Bruce Sacked at last (now official)

[Matt Collins]

Burton is tough but winnable

Bolton at home is as close to a gimme as you'll get. Might get to see what the likes of hogan, O'Hare, Onomah can do in that one

[Damo70]

I think we will win the next two games. Burton won't be easy but Bolton look totally abject and a 'down by Christmas' job.

If that's the case then Bolton sound exactly like the kind of team we've taken care of with minimal fuss over the years!

Yeah but, no but.... 

[PaulWinch again]

Good to have two back to back wins, but for long-term success he needs to get us controlling the ball for longer.

[aj2k77]

Good to have two back to back wins, but for long-term success he needs to get us controlling the ball for longer.

Apparently that's what every team who comes here are looking to do, control and keep the ball and frustrate us. Don't think we will see much difference the entire season and will look for quality moments from our better players to hide the inadequacies of the way we are set up.

[London Villan]

Giving the opposition the ball back after we have completed two passes doesn't help.

[sickbeggar]

Still don't see how this side is going to get up this season. One performance admittedly yesterday but the possession thing is a long running saga. If we're surrendering 64% of the possession at home to a duff side like forest, then what happens when we meet anyone good? Is there any examples for teams going up and doing that at home all the time? I'm genuinely interested because it seems unlikely to me. If we'd taken a 2-0 lead early on and then just invited them to attack for 90 minutes, then they'd make sense. Otherwise i have no idea what Bruce's plan is. Win every game 1-0? Seems to be putting an amazing responsibility on our back 5 if that's the case.  At the moment we're 7 points off a straight promotion spot,and 2 off a play-off spot so we're nicely poised but i've got be honest, yesterday didn't look like a side heading for promotion to me

[SoccerHQ]

We are strong at home.

3 defeats in over 12 months indicates team just come to VP happy to take a point and play accordingly.

Lack of possession away from home concerns me greatly though. We concede terriority and often concede the first goal which is one of the reasons we're so bad away.

It isn't so bad if we can counter attack at lighting pace like in the MON era but we just don't have the players for that bar Adomah.

[Ads]

Possession is utterly meaningless without territory.

They had 75% first half apparently but were the worst team we'd played. Absolutely awful. They may as well have have left Murphy in Newcastle. Johnstone may as well have not been on the pitch.

[sickbeggar]

Look if Bruce has perfected a system where for 2 thirds of a game we don't get to touch the ball, and we get promoted doing it then fairplay to him. Personally i think its borderline genius if it works - Promotion without having to watch our players try to pass or control a ball? If only this had been brought in 5 years ago, we'd still be in the premier

[Ads]

The other side can play as many square balls in their own half as they like, I'm not going to be concerned unless we are losing.

People are getting hung up on possession as a statistic in isolation. No consideration is given to where the ball is or what's being done with it. Do you think they would have had so much of the ball if they'd have tried to move towards our goal and actually ventured something?

[olaftab]

We can argue possession v territory till the cows come home and is not so relevant in a single match the important point is that teams that have more of the ball and therefore possession in most of their matches tend to be the teams that achieve sustained success.

[Ads]

I can't agree with that at all. Success for possession based teams comes from having territory. Man City aren't top because they dominate the ball, they're top because they dominate the ball 30 yards from your goal. When it is recycled, they have less to go to create a chance.

[sickbeggar]

It's not just possession though is it. They had 13 shots, 5 on target, so we're surrendering that to the opposition with surrendering possession.  The question is would a better forward side only have scored the 1?  I mean even our lot managed 2 goals in 4 shots on target. Pretty impressive or lucky?

[Ads]

They had one chance beyond the goal where they may have scored.

The free kick was well saved but bread and butter for the keeper. They created Jack all.

[sickbeggar]

They had one chance beyond the goal where they may have scored.

The free kick was well saved but bread and butter for the keeper. They created Jack all.

I don't disagree with that, but are we gonna hand 13 shots to the opposition each game in the hope they're as bad as Forest?