Saturday 12th February - Notts County v ECFC Prediction Thread

[greciansontour]

We will scrape a narrow win and fickle city fans will turn exeweb into wave of positivity. That is until we lose the next game and are of course guaranteed relegation

 

[city_is_my_life]

Apparently Thomson limped off against Brentford so we will be without him... http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/eng_div_2/9387847.stm

CIML

 

[grecIAN Harris]

And why do you think that is Greasy? It's because of lack of discipline coming from Tis and the coaches. If you are told to go and play left mid and not to roam around then that is what you do. If you are told ot go play left mid but go where the ball is then obviously you are going to roam.

Tis needs to be saying to these guys "Look this is your position and this is where you are playing, I don't want to see you stray from here, keep the width" etc. He obviously isn't doing this and if he is then the players aren't listening. Either way it has to come from him.

Now if you start with a conventional structured diamond then Edwards/Troy sit in front of back 4 and protect them without going past the ball. Easy. Then you have Dunne and Sercs whose jobs it is to keep the central mid ticking over and the full-backs being Goldie and Tully will push up the flanks as well offering a little width. Then you have Noble/Harley in behind the front 2 basically with a free role so he can do what he wants to add some creativity. He should be the only one who can vnture from his position and can even drop back i with Dunne and Sercs.

Hardly rocket science stuff but pretty common sense if you ask me.

You'll have very little width because Tulls (assuming he's fit) and Goldborne will have very little licence to get forward because they'll have no cover. Or are you expecting the centre halves to step out and cover as they do when there is three of them at the back? In which case, expect our back four to be dragged to hell and back and have even more cause to moan than you do already. That's what I meant by the insurance policy allowing Tully and Goldborne to get forward. If one of them gets caught, then one of the centre halves can step across and cover whilst still leaving adequate cover in the middle to deal with anything incoming.
As for telling central midfielders to stay wide, you can try all you like but their natural inclination is to come and look for the ball, especially when they're game revolves around being on the ball such as Ryan Harley. In contrast, why do you think proper wingers disappear out of the game for long periods? Maybe because the hug the touchline all the time and stay out there until they're fed the ball. Again, it's a natural instinct.
As for Edwards and Troy sitting in the holding role, I'm not convinced either is a good idea. Edwards can do it from time to time but I don't think he's up to the rigours of playing week in, week out anymore and I don't think Troy has the awareness to play there. Why do you think he makes so many last ditch tackles playing the role he knows? That and I'm not very comfortable with him on the ball at the best of times. It's like watching Bambi on ice prancing out with the ball.

 

[grecIAN Harris]

Apparently Thomson limped off against Brentford so we will be without him... http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/eng_div_2/9387847.stm

CIML

Bizzarely enough, he wasn't even on the bench for that game.

 

[Hants_red]

Apparently Thomson limped off against Brentford so we will be without him... http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/eng_div_2/9387847.stm

CIML

We done the BBC. He got hacked by Torquay players (an old friend and colleague from last season!), in the reserve match on Tuesday.

 

[GrecianGoggles]

Seems opinion is divided on team selection. If Tully is out then I doubt Tis will go back to our wing back system. For what it's worth I would go with the following...

-----------------------------------------Hamer-------------------------------------------------

Duffy----------------------Taylor-----------------------Troy--------------------------Golbourne


----------------------------------------Dunne--------------------------------------------------

--------------------------Noble--------------------------Harley---------------------------------


Logan---------------------------------Cureton------------------------------------------Nardiello


Bench: Krysiak, Jones, Edwards, Cozic, Sercombe, Thomson, O'Flynn


- The Duffy selection picks itself with no Tulls
- Taylor and Troy need a run of games together in my opinion although I would have no complaints if Edwards played
- Golbourne over Billy Jones for me
- I think the Noble & Harley pairing in midfield would work better if they had Dunne behind them instead of Sercs, who has been poor in 2011 IMO
- Nardiello is the man in form so should start. I like him cutting in off the left side.
- Cureton up the middle flanked by Logie, Logan playing on Cureton's right lightens JC's work load. Logan also gives us the crucial option of a direct outlet ball if we are struggling.

- A well balanced bench too, plenty of pace.

I believe this side could get something, we must improve greatly though.

1-1, Cureton with ours.

The pitch is wider than it is long...interesting

 

[Red Dingbat]

Well as they are below us in the table and we never really play that well against teams around us, plus the fact it's away and were not playing the greatest... then i think the best we can hope for is a draw or for one team (hopefully us!) to nick it 1-0 in the 89th minute...

A 0-0 draw like at Swindon a couple of weeks ago

 

[orangeshark]

Apparently Thomson limped off against Brentford so we will be without him... http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/eng_div_2/9387847.stm

CIML

The BBC got this wrong - according to the City website he limped off against Torquay in the reserves match. Likewise, they suggested that 'Richard Tully' was still shaking off his knee injury.

http://www.exetercityfc.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10436~2287657,00.html

Whatever happened to quality journalism?

 

[RaeUK]

I think both the team and Tis will want to get a good result from this. A heartening 0-2 City win it will be ...

Wow, I got one right!

 

[wiveygrecian]

Wow, I got one right!

I had a quid on that at 25-1 so not bad!