Foo thoughts on tonight

All in all reasonably encouraging, especially first half. Clear gulf in class but hard to know if that was us being good or them being poor. Possibly a bit of both. Very sloppy first 20 of the second half where we seemed to lose our shape and a few players ran out of steam a bit.

On the positive front Marshall looks a really good player. Pukki I think has potential to become a bit of a fan favourite due to his mix of scruffiness and a good touch. Even before the Rhodes injury scare I would have said he looks the more likely candidate if we go with one up front as he is much more of a link man. McClean also very tidy and has a good touch. Stiepermann also did well and Aarons started to shine a bit once moved to right back.

Buendia was a bit iffy to start with but grew into it as the half went on. Enough there to suggest he’s a tidy player but will need a bit of time to acclimatise to the pace of the game I think.

Concerns: still a bit of a lack of pace going forward without Hernandez in the side and still think we are occasionally going to play ourselves into trouble at the back when pressed.

All in all we looked strong though and seem to have an added physicality to us this season. God knows what the formation and team will be at brum though. I couldn’t even tell you what formation we were playing at times tonight.

Posted By: Jim, Jul 25, 23:15:00