm not saying the tactics and team selection were perfect yesterday, but by that reasoning, most goals can be attributed to individual skill, luck or errors by the opponent. For the first two chances, it wasn't just one guy winning back the ball but it was a team effort of pressing the opponent, swarming the ball carrier and blocking potential passing lanes. They play that way because that is how they are set up to play by the coach. As for Durm, he's the more conservative choice and he is more suited to hassle the opponent and run for 90 minutes than contributing to our buildup play or creating chances. It isn't nice to watch but I thought he did well against Leipzig. Given the role he had, I don't know who else would have been better suited for that position. But then again, that just shows we likely don't have the right players for that formation.
To an extent yes, but there is usually some form of cohesion or team strategy. Durm is terrible for the role, because he offers nothing going forward. It means that teams can just defend narrow, because they realise there is no threat out wide. Schmelzer was a joke all game, losing the ball, being beaten easily and over hitting crosses. The tactics and team selection were terrible. I repeat the most important thing in football is the players. Even with terrible tactics a team can still win if they have the best players. This Dortmund is one of the best in the world. Yes it has holes, but in Auba, Reus, Weigl and Raphael they have arguably the best players in the world for their position. Throw in Dembele (the boy is going to be a star), Sokratis and Burki, and you have an unbelievable team. Tuchel is destroying this team. The bigger problem is I am getting the sense their is a split in the dressing room.
Set pieces are one area that a good coach can make a real difference on the training ground. Dortmund's set pieces are ineffective. Why?
I also get the feeling there is a deeper issue here...... whether that's a locker room split or not, I'm unsure.
Yet when I brought up the fact that bvb have been the most frustrating team to watch when it comes to finishing I was told I didn't know what I was talking about and that none of my examples were recent enough This game should've been over in the first half FFS!
To be fair, Tuchel was better with his selections and subs last year, outside of being too defensive for Bayern games. We also had Gundogan-Weigl solidly in the middle. Miki and Auba provided goals and assists. Kagawa was ok 50 percent of the time. Hummels was solid 3/4 of the time. Castro was not bad either. What has changed? Schurrle, Gotze, Rode, Bartra are not doing well so far. I don't think Durm is good enough for starting 11. LP is getting old and Schmelzer is not the same guy as in the first half of last season. Big giant hole at 8 position. Our 10s got to de better. And Schurrle should play up to his price tag. No complains for Auba, Dembele, Pulisic, Reus, Weigl, Socratis and Burki. We will beat Benfica comfortabely at home and do ok in BL. Tuchel will sort this out.
Because what you said only applied to a couple of games. It is not a general problem under Tuchel. How hard can it be to understand this simple concept? Here is a quick list of the most clinical strikers in Europe. Alexis Sanchez (88)......................91 shots.............37 on target............17 goals..(2 pg)..(8 as) Romelu Lukaku (93).....................63 shots.............33 on target............16 goals..(0 pg)..(4 as) Zlatan Ibrahimovic (81)...............102 shots.............42 on target............15 goals..(1 pg)..(5 as) Diego Costa (88)..........................70 shots.............31 on target............15 goals..(0 pg)..(5 as) Jermain Defoe (82).......................62 shots.............22 on target............14 goals..(5 pg)..(3 as) Harry Kane (93)...........................57 shots.............28 on target............14 goals..(4 pg)..(3 as) Sergio Aguero (88)........................80 shots............33 on target............11 goals..(3 pg)..(1 as) La Liga Luis Suarez (87)...........................70 shots............32 on target.............18 goals..(0 pg)..(7 as) Lionel Messi (87)...........................92 shots............38 on target............17 goals..(2 pg)..(4 as) Cristiano Ronaldo (85)...................88 shots............38 on target............14 goals..(4 pg)..(2 as) Iago Aspas (87)............................45 shots............21 on target............11 goals..(2 pg)..(3 as) Antoine Griezmann (91).................53 shots............23 on target..............9 goals..(0 pg)..(4 as) Sergi Enrich (90)...........................43 shots............18 on target..............9 goals..(0 pg)..(4 as) Serie A Gonzalo Higuain (87).....................79 shots.............35 on target............18 goals..