BFIT - Wycombe (H)

[RoyalBlue]

Not sure I'd fancy Esteves defensively against many teams at the moment, Onyedima went past him about 4 times in the space of 20 minutes yesterday, and he rarely looked in line with the rest of the back 4.

Thought Semedo looked very good though, high tempo, a few decent passes and won a lot in the air.

Agree with both points you make. Holmes looks much better than Esteves defensively but Esteves looks like he could be a real threat going forwards - hence why I said earlier to play them both.

I thought Esteves still looked pretty good defensively. There were quite a few occasions where he got his foot in just enough to dispossess their player and help break up an attack. On another occasion he lost the ball and it looked like the Wycombe player had got away from him but he made a good recovery run and again made just enough of a challenge to poke the ball away. On a couple of other occasions I'm pretty sure he won the ball in a tussle and came away with it.

I think it was reported that the club were slightly worried about how he might cope with the physicality of The Championship but I reckon Wycombe would've been a good team to test that and I thought he did OK in that respect.

[LUX]

It's a shame for Wycombe - terrific that a relatively tiny club has reached this level, but last night they looked like a club that 'finished' 8th in League One last season.

srsly, that is a ridiculous (and patronising) statement. I mean, we were only marginally better than them over the 90 minutes and yet we are three points clear at the top of the Championship.

Wycombe gave 100% but just don't have any obviously quality players who can do something unexpected to win a game. There was nothing to choose between the sides except that Reading have Olise, jaoa, Ejaria - who all look like they can do the unexpected at any minute. On this occasion it just took one moment of superb quality from Jaoa - who apart from that had a pretty ordinary game - for Reading to take the points. Plus an excellent defensive performance of course.

no problem with all that. But that is not what Cmonurzers wrote.

Of course Wycombe will/are struggling. I just do not agree that "last night they looked like a club that 'finished' 8th in League One last season."

[Simon's Church]

Not sure I'd fancy Esteves defensively against many teams at the moment, Onyedima went past him about 4 times in the space of 20 minutes yesterday, and he rarely looked in line with the rest of the back 4.

Thought Semedo looked very good though, high tempo, a few decent passes and won a lot in the air.

Agree with both points you make. Holmes looks much better than Esteves defensively but Esteves looks like he could be a real threat going forwards - hence why I said earlier to play them both.

I'd quite like to see them in a back 5, gives Esteves more cover while still allowing him to attack from deep. I'd keep the same formation while its working but maybe something we could see later in the season. Although Paunovic doesnt seem to want to change from 4231

[South Coast Royal]

When he plays at a high tempo, he’s dangerous and tough to handle. The problem is he doesn’t do it enough, too much dawdling on the ball, twisting in and out

The most frustrating thing is if you rewind 10/11 months, people are saying the exact same thing about him. His decision making is what is stopping him from becoming a much better player, but then I guess he wouldn’t be playing for us if that was the case

It will come. He has all the ability in the world and if he’s creating three excellent chances per game as he did last night then he really is doing his job. Very surprised at the negative comments about his performance last night. Can anyone name a player who created more than he did last night?

I think people just seem to get so frustrated on the occasions he takes too many touches (and to be fair it did happen a lot in the first 30 minutes especially ) that they forget what he actually contributes during the game.

Meite is rightly lauded for his defensive work at times but yesterday Ejaria was winning headers , making interceptions and at one stage a very important tackle late on in the penalty area to stop them getting in on goal.

I think it's easy to look at players of ability and wonder about all the things they could do if they only did "This Thing" or "That Thing" better and ignore the positives they bring.

Spot on.
Both Ejaria and Swift get criticised a lot but they are generally both in the game a lot so there will be errors along the way.
Olise, Laurent and Rino however tend to get less criticism because they do less and so tend to make less mistakes.

As for last night nearly all has been said by page 8 but nobody has mentioned the bookings for Joao and Morrison.
Both challenges were made on the stretch and in the Premier League they might have seen red so I feel relieved that we are not (yet ) in the Premier League.

An off night where a cracking goal came out of the blue.
Esteves-how could you not be excited?
He was however disposessed a couple of times quite easily and may well be better suited as a wing-back but the hype doesn't appear to be misplaced.

Lastly on the debate about whether we have played anybody much, 3 of the teams make up the bottom 3 if you disregard the penalised Sheff Wednesday.
Blackburn, Stoke, Bournemouth and Brentford games will give us a better idea of our chances longer term but nobody can fault the points tally so far from games involving a mixed bag of early fixtures.
Being at the top certainly feels better than where we have been in recent seasons.

