The winter break is over and the season restarts. Arguably have our 2nd toughest match, away to Leipzig. No Reus. -----------------Burki------------- LP----------Weigl------Diallo--------Hakimi ----------Delaney----------Witsel Sancho-----------Philipp--------Raphael ------------------Gotze----------------- A really huge match and without Reus and Akanji to boot. Alcacer not fit again, we really need to sign someone next summer. Let's hope we win this.
Witsel has been amazing and not just because he scored the goal. It's a dog fight out there and the players are giving it their all. LP has been great too. Just hope they can hang on. The football has not been great, but tonight is all about winning. Raphael has put in some great set pieces, with Diallo missing a great chance.
Where is Reus? Anyone know why he's missing? Gotze is a PAIN to watch! I bet Pulisic or Guerreiro even can do a better job in this position. RB is defending pretty well and pressuring well. It'll be a tough 2nd half.
I disagree. Gotze has held the ball up OK when played inot him. Reus has an ankle injury, but hopefully it is not too serious. Why would you play Raphael as a striker?
Gotze did well controlling the ball and gave everything he had. This was match where we lacked quality so had to make up for it with fight. Witsel, Weigl and LP gave immense performances and Burki made some key saves. A huge result. It sends a clear statement to Bayern 'even if we have an injury to our best player we are going nowhere.' Now it's up to the board to strengthen.
I think it is possible you just don't understand the role of M Gotze. It's not because he is often sub for Alcacer that they have the same role...
Agreed. Burki did have a huge game but also almost blew the game up at the worse possible time... But all forgiven, he was spectacular and saved us at least 2 points and our lead over Bayern.
Agreed that he gave a good fight.. he always looks exhausted though, and looses too many balls. He had one good through ball to Phillip but I'd still love to see someone else given a chance in this role. Overall, we escaped with this one. But the players put on a big fight! Great job in that regard.
But that 'IS' the role, keep the ball, attract players to him, hold the ball, free spaces in the hope to try to spring someone else with a last minute pass. It's high risk high reward strategy but with a low success rate. So it is normal to lose lots of balls. It's not the guy's fault but rather it's a coaching strategy. And so far this year it paid alot!!
OK.. That's good to know. I didn't see it that way.. what drove me crazy is that he makes bad passes, even low-risk ones, and he will put himself into these tough positions of being surrounded by 3 players by failing to find an earlier better pass. It's either him, or the other players are not moving into good spaces for him, or like you say it's the game plan..
Gotze was awful in the first half but was a beast in the second. His problem is that he's lost his fleetfootedness. But he's been working his ass off and his stamina has improved noticeable. This is why he was a lot better in the second half. Everybody played in incredibly well today. But I can see the plaudits going to Weigl and Burki.
Unlike the past few years, this was a "grinder" of a win; something this team was not capable of doing last couplle of years as the only possible way to win this kind of a game would be by outscoring the opponent. That why this type of win is so important on many levels as it infuses confidence into the team showing that they can grind out a win just as much as play a beautiful, high-scoring game. But, more imprtantly, it sends a message to Bayern & Co. that this team is capable of winning without key players away from home against a top tier BL team thus putting more pressure on them to perform as well.
We are talking about Lucien Favre here. He's got a tendency toto we out players at the 3/4 season mark. Happened at BMG and Nizza. If after 10 matches we are grinding out victories then I'll believe the hype. New reports coming out saying that the le Parisien report on Weigl deal was false. There's been no talk of him leaving. If he keeps this up we should keep him when Toprak leaves. Akanji, Diallo, Weigl and DAZ aren't bad. Weigl can also sub in for Delaney.
I thought Weigl was good, though he made a loose play while charging forward and had to slide in to push the ball forward. That ball was an inch from being deflected into a man in alone on goal. He makes those plays often in midfield, but he can't afford them as a CB. It left me scared, but he tightened it up and there were no repeats. Gives me hope he can be counted on to provided coverage at CB also.