(0 pg)..(1 as) Edin Dzeko (86)..........................125 shots..............59 on target...........18 goals..(1 pg)..(2 as) Andrea Belotti (93)......................68 shots...............30 on target...........17 goals..(1 pg)..(3 as) Dries Mertens (87)........................88 shots..............41 on target...........16 goals..(1 pg)..(4 as) Mauro Icardi (93)..........................81 shots.............27 on target............15 goals..(1 pg)..(5 as) Ciro Immobile (90)........................94 shots.............40 on target............12 goals..(3 pg)..(4 as) Bundesliga Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang (89)....65 shots...........37 on target.............17 goals..(1 pg)..(1 as) Anthony Modeste (88)....................68 shots...........24 on target.............16 goals..(2 pg)..(1 as) Robert Lewandowski (88)...............80 shots...........30 on target..............15 goals..(2 pg)..(2 as) Timo Werner (96)..........................48 shots...........21 on target.............11 goals..(1 pg)..(2 as) Sandro Wagner (87)......................37 shots............15 on target.............10 goals..(0 pg)..(1 as) Vedad Ibisevic (84)........................44 shots............21 on target..............8 goals..(2 pg)..(2 as) Ligue 1 Edinson Cavani (87)......................82 shots............42 on target.............25 goals..(6 pg)..(0 as) Alexandre Lacazette (91)...............58 shots............32 on target.............20 goals..(9 pg)..(2 as) Radamel Falcao (86).....................46 shots.............24 on target............16 goals..(4 pg)..(3 as) Bafétimbi Gomis (85)....................68 shots.............38 on target............16 goals..(3 pg)..(2 as) Alassane Pléa (93)........................73 shots.............30 on target............11 goals..(1 pg)..(2 as) Martin Braithwaite (91)..................75 shots.............32 on target............10 goals..(4 pg)..(3 as) http://www.redcafe.net/threads/current-conversion-rate-in-europe.426458/ Auba is the most clinical striker in Europe and has been for a while. Notice how poor Lewandowski's finishing is. Now Lewandowski is an exceptional striker arguably the best in the world, he brings a lot more to the team than Auba, but when it comes to finishing Auba is much better. The bigger issue I believe, is that Reus, Auba and Gotze have fallen out with Tuchel.
I've said from the start of the season that I fancy Bayern to win the CL. This could be the last hurrah of their legendary team. If they manage to win the CL then statistically they can claim to be the greatest ever Bayern generation.
Nothing will top their 70s generation. But they can win it this year. Barca are almost out, Real and Bayern are real contenders.
I am not going to pretend that I was alive to see the great team of the 70s. That being said 5 consecutive league titles (looks almost certain), at least 3 cups, record points totals in the league and possibly 2 CL titles cannot be ignored statistically. It would take someone older to comment on which team was better.
Fair enough. On paper we should have a team capable of being in the top half. Ask 10 different Palace fans and they will give you 10 different answers. My take is that Pardew was an excellent man manager, but was poor tactically and did not set the team up well. He also got rid of too much experience and leadership in the team too quickly. Jedinak and Speroni were past it, but they were legends of the club and leaders. Pardew tried to be too expansive and we kept conceding stupid goals and narrowly losing. Pardew for all his man management struggles to get a team out of a rut. Couple that with the other problems and we just kept losing games we should have drawn or won like Swansea, Burnley to name a few. Eventually the board sack him and bring in Allardyce. The players don't seem to like him and for the first time in over a decade they are not trying. With Pardew the team choked and threw away leads, but every player gave his all for the manager. So I am really worried we are going down. The teams around us have picked up form. The other reason, which I don't like to admit myself, is that we have lost the hunger. The fans included. When we first came up we were a bit like Burnley. Every play and most fans gave everything they had for the team to win. We simply worked harder than everyone else. I don't think such work rate, intensity or concentration is possible for several seasons on the bounce. We can field a team that looks like this Mandanda Ward Dann Sakho Van Aanholt Zaha Cabaye Ledley Townsend Remy Benteke Ideally you would want a more defensive partner for Cabaye, and yes some of those players came in January, but that team should not be getting relegated.
