Originally Posted by
Don Corleone
It occurred to me I hadnt seen a " just back" thread on here in a while after an away game.
Anyway just back from the game at a freezing Amex. They announced there were 451 City fans at the game but it looked half that number to me ( guess some had tickets and didn't bother a second time!).
Brighton fans were complaining at the end about our anti football tactics and they had a point but it nearly saw us getting a point. We gave possession to Brighton, stopped Lewis Dunk bringing the ball out from the back and man marked (and sometimes doubled up) on Knockaert and first half especially this was pretty effective. They were clearly frustrated by our tactics and we created the better chances, a Morrison header tipped over and a good save from a Hoilett shot. Second half we didn't create anything of note, there was one sequence where Halford took 4 consecutive long throws down the touch line resulting in a long throw from Gunnarson into the box, effective to a point but not very pretty! We also took our time over all throw ins and free kicks, understandable but also a sign of our limitations.
Brighton didn't create much but had so much possession you felt they would eventually find a way and it took a good turn and shot to finally break the deadlock.
We then brought on Noone and Healey and actually played some decent football for about 10 minutes but one blocked effort from Noone was all we achieved.
We all know we desperately need a striker, Brighton had their 2 back up strikers playing today and they both looked more threatening in front of goal than anything we have. In fairness to Zohore, like the rest of his teammates ,he worked tirelessly and ran all night. He is strong and pacy and willing to keep running but he simply doesn't look like he will score a goal ( mind he was very isolated this evening).
Halford only seems to be in the side because he is big, can head the ball and throw it some distance but is not "a footballer". Gunnarson covered a huge amount of ground tonight and Bamba was impressive, apart from that one slip that lead to the goal. All of the team worked very hard and stuck to their task but there is little flair in this side.
I expect we'll see more of the same against Reading on Saturday