Lotus

Odd to have so little possession but have a much higher expected goals stat. It looked that way as well. We left a couple of goals out there tbh. 6-0 wouldn’t have felt like a robbery.

He’s got the pace, stamina and attitude to reduce a good few wingers into misery, I reckon. Ultimately doesn’t have enough about him to be a modern FB but he can apply himself to the WB role pretty well.

Will be a huge boost if we can get him back.

Left side of a back 3 is clearly his best position.

Barkley had amazing balance and control. Wasn’t great at getting his head and passing the ball though. Elliott is decent running with the ball but scans the field well and looks like he makes good early decisions.

He’s a better footballer than I expected. I think he’s better with the ball, passing and striking it than Gordon, actually. Not necessarily a better player but has better technique and very good vision. Delighted he’s contributing as much as he is. Should be fresh and raring to go for the run in.

You can’t judge his input from the one game though. He doesn’t do progressive passes, the stats show that. He also only really makes his tackles in our defensive 3rd. The running thing for sure seems a Howe preference. He clearly likes players who can run the ball up the field rather than those who pass it. It’s a trade off, running it is less risky in that a pass can be intercepted, but passing it quickly through the lines is a much faster way of attacking. Better teams than us do this. Over time, we may change. It’s early days for us so far.

I think Joelinton is an unusual player. He’s attacking midfielder. He does next to nothing in the middle 3rd of the pitch. He doesn’t do passes and the majority of his tackles are actually him showing the desire and get back and help out in our defensive 3rd. He does get involved in our attacks though. Running with the ball (although he does lose it a fair bit) and receiving passes in dangerous attacking positions. He’s also very low on the assists numbers. So when people say we have more control over the midfield with him in there it’s not because he makes tackles there, because he doesn’t and it’s not because he’s spraying the ball around from there either. But he definitely does bring a level of combativeness and intimidation that we clearly miss.

Maybe he and other Ukrainian sports people donate a proportion of their wages to the war effort ?

Not a player I’d be thinking about selling at all. He’s feeling his way back in and we’re a little dysfunctional atm which doesn’t help.

I wouldn’t get too excited. Wham were totally defeatist by the time Hall came on. If Trips is fit to start I wouldn’t be surprised to see some permutation that means Hall is on the bench again. And, tbh it would probably be for a good reason. He made some good blocks when he came on but it was mostly high up the pitch. I do trust Howe to judge if he’s ready to be positionally sound when defending our box.

Aye, wasn’t his best performance. He’s probably playing below the standard of Jeff Hendrick atm. Maybe he needs a bit of a rest.

Delighted for him like but Wham were all over the place. Need to see him have a few good games before knowing if he’s significantly improved.

Surprised WHam didn’t get tighter to him when he came deep. They were even more disorganised than we were for a while. Would’ve like to see Isak have more goal threat throughout the game. But if you’re not, getting an assist and scoring 2 penalties is pretty awesome tbh.

Reckon Howe’s played a blinder by holding him back. Like Pardew did with Ben Arfa 😜