Well, I can see why there is no enthusiasm for Allardyce. Yes, Hull got stronger, Swansea got better. I think, Sunderland is number one contender for relegation. There would be a tough fight between you, Boro and Leicester.
Good lord blaming the coach and the entire team for this loss? What is it with some of you? They played well. Dominated possession, kept Benfica from stringing passes together created some chances. The problem was that our striker missed two 100% chances and a bloody penalty. Had AUba converted those chances, we win 3-1 at least and the tie is over. And there would be no ridiculous comments about "playing into their hands", what absolute nonsense. No, this loss is on Auba. Maybe he should focus on scoring goals instead of flapping his mouth off every week about his desire to one day play for Real. On any other night, he would have put those away.
The game against Leipzig, Tuchel hit a jackpot with his formation and player choice that worked very well against Leipzig's high press so he kept at it for the next series of games. Benfica doesn't play Leipzig's high press but did play a high back line with a bunch of offside traps that worked well for a large part of the game. The problem is that a technically lacking player such as Durm is not able to dribble through the high back line and help break up the offside trap. As a result, all we got to see from Durm is a back pass to the CBs as soon as he got the ball. In the couple instances he tried to make run into the box, he was either caught offside or showed a poor first touch resulting in goal kicks. These types of adjustments are what concern me the most about Tuchel as he's just to stubborn to make. A Pulisic or Mor would have been much better fits in place of Durm as we were controlling possession all game long.
The decision to play Durm was weird to say the least. Nonetheless, neither tactics nor lineup are what lost us this game.
So in 2017 we've tied with Mainz, scraped past Hertha, have most recently lost two in a row to teams way inferior to us and it has nothing to do with tactics or line-ups. Yeah makes a lot of sense!!
Good to see his team mates supprting him "Er hat uns schon so oft den Arsch gerettet in wichtigen Spielen. Ich bin überzeugt, dass wir uns im nächsten Spiel wieder über seine Tore freuen können", prophezeite Torwart Roman Bürki. Abwehrhüne Sokratis ging sogar noch weiter und kündigte schon einmal konkret an: "Im nächsten Spiel wird er zwei oder drei Tore machen." Auba needs confidence. If they play like today (minus the finishing) I have no doubt that BVB will beat Benfica in the next game
I wish Tuchel was watching the Bayern game. He might learn a few things. 1. Full back is not the position you chuck the rubbish player in the team. Full backs are key players. Lahm was arguably MOTM. 2. When Germany restructured their youth system they decided upon the 4-2-3-1 formation. The vast majority of German and German based players, play best in this formation. It's not rocket science that most German clubs should play 4-2-3-1. I will always say this openly. This Bayern generation was the best team I have ever seen in my life. Guardiola messed them about trying to show how smart he was, but had they kept Heynckes, I strongly believe they would have had 2 more CL titles. On the plus side for us, Bayern are still immense, but they haven't laid the foundations for a rebuild. Lahm, Robben, Ribery and Alonso have not been adequately replaced. Of course they may move Vidal deeper, move Thiago deeper and play Muller as 10 in the future, but they still need to replace three legends.
You would think that some people would realise that Auba, Weigl, Dembele, Reus, Sokratis and Raphael were far better than anything Benfica have. For Benfica to get the result they need to be spot and get lucky, because having better players matter. Yes if Auba, arguably the best striker in the world, has a good game then the match could end 3-1, but that's still just paper over the cracks. When you watch a team like Palace and play the big teams you realise that the manager can be perfect, the tactics can be perfect, the players can play brilliantly for their level, but you still lose. You may still lose even though the other manager was terrible and he set his team up badly; simply due to the quality player. You answer me what's the point in playing Schmelzer and Durm at wing back? Schmelzer was shocking defensively and added nothing in attack, in fact he wasted many good attacks. A 3-4-3 depends on the wingbacks being a threat and being able to get crosses into the box. When you can't do that then teams can defend narrow and shut you down.