[Sanguine]

srsly, that is a ridiculous (and patronising) statement. I mean, we were only marginally better than them over the 90 minutes and yet we are three points clear at the top of the Championship.

Wycombe gave 100% but just don't have any obviously quality players who can do something unexpected to win a game. There was nothing to choose between the sides except that Reading have Olise, jaoa, Ejaria - who all look like they can do the unexpected at any minute. On this occasion it just took one moment of superb quality from Jaoa - who apart from that had a pretty ordinary game - for Reading to take the points. Plus an excellent defensive performance of course.

no problem with all that. But that is not what Cmonurzers wrote.

Of course Wycombe will/are struggling. I just do not agree that "last night they looked like a club that 'finished' 8th in League One last season."

Fair enough. Looked like a League One team, in my view. Lots of fight, but little quality, almost like an FA Cup performance playing a side in the division above. If you think they look like a Championship outfit, that's your prerogative.

[Forbury Lion]

3 points is all that matters at this stage, thankfully we played badly against the right team and this went unpunished.

Keep it up and we should be clear of relegation in a few months time

[Snowball]

Some strikers get goals some strikers MAKE goals

I like Meite but he hasn't been great last two games

We struggle to make many chances. Our conversion rate is excellent ATM (Meite has ONE goal from a scramble)

My opinion is we would make more chances with Esteves playing RW or RB

oh you were serious. Apologies Snowie. I think you need to look at Richards and realise how much he does from LB. Esteves should never be played as a winger as our wide play is coming from our full backs anyway.

Snowflake has, rather fairly, criticised out full backs advanced positioning the last 2 seasons however this season, with Rinomhota and Laurent, they can play high up. Yiadom and Esteves can really make a difference here.

I wasn't really suggesting we should bring in a gifted RB and play him RW. As far as I'm concerned he should come in as RB ASAP and would probably make it his shirt (however tough that might be on Holmes).

I was only responding to someone's suggesting for moving Meite to the bench and "could Esteves play there"?

We've played six games and in the last two I'd say both Meite and Joao looked a long way from their best.. Meite got an important goal against Barnsley, may well have won us the points, Joao got the winner yesterday. I still think (partly because of heavy marking in Joao's case) they have looked a bit ordinary.

Meite is "my kind of player" I like triers like him and Long, but sometimes he looks no better than League Two

[Snowball]

Lastly on the debate about whether we have played anybody much, 3 of the teams make up the bottom 3 if you disregard the penalised Sheff Wednesday.

True, dat, but six games in and defeat to us is a major factor in them being low in the table

We've also played sixth place Watford, (sixth with a game in hand) and could go join second tonight. And 9th-placed Boro who have only lost one game (unluckily) 1-0 to Waford, and have now beaten Bristol.

Cardiff are a bit dull, but they could be top six if they win tonight (despite losing to us)

[WestYorksRoyal]

Lastly on the debate about whether we have played anybody much, 3 of the teams make up the bottom 3 if you disregard the penalised Sheff Wednesday.

True, dat, but six games in and defeat to us is a major factor in them being low in the table

We've also played sixth place Watford, (sixth with a game in hand) and could go join second tonight. And 9th-placed Boro who have only lost one game (unluckily) 1-0 to Waford, and have now beaten Bristol.

Cardiff are a bit dull, but they could be top six if they win tonight (despite losing to us)

Wycombe could be beneath Wednesday by the weekend

[Snowflake Royal]

I think if Esteves can get in some of the positions Holmes has found himself in as an advanced fullback, he'll create us a lot. Holmes has been fine, but he really is no more than a short term fill in there.

Absolutely this. Bright future. As a CB.

[CountryRoyal]

Lastly on the debate about whether we have played anybody much, 3 of the teams make up the bottom 3 if you disregard the penalised Sheff Wednesday.

True, dat, but six games in and defeat to us is a major factor in them being low in the table

We've also played sixth place Watford, (sixth with a game in hand) and could go join second tonight. And 9th-placed Boro who have only lost one game (unluckily) 1-0 to Waford, and have now beaten Bristol.

Cardiff are a bit dull, but they could be top six if they win tonight (despite losing to us)

I think when you look at Bournemouth’s and Watford’s squads is hart to see past them for the top two over the course of the season, but particularly Watford. Can’t see too many teams getting much joy against them and when they click going forward they’ll be unstoppable.

[leon]

I’m wasted on here with you shower of pcunts.

Nice sig.

[leon]

Lastly on the debate about whether we have played anybody much, 3 of the teams make up the bottom 3 if you disregard the penalised Sheff Wednesday.

