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First Halves

Deutsch Wolf

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Tomorrow is Nuno's 50th PL game in charge.

In the 49 games to date, do you know how many goals we've scored before half time? You don't, do you.

It's 17. Three of them came in one game vs Arsenal (and I think they were our only three shots too, so it's a big outlier).

Now - do we think this is deliberate (we play conservatively, we know we are equipped to go long into games - we do score a LOT of late goals), some weird freakish Cyber thing that we needn't worry about, or a bit of an issue?
 
I sit in the NB and want to be entertained. So I want first half goals.

On a serious note. We are a conservative team in general. So the longer the game goes on we might finally make a worthwhile chance and convert it, or take a bit more of a risk and get More players forward. This season though we’ve been losing regularly so are having to go for it more by necessity to get a result.

Hopefully the shackles are off tomorrow like they were to an extent against Slovan
 
I’m sure Nuno would be happy if we scored earlier in the game as I think he is all about control. But we are cautious, we do stay in the game til the end so it’s no surprise that we get stronger as games go on.

His recent comments seem to hint towards him wanting us to dominate the game earlier more often. I think we have to be more proactive against teams in the bottom half. We have the quality to open them up more often than we tend to do.
 
I think there is a strategy to stay in the game in the first half and hit tiring teams on the break in the second.

There are games when this is frustrating. As an example Southampton were low on confidence I'd like to see us go for that type of side from the off and exploit that weakness. We don't
 
I look at games where we scored early at home last season (Bournemouth and Cardiff just to pick two off the top of my head) and we were in total command from there on. Clearly there was a natural gulf in class in the Championship but again, score quickly, you could never see us losing. Not saying we should absolutely flood the attack in the first 15 minutes but we're very adept at holding on to leads, get it in the opening stages and we'll start picking up more points.

17 in 49 is pretty poor! Was surprised when I checked.
 
I sit in the NB and want to be entertained. So I want first half goals.

On a serious note. We are a conservative team in general. So the longer the game goes on we might finally make a worthwhile chance and convert it, or take a bit more of a risk and get More players forward. This season though we’ve been losing regularly so are having to go for it more by necessity to get a result.

Hopefully the shackles are off tomorrow like they were to an extent against Slovan

Not sure that's entirely true - we haven't lost that many just not won them either - load of draws (not like the Hoddle ones when you didn't expect anything else, but draws nonetheless)

A bit more adventure earlier would not go amiss
 
Not sure that's entirely true - we haven't lost that many just not won them either - load of draws (not like the Hoddle ones when you didn't expect anything else, but draws nonetheless)

A bit more adventure earlier would not go amiss

Losing within the 90 minutes...
I assumed the second half of that sentence made that obvious? [emoji2371]

We’ve conceded the first goal in every game except City and Watford !!(the only games we’ve won).
 
Losing within the 90 minutes...
I assumed the second half of that sentence made that obvious? [emoji2371]

We’ve conceded the first goal in every game except City and Watford !!(the only games we’ve won).

Game doesn't end till the whistle goes - 90 mins, 95 mins whatever. The game is 90 mins by the referees watch so if we score before then it's still within game time
 
Game doesn't end till the whistle goes - 90 mins, 95 mins whatever. The game is 90 mins by the referees watch so if we score before then it's still within game time
I’m struggling here. Your arguing a point I haven’t made. Read the sentence again, then read my other response to you.

This season though we’ve been losing regularly so are having to go for it more by necessity to get a result.

I’ll try explaining again...
We’ve regularly conceded the first goal (which means we are losing). So therefore have had to push on in the second half to equalise (to get a result aka points). Therefore not losing...
 
Not scoring in the first half isn't for want of trying. I just think we are a fitter team than most and that shows more in the 2nd half and latter stages of games.
 
We definitely are fitter than most. Everyone has to buy into it or you don't play. Look at Doc three years ago FFS and what he is now.

We do definitely have it in us to control games though. I think we're confident in our ability to be a top end team (in time) but top end teams don't have that many scoreless first periods.

Looking at Leicester this season (people seem to be using them as the benchmark, whether it's for now or later):

Sheff Utd x 1
Bournemouth x 2
Newcastle x 1
Burnley x 1
Southampton x 5

10 already. We've only got 2 this season (Saiss at Everton, Doc vs Watford). Even accepting that Southampton is an outlier (as was our 3 vs Arsenal in April last year), it's a fair enough difference to see where they currently outperform us. They won all of those games too.
 
Losing within the 90 minutes...
I assumed the second half of that sentence made that obvious? [emoji2371]

We’ve conceded the first goal in every game except City and Watford !!(the only games we’ve won).
The section in bold is pretty telling imo.
 
Very much enjoyed seeing a goal down the NB end yesterday, feels like it’s been a very long while.
 
Well we did have two vs Southampton...(for a while anyway)
 
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