Wolves 0-0 Birmingham City
By Tom Bason
November 1 2014
Wolves today drew 0-0 with local rivals Birmingham City. David Edwards had the host's best chances, while Paul Robinson forced Carl Ikeme into a good save from a second half header.
- With rumours of Bakary Sako and Nouha Dicko missing the game due to injury, Kenny Jackett picked virtually the same starting XI as I would have. I thought that Liam McAlinden and Leon Clarke linked well in their one appearance together, the 1-0 win at MK Dons last season. Clarke clearly isn't suited to playing upfront by himself (which does raise questions as to the decision to sign him), and I dread to think what it would have done to his confidence had he been left out the week after scoring the winning goal at Leeds. Thus, Clarke and McAlinden seemed to be the logical choice. The one change I might have made would have been bringing Scott Golbourne in at left back, and playing Tommy Rowe on the left of midfield.
- This was a game that had plenty of potential narratives. Had Lee Clark still been in charge, I'd have backed us to win comfortably before the game. But with Gary Rowett taking charge for the first time, I said before the game I'd be happy with a scrappy 1-0 win. Throw in Paul Robinson as Birmingham's captain, not to mention his previous relationship with Kenny Jackett at Millwall, and there were all the ingredients for disaster. And that's without mentioning Birmingham's central midfield pairing of Stephen Gleeson and David Davis, two Wolves youth teamers who didn't quite make the grade at Molineux. And I haven't even said that it was a local derby. If any game didn't need Sky's hyperbole, this was it.
- One of my friends at work is a Burton Albion fan, and I text him this morning to find out what Rowett's game plan would be, and he was pretty accurate. He reckoned they'd play a 4-5-1/4-3-3 formation and would be difficult to beat. They sat two central midfielders deep (Gleeson and Davis) and allowed Andrew Shinnie a little scope to support Clayton Donaldson. Shinnie generally stayed goal-side of the ball, and this caused us huge problems. With Kevin McDonald and Lee Evans sitting as deep as they do, and us having both McAlinden and Clarke upfront there were huge gaps between the midfield and attack. At times, James Henry and Michael Jacobs moved inside into the gap, and allowed Tommy Rowe and Matt Doherty to move forward up the flanks, but this didn't happen enough.
- When McDonald and Evans did have the ball, they had very few options. Clarke and McAlinden were isolated and so were left to feed on hopeful balls forward. McAlinden doesn't yet have the body strength to match defenders in a physical battle, although he did hold the ball up very well when it was played into his feet, far better than Dicko does. Generally, the back seven would pass the ball around between themselves, perhaps feed the ball to Jacobs or Henry, get it back and move backwards. I go into more detail on a blog I've written for another site, which will be released this week, but at the moment McDonald is running in first gear. Today, the game was crying out for someone to gamble and make that break forward. Hell, their midfield was Davis and Gleeson - we should have been able to make some inroads there. McDonald has the ability to make a difference and really drive the team forward. He didn't need to do it last season, now he does.
- The first half was a pretty non-existent affair - McAlinden ran onto a long ball and saw his shot saved by Darren Randolph, while Clarke had a header tipped over. I thought there might be a change at half time, but Jackett elected to keep the same 11. When he did make a change, it almost won Wolves the game. Bakary Sako and David Edwards were introduced for McAlinden and Jacobs and we reverted to the normal 4-2-3-1 formation. I felt a little sorry for Jacobs when he went off. He's not a winger; I thought he was poor when he played there in League One, so I don't know why anyone else would expect him to play we there in the division above. All of his best performances have come when he's had that free role behind a striker, when there are fewer blind alleys for him to run up. I still think he's a better bet there than Edwards, and feel that at some point Jackett is going to need to try him in that position.
- But Edwards did well when he came on and his added energy, allied with a general increase in tempo meant we got more of a grip of the game. We'd also missed Sako in the first half - without him we just didn't have that player who frightens oppositions to death with their directness and pace. Gary Rowett responded to Jackett's changed by bringing on Brek Shea for Koby Arthur. Arthur had been Birmingham's best attacking threat until that point, and their one player who I felt threatened by. When he went off, I felt like we could concentrate on attacking, without worrying about leaving the door open at the back. Shea is a more defensive minded player, and it was very noticeable that every time Sako got on the ball, three Birmingham players instantly surrounded him. This should have freed up space elsewhere, but we weren't really able to use it. But he was still a threat, blasting over when he probably should have scored, and driving a ball to the far post that was almost slid in by Leon Clarke. Add that to Edwards' chances, the second of which was a header tipped over by Randolph, before clipping the bar with a lob, and the two subs contributed more going forward than the starting XI put together.