True, dat, but six games in and defeat to us is a major factor in them being low in the table

We've also played sixth place Watford, (sixth with a game in hand) and could go join second tonight. And 9th-placed Boro who have only lost one game (unluckily) 1-0 to Waford, and have now beaten Bristol.

Cardiff are a bit dull, but they could be top six if they win tonight (despite losing to us)

Cardiff are the classic dull Championship team that could do well. Organised, hard working and dull. See also WBA.

[Snowball]

I think when you look at Bournemouth’s and Watford’s squads is hart to see past them for the top two over the course of the season, but particularly Watford. Can’t see too many teams getting much joy against them and when they click going forward they’ll be unstoppable.

But there's only one place available...

[andrew1957]

Lastly on the debate about whether we have played anybody much, 3 of the teams make up the bottom 3 if you disregard the penalised Sheff Wednesday.

True, dat, but six games in and defeat to us is a major factor in them being low in the table

We've also played sixth place Watford, (sixth with a game in hand) and could go join second tonight. And 9th-placed Boro who have only lost one game (unluckily) 1-0 to Watford, and have now beaten Bristol.

Cardiff are a bit dull, but they could be top six if they win tonight (despite losing to us)

I would say that Cardiff, Watford and Middlesbrough are all likely to finish top half by the end of the season in which case we have played three top half teams and three bottom half teams so far - which is about right. We should know how good we are after 14 games as by then I reckon we would have played 7 top half and 7 bottom half teams.

[andrew1957]

I think when you look at Bournemouth’s and Watford’s squads is hart to see past them for the top two over the course of the season, but particularly Watford. Can’t see too many teams getting much joy against them and when they click going forward they’ll be unstoppable.

But there's only one place available...

It would be truly ironic if the PL is reduced to 18 teams at the end of this season under some dodgy deal with the EFL and we finish second and are robbed if automatic promotion for the second time in our history!

[andrew1957]

Not sure I'd fancy Esteves defensively against many teams at the moment, Onyedima went past him about 4 times in the space of 20 minutes yesterday, and he rarely looked in line with the rest of the back 4.

Thought Semedo looked very good though, high tempo, a few decent passes and won a lot in the air.

Agree with both points you make. Holmes looks much better than Esteves defensively but Esteves looks like he could be a real threat going forwards - hence why I said earlier to play them both.

I'd quite like to see them in a back 5, gives Esteves more cover while still allowing him to attack from deep. I'd keep the same formation while its working but maybe something we could see later in the season. Although Paunovic doesnt seem to want to change from 4231

You are right that if we moved to 5-2-3 we could have Esteves as attacking right back with three of Holmes/McIntyre/Morrison/Gibson and Moore as a central back three. But at the moment 4-2-3-1 is working very well and IMO putting Esteves at right back in a four will be a risk. I thought he looked exciting going forwards last night but was more than a tad shaky defensively.

[Zip]

Just for perspective. At the start of last year having just lost 4-1 at home to Swansea we had just 20 points from 26 games.

[Norfolk Royal]

Was greatly looking forward to the game on the red button last night as can't be arsed with new fangled stuff like ibookchat or whatever it is.
Having read all the reports of our other games beforehand and interviews with players etc I had been struck by the new energy, never say die, we'll fight to the end rhetoric and was excited to see this in action.

It wasn't really like that though, didn't notice a hell of a lot of difference in energy fitness levels at all. We still looked to be strolling and standing off most of the time.

What I did notice though is that we are much better defensively than in recent years. Put a lot of that down to Porno getting Liam Moore playing at his best again as at that level believe he is premiership standard.

[Lower West]

Agree with both points you make. Holmes looks much better than Esteves defensively but Esteves looks like he could be a real threat going forwards - hence why I said earlier to play them both.

I'd quite like to see them in a back 5, gives Esteves more cover while still allowing him to attack from deep. I'd keep the same formation while its working but maybe something we could see later in the season. Although Paunovic doesnt seem to want to change from 4231

You are right that if we moved to 5-2-3 we could have Esteves as attacking right back with three of Holmes/McIntyre/Morrison/Gibson and Moore as a central back three. But at the moment 4-2-3-1 is working very well and IMO putting Esteves at right back in a four will be a risk. I thought he looked exciting going forwards last night but was more than a tad shaky defensively.

Why change what's working. Given the little time Pauno has had with the squad. Must be great to be on this run. Focus can be on improving what's there. Rather than constantly switching players in and out. The team can only improve with match time together.