Nowt

Shake It All About.

From almost every angle that's what we got from yesterday's game. The loss of Fuller to an apparent hamstring injury was the final kick in the nads.

A bumper crowd witnessed a typical day in the life of the long-suffering Addick. At least for the part-time sufferers they only had to shell out a fiver for the privilege. As is customary after a dismal performance on one of our promotion days, one wonders how many will return in the near future. The Peterborough game will be something of an acid test.

It all went Pete Tong yesterday. The formation was wrong, the majority of subs were wrong and so too, some of the personnel. That aside, it was fine and dandy ! 

My observation prior to kick off was that the formation was wrong and that at some stage it would need changing unless we were well ahead which I didn't ever think would be the case. It was just a question of when the changes would come and who the players involved were.

Razak is a quality player who showed touches of that yesterday, in particular one exquisite drag back will live long in the memory. He is an accomplished passer of the ball. Prior to Blackpool away I doubt that he has played just behind a sole striker. Clearly he is a player who needs to be a bit deeper a la Perkins of Barnsley, who for me was their man of the match yesterday and pulled all the strings for them.

That Razak was asked to play there compounded the error in my view of the 4-4-1-1 or 4-5-1 as it was at times. Their back four didn't looked all that comfortable on the ball especially when pressured. However, this wasn't as much as it should have been as because it was only Fuller up front of course. 

We set up as though we were determined not to lose.......against Barnsley at home !! We should be looking to win at home and for that,  you need to be positive. 

The half time subs were correct only in as much that Hollands needed to come off and we needed another striker on. That was fine. Did anyone seriously think that removing one of our best players ( Razak ), and replacing him with Jackson was going to change anything for the better ? There's widespread agreement that Skip hasn't been great this season. He had little positive impact I'm afraid.

What other options did Sir Chris have ? Well, since in my view Wilson and Evina are good attacking players either one of them could have gone to wide right or left with Solly returning to his preferred right back berth. 

The third sub made even less sense to me. I really like Pritchard but he's no right winger and to bring him on for Green was never going to improve matters. Had Evina come on then and Kerkar switched to the right or Wilson moved to right wing the I would have applauded that as it makes sense. Sadly of course that didn't happen.

The formation away to Blackpool was appropriate because the home side will come and attack more and you set yourself up to stifle them and to nick a goal or two, just as Barnsley did yesterday. At home it's different and you've got to be positive. The outcome was the same as the Watford game where we failed to go for it despite them being down to 10 men. It's as though we're happy to settle for a point at home and against the likes of Watford and Barnsley that's not good enough.

Leeds and Wolves away followed by Middlesbrough and Cardiff at home were always going to be tough but now without Fuller I dread to think what we'll get out of them. We can't play BWP up front on his own as has already been proved. Therefore, Hulse or Smith will have to step up to the plate.

I'll always stick up for Sir Chris but I have to say his selections and substitutions at home are looking a bit naive on occasions. Many of the changes this season he's made that have been a success have largely been dictated by circumstances as much as I'd like to think he'd have made them anyway.

The boss needs to learn and learn fast. I think there's an awful lot of learning to be done in the next four games.