- I think Birmingham had one real chance in the second half, which had a whiff of controversy about it. Matt Doherty did well to get to the by-line, and whip a cross to the near post, which was nearly touched in. But as Doherty crossed it, he was clattered by (I think) Jonathan Grounds. I don't really understand why this isn't a free kick. You see it all the time, a striker shoots, gets clattered by a defenders last ditch challenge and no foul is given because the ball has already gone. But if a defender clears the ball up field and is clattered by a forward, it's probably a free kick and a yellow card. The Laws of the Game make no mention that the fouled player has to be in control of the ball for it to be a foul. To make matters worse, Doherty had to have some treatment, while Birmingham cleared the ball and attacked down our right flank. The ball went out for a corner, with Doherty still behind the goal line at the other of the pitch. Doherty had to run the length of the pitch to be back in position to defend the corner, and understandably wasn't quite prepared, and the man he was marking, Paul Robinson won the header and forced Carl Ikeme into a diving save on the goal line.
- I think that given Birmingham's precarious position, a draw was the least we should have been aiming for. But equally, I don't think it was the worst point in the world. We've also gone from a porous defence to conceding once in three games as Rowe and Ethan Ebanks-Landell settle into the defence. I actually thought Rowe was excellent today, even if there were one or two tricky moments against Arthur. But I think he's a better attacking player than Scott Golbourne, who reminds me little of Ashley Cole when going forward; he's happy to get into positions to help going forward, but he's very much reliant on the rest of the team to get him there. He's not likely to actually create something himself, whereas I get the feeling Rowe can do this.
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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2014:12:06:19:32:19 by toomb.
In the cold light of day, who cares what would be done to his confidence after scoring a tap in at Leeds that a blind emu would have put away. The guy is utterly hopeless so let his confidence suffer, we aren't a charity being funded to boost the confidence of hapless shitehouses like this. If leaving the cumbersome carthorse out of the team is beneficial to our chances of obtaining a result then Clarke will have to toddle off to the Samaritans for counselling.
I take your point on a new manager ( one with no pedigree) but how anyone can be even close to being satisfied with a point at home to a team that has won 1 out of the last 14 and the worst home record in world club football for the last 18 months I have no idea. It's a shocking result so lets not kid ourselves.. on a par with Huddersfield IMO taking into account the quality of the opposition
I tend to agree with the comments about Jacobs and ,while I wouldn't say that Rowe was excellent, he did play well.
Brum were on their knees trying to stand back up again and we picked a slow, awkward team which played amongst themselves without putting a weak team under pressure.
I just don't get it with Clark. It's as if Jackett is praying that if he plays him often enough he'll eventually score a goal or two and justify the decision to buy him.
It was cautious team selection, at the wrong time against the wrong opposition.
Very poor I think.
Quote:Risca TM
Good write up but for once I have to chip in with a contra point, in that I think it was a terrible team selection.
Brum were on their knees trying to stand back up again and we picked a slow, awkward team which played amongst themselves without putting a weak team under pressure.
I just don't get it with Clark. It's as if Jackett is praying that if he plays him often enough he'll eventually score a goal or two and justify the decision to buy him.
It was cautious team selection, at the wrong time against the wrong opposition.
Very poor I think.
ime glad you said it 1st risca, i was unhappy with the team selection aswell, we should have stuck with what got us this far, with edwards playing behind the front man, if sako wasent fit enough to start vlp should have started, jacobs was sh#te the only real problem we had was who was goner be the front man, a player brought back from a loan from div 1 or clarke i agree with angry, clarkes f#cking useless he strolls round all day doing absolutely f#ck all. why jacket keeps playing him i dont know, the only defence i can put for jackets team selection is he thought we would be more attacking with two up front, but it dident work
Clarke is useless, no pace, very little skill and no football brain.
Birmingham, a team with zero confidence coming into the game, were the better team in the first half.
I was very disappointment.
I cant believe Tom Bason above, when he said it wasn't the worst point in the world.
It was poor and an opportunity missed. Lets see how costly those 2 points could be come the end of the season.
Very poor stuff IMO
And I didn't say I was happy with the point, I said that a draw was the least we should be aiming at. But I read a stat this week that said "Since 05/06 26 teams have been beaten by 6+ goals in the Premier League. 2 were last games of the season so I'll discount. Of the remaining 24 in their next game 18 of them won." I'm not saying it was a good point, more that it was easily a game we could slipped up in.
petewolf - I don't think Jackett thought we'd be more attacking with 2 upfront, that very rarely happens. But I think that without Sako and without Dicko, Jackett looked at the available players and picked the lineup he thought had the most chance of winning the game. I said at the start of the piece that it was pretty much the lineup I'd have played, so I'm not going to criticise him too much for it.
The point I was trying to make about the gap between the midfield and the forwards was not necessarily that they were isolated, more that the balls into them from McDonald and Evans. I even took a photo during the game to show the huge gap between McDonald/Evans and Clarke/McAlinden - there are three Blues players between the midfield and the forwards, and this was typical of the game, which meant that balls into forwards were often hopeful ones and didn't really give the strikers much to work with.
toomb's twitter
I can't confirm or dispute those stats you mentioned about teams coming back to win games after a hammering but would be interested to see a link to those stats as I find it hard to believe that 24 teams have been annihilated by 8 goals and 18 have won the next game especially in the premier league. You're a bright guy Tom but if this is true I'll dress a stray cat up in a tweed suit, take it to the town hall with accompanying pic and encourage voters to elect tinkerbell as mayor. There's no way 18 out of 24 teams have lost by 8 goals and won their next league game, I don't need to check stats to confirm this.. its from experience of years of trading stats from every major European league in the world.If you can prove otherwise, tinkerbell awaits the news with whiskers twitching. I maintain my original point, Birmingham are as bad as it gets in this division and it's an abysmal result against a team so lacking in confidence I'm surprised their players didn't foul themselves in the tunnel perhaps as a post Halloween horror to celebrate with their mindless fanbase.
In relation to the distance between the "strikers" and the midfield, I agree the gap was too great but dicko for example drops back and moves not just standing like a statue aka Clarke waiting for the ball to come to him. That's what good strikers do, move and create channels for the ball to be fed into so its as much the fault of the so called strikers on show as it is the midfield who I agree was poor.
Jackett clearly thought it was going to be easy too which his team selection reflected. McAlinden has had a handful of minutes all season in the league but suddenly he's put straight in the side after being out on loan. If this was Derby or Watford no way would he have started and no way would Sako have been on the bench. That's no criticism of Jackett though, a home game against a side rock bottom in confidence, even if he did make a couple of changes he wouldn't normally make it should still have been a comfortable win.
Any striker worth his salt would have destroyed their centre halfs yesterday, 1 had just arrived the day before and Robinson is about 5ft9 and hasn't played centre back in a 20 year career until this season. Even if he didn't score Dicko would have pulled the both of them all over the pitch but other than a missed header in the first half by Robinson they couldn't have hoped for a more comfortable afternoon. McAlinden was like a little boy running around lost and Leon Clarke strolls around in the middle of the pitch and ventures about 5 yards left and right all game.
toomb's twitter
Quote:toomb
Angry - you mention about the winter programme. I don't know if it's worth looking at last season, when about this time started a pretty poor run of form. From November 5th onwards, we won only 2 out of 7, and 3 out of 11, before going on that 9 match winning streak
I think its dangerous to compare last seasons results with this season Tom due to the fact the primarily in the 3rd tier no team has any real strength in depth and the quality of the opposition was so low we could simply "wing it". It's important to realise also just how lucky we were with injuries and suspensions which is quite rare and unlikely to be repeated this season.
The winter I suppose is irrelevant with the point being over a 46 game season, it's unlikely we are going to get through it with sako/dicko playing every game and it's already obvious without either of these two players we aren't capable of beating anyone without a huge slice of luck. We have already seen the squad depth show its true colours in various cup games where these two don't play and its frighteningly poor.
I would like to have seen McAlinden left on and Clarke replaced by Edwards at half time. I thought Jacobs was disappointing having been given another chance, but was impressed by the performances by Ebanks-Landell and Rowe, and I think Doherty is developing into a very promising right back. It's no wonder he's keeping Ricketts out of the side.