Player ratings v Watford (h)

[KZNSeagull]

Thanks to the internet I got my first look at a whole game of Oscar Garcia's Brighton team last night.

The obvious difference between last year and this is the speed. The team certainly play a more direct uptempo game yet still concentrating on the short pass. Is this better? Well, its better on the eye certainly as it makes the game more exciting..... and more risky. perhaps when weve got all the injured players back this tactic will take off but last night I could not but wince at the mischosen passes (completed but the wrong pass), the rushing around occasionally like headless chickens and our truly awful set pieces (a major step back from last year).

I thought Gus style of play was initially dictated by the quality of players at our disposal..... better to take care with possession and passing with our level of players.... an idea which may have outgrown itself by last season when the quality of the team was much higher.... with the eleven we have playing now though this quicker direct style may cause ourselves problems against teams like Watford that can punish us.

The team (no numbers as numbers mean nothing)

PIG - always one of my favourites did fine last night but he is a bit of a moaner.No chance with the goal OOPs forgot the flap,,,,, will forgive him that for being PIG
Bruno - lucky to stay on.... very reckless last night and although ocassionally a danger in the opposing half. One or two good tackles so a mixed bag from him
Ward - unlucky with the goal... couple of good crosses and generally did ok... hope injury isnt a problem because then its..... Chicksen !!!
Greer - lucky man!!! Needs to play with BOTH feet! Generally dependable but tricky quick wingers do undo him
Upson - quiet but did his job
JFC - I am probably in a minority of one but do think its B2B midfielders we need (ie a quicker forward passing Hammond) and JFC does fit that bill. You wont see that much of him in a game but everything he does is tidy and with experience the chances and the goals will come..... his set piece taking needs serious work though. Not a finished product but like the look of him.
Crofts - Good game, dangerous probably our MOM and the second of our needed B2Bs
Andrews - of the three I thought he was the least impressive. Ok but...
Buckley - also a very good game. Really dangerous and seemingly back to his best.... no better crossing and shooting and the old Buckers is back. BTW him and Crofts for MOM
Barnes - hes not strong enough for the Ulloa role and he is definately having a porblem scoring but his harassing and link up work was excellent. Afraid though for his future at the Albion as I suspect he is the wrong type of player to hold down a place. Soemwhere he is goign to do very well, though
Conway - patchy, good at times at everything but not consistent

Lita - he is so obviously not match fit (the danger so loans... by the time they are fit the loan is over) but is the closest to Ulloa well probably find right now. Good cross to set up Crofts chance but needs time and perhaps hasnt got it.

Calderon - fizzed and buzzed int he time remaining but to no real avail

I would say that we looked more threatening and contained them better than the last time we played them at home.

I thought the defence and defensive midfielders broke up the play well and were often first to the loose ball.
Bruno and Buckley combined well and Barnes did well too.
Upson is a very efficient defender and as such, maybe does not look good when he actually is.
Crofts was good and JFC was too in patches.

All in all, I thought it was a decent team performance, nothing like as bad as I thought it would be having read NSC for the last few weeks. Other than the missing playewrs back (Ulloa and Orlandi in particular), confidence and belief are the two things we need to move on, I would say.

 

[Gwylan]

Kuzsczak - 7 Solid enough, not much to do
Bruno - 7 Nightmare first 15 mins when he kept giving the ball away, settled down and was attacking threat but still had couple of wobbles
Greer - 5 Misplaced passes galore and nearly gave goal away
Upson - 7 Solid enough
Ward - 7 Looked good tonight, went forward well
Andrews - 6 Seