WSL 21/22 | United v City - Sat 9 Oct at 1:30

We are so much less vulnerable when we lose the ball with Ladd on the pitch. Her positioning and ball retention under pressure means she deals with breakaways far better.

I'm mystified why coach is consistently leaving her out of the midfield. She protects the defence and links to the creative players with simple quick passes.
 
City were missing players, in poor form and had a RC 1st Half.

Very disappointing result. You could barely tell they were a player down. Draw was a fair result imo.

Long season ahead.. hope we can turn it around soon.
 
buchansleftleg said:
We are so much less vulnerable when we lose the ball with Ladd on the pitch. Her positioning and ball retention under pressure means she deals with breakaways far better.

I'm mystified why coach is consistently leaving her out of the midfield. She protects the defence and links to the creative players with simple quick passes.
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Agreed. Should absolutely be starting.
 
buchansleftleg said:
We are so much less vulnerable when we lose the ball with Ladd on the pitch. Her positioning and ball retention under pressure means she deals with breakaways far better.

I'm mystified why coach is consistently leaving her out of the midfield. She protects the defence and links to the creative players with simple quick passes.
Click to expand...

I guess Skinner thinks we are an all star samba team and Zelem is the best playmaker of the league? Thats the only reason I can see her starting ahead of Ladd. Stoney had Zelem on the bench mostly last season, its a remarkable turn of events with the new manager. Zelem got no physicality to her game at all, which we need in midfield.
 
Disappointing performance given Georgia Stanway's red card in the first half. Lauren Hemp was the best player on the pitch by a mile. Very poor defending by Mannion to let Shaw score such an easy header. Nice flick from Lucy Staniforth for her goal after the quick short corner, Ella Toone with the assist. Super shot from Alessia Russo for 2-1 after Hannah Blundell and Ella Toone had done well in the build-up.

No idea what we were doing towards the end of the match, pumping balls forward when we had so little pace in attack and Alessia and Leah both looked exhausted. We had an extra player, there should have been plenty of passing options to progress the play.

Earps - one of her best performances that I've seen, saved early Beckie effort from Hemp's cross, caught and punched crosses, unfortunate after saving Park's shot on to the bar

Batlle - got beaten by Hemp far too easily and too often. Awful performance.
Blundell - vital assist for Alessia's goal, poor defending for their 2nd goal, otherwise ok
Mannion - terrible marking for Shaw's goal, her long passes not as good as previous matches
Thorisdottir - cleared a Hemp header off the line in the first half, completely misjudged Stokes' cross for Shaw's goal

Zelem - didn't seem to influence the game that much
Groenen - got stuck in but not much quality from her today
Toone - one good turn and shot from distance that was saved, involved in build-up to Alessia's goal, provided assist for Lucy Staniforth's goal, a couple of shots that were blocked, awful pass gifted Hemp a chance from an angle.

Hanson - nice turn and shot that was saved in the first half, rarely managed to get past Demi Stokes
Galton - twice given offside when she wasn't, wasted a big chance when through on goal, a few crosses that almost led to something
Russo - super shot for her goal, linked well on occasion, other times got out-muscled or tackled while she was deciding who to pass to.

Subs:

Staniforth - lovely flick for her goal after the short corner, a bit careless with her passing
Ladd - only got a few mins
 
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A disappointing result in the context of the match, but not too bad considering we're still 6 points ahead of them. The reaction to the red card, and then going 2-1 up was really poor. We definitely need to reconsider out midfield. Zelem/Groenen isn't a good pair, and we have some good options in Ladd and Boe Risa.
 
buchansleftleg said:
We are so much less vulnerable when we lose the ball with Ladd on the pitch. Her positioning and ball retention under pressure means she deals with breakaways far better.

I'm mystified why coach is consistently leaving her out of the midfield. She protects the defence and links to the creative players with simple quick passes.
Click to expand...
I would think it’s to get Toone in the team. Jackie and Zelem are clearly good players that offer a lot but they need Ladd so they have a platform to do what they excel at. Just seems like it’s been decided that Ladd is sacrificed to get the 3 most attacking on the field and it looks a bit disjointed.
punt and run might work against some teams in the league but against well drilled structured teams it’ll just get dealt with like it was today.

No idea what they thought they were doing in the final moments. Russo and Galton were clearly out of steam and yet we just kept punting balls for them to try and get on.
 
Social media sites bring out the worst in some people. Bizarre response to the specific situation as well. Nobody maliciously does a foul that obvious or that stupid with an intention to injure.
 
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