Team Selection

Much as I love Vicente, and he is the best player I have seen play for Albion, IMHO he should not have started tonight, or maybe any match, he seems so much better when he comes on as an impact sub.
Tonight, the team seem in awe of him. Every ball seems to have to go through him or involve him.
IMHO, Vicente starting tonight, resulted in Spanish Dave, Buckers and Kaz, and Leo having their worst game in the last six matches.
His selection seems to influence the way and system that we play, plus Orlandi didnt even get off the bench. Now I dont know if there were any injuries or niggles which may of influenced the selection or lack of substitutions, but we were a shadow of the team that played and stuffed Palarse.
Credit Charlton for achieving what they set up for, to stop us playing, their work rate was superb, but they wanted a point and they got it.

Just seen the Orlandi thread, echoes what ive said here.

Vicente is the best player on the pitch.
Therefore you pass the ball to Vicente, you'd be an idiot not too.

The problem being you stop the rest of the team from playing and the opposition know what we are going to do with the ball.

The fact he still had touches of brilliance only goes to underline how good he is, but how disruptive his brilliance can be.

HAILSHAM SEAGULL said:

Much as I love Vicente, and he is the best player I have seen play for Albion, IMHO he should not have started tonight, or maybe any match, he seems so much better when he comes on as an impact sub.
Tonight, the team seem in awe of him. Every ball seems to have to go through him or involve him.
IMHO, Vicente starting tonight, resulted in Spanish Dave, Buckers and Kaz, and Leo having their worst game in the last six matches.
His selection seems to influence the way and system that we play, plus Orlandi didnt even get off the bench. Now I dont know if there were any injuries or niggles which may of influenced the selection or lack of substitutions, but we were a shadow of the team that played and stuffed Palarse.
Credit Charlton for achieving what they set up for, to stop us playing, their work rate was superb, but they wanted a point and they got it.

Click to expand...

Hey, unpopular but I agree,Vicente seems to be a magnet when he plays in that we have to play to or through him.this sidelines Dave and slows the game down. I think the team plays better without him. I would have to question the managers tactics and team selection tonight. yes we nearly stole it, but also nearly lost it. The strategy showed a lack of ideas and a certain arrogance towards our visitors. WE play the passing game? No we cross the ball badly to a centre forwrad who was well marked and looked very tired tonight. No substitutions Gus, were you watching the same game as me?

The team selection was wrong tonight but not necessarily because of Vicente

To a certain extent i see your point, but to be honest I don't think Vicente starting is the reason we didn't perform tonight.

I think the reason we didn't perform is because we had far to many attacking players on the pitch that were getting in each others way

Our gung ho tactics nearly paid off first half but by the end of the 2nd it was obvious we needed to take an attacker off and attempt to pull charlton out of their box

we couldn't have bought a goal with charlton dropping deep and our front attacking 5 getting in each others way due to over-crowding... (goes against NSC opinion but crofts or hammond should have come on!!)

No one on the pitch today played aswell as they usually do IMO. Even the defensive players didn't do aswell as usual, Pig gave the ball away a lot and looked shaky at the start. Calde missed loads of good chances, Greer was indecisive and didn't keep possession well. Can't see how all of this is suddenly Vicente's fault, yes a lot goes through him. Not his fault the others played badly.

griff9 said:

The team selection was wrong tonight but not necessarily because of Vicente

To a certain extent i see your point, but to be honest I don't think Vicente starting is the reason we didn't perform tonight.

I think the reason we didn't perform is because we had far to many attacking players on the pitch that were getting in each others way

Our gung ho tactics nearly paid off first half but by the end of the 2nd it was obvious we needed to take an attacker off and attempt to pull charlton out of their box

we couldn't have bought a goal with charlton dropping deep and our front attacking 5 getting in each others way due to over-crowding... (goes against NSC opinion but crofts or hammond should have come on!!)

Click to expand...

Sorry but tonight showed that Gus is lacking tactical nouce. In a game that we could win to give us breathing space in the chase for the play offs, I was happy to see what I thought was an attacking intent. However, that soon changed. Every dead ball situation whether a corner or free kick was taken short until the 70th minute when we decided to try and put the ball in the box. In a game that was crying out for a change, neither winger swopped sides, no substitutions against a side that were not looking to win the game and showed little threat until they nearly stole the game late on with their only shot at goal. Our best three chances fell to Calderon our right back. Vicente seems untouchable if he starts and no matter how good he is his record of being on a winning Albion side is not great. Why not bring on Orlandi for him or David who was having a quiet game just to change things and give us something different. From the attacking game we played against Palace we went back to the two passes forward to three back again and the defence put themselves under pressure a lot of the time. Several times tonight Upson could have driven forward into the opponents half. Surely if he goes forward Bridcutt could drop in to cover until he gets back. It appears that his and Greer's brief is don't go over the half way line. We are more intent in not conceding than scoring and that will be our undoing against Leicester on Saturday unless we try and get the ball into the opponents box at every opportunity. Gus has the potential to be one of Brighton's great managers, but he could also be a victim of his lack of ability to change things when they are clearly not working. Tonight was the clearest indication yet that he has no plan B. I still think we will make the playoffs, but tonight was an opportunity missed.I will now sit back to be shot down by the Gus lovers.

Tonight was an opportunity missed mate but we are Brighton - we never have and never will do things the easy way!
And, for me Gus already is one of Brighton's great managers!