Our midfield

[QPRDave]

bar a couple of free kicks and crunching tackles I can not think of anything special, but I have probably only seen him play a handful of times before he came here.

I don't understand the idea of playing him on the right when his passing and crossing aint that great and he has no pace, but what do I know!?

No mystifying init

[EYR]

derry is not good enough mate. chases shadows at this level.

This is the problem he hasn't made the step up (no real surprise) and at present we literally have nobody else. Same could be said of Mackie.

[RussRanger]

We seem to stick rigidly to our "Two banks of four" at all times. Problem is, after going 2-0 up, our midfield dropped back and let Villa come onto us instead of doing what we had been doing.
This allowed them to retain possession with no one closing them down or getting in their faces, which gave them confidence to come at us and eventually - despite having 9 players (including Kenny) behind the ball - they were passing it neatly around us and cutting through us too easily. Score could've been 6-2.
Other problem with playing so deep around our own penalty area is when we did eventually get possession we had no one forward to pass the ball to as all our midfield were defending and again we conceded possession too easily. Just pumped it upfield to no one and watched it come back.
Hopefully Diakite, by all accounts some midfield destroyer who breaks up play, will allow our other midfielders to play more forward and attacking roles and not defend all the time.
Also, if we do punt it long, Zamora is more than capable of holding the ball up long enough for the midfielders to join him in attack. Add our players coming from back from injuries and ACN and we might be more clinical and finish teams off cos at the moment we concede momentum too easily.
My criticism of Barton - apart from a failure to deliver a free kick and give comfortable catches to keepers at corners - is he doesn't dominate play enough and lead. I want to see him yelling at his team mates a lot more, organise on the pitch and get in the faces of opponents. It's what a Captain does.

[theblackmafia.]

We seem to stick rigidly to our "Two banks of four" at all times. Problem is, after going 2-0 up, our midfield dropped back and let Villa come onto us instead of doing what we had been doing.
This allowed them to retain possession with no one closing them down or getting in their faces, which gave them confidence to come at us and eventually - despite having 9 players (including Kenny) behind the ball - they were passing it neatly around us and cutting through us too easily. Score could've been 6-2.
Other problem with playing so deep around our own penalty area is when we did eventually get possession we had no one forward to pass the ball to as all our midfield were defending and again we conceded possession too easily. Just pumped it upfield to no one and watched it come back.
Hopefully Diakite, by all accounts some midfield destroyer who breaks up play, will allow our other midfielders to play more forward and attacking roles and not defend all the time.
Also, if we do punt it long, Zamora is more than capable of holding the ball up long enough for the midfielders to join him in attack. Add our players coming from back from injuries and ACN and we might be more clinical and finish teams off cos at the moment we concede momentum too easily.
My criticism of Barton - apart from a failure to deliver a free kick and give comfortable catches to keepers at corners - is he doesn't dominate play enough and lead. I want to see him yelling at his team mates a lot more, organise on the pitch and get in the faces of opponents. It's what a Captain does.

now that's another debate!

[winalotto]

Im afraid its been the same all season, the spine of that midfield is to slow, teams can easily play through us. Barton & Ali or Barton & Buz or Derry no pace at all.I thought he may play Onouha there last night and Hall at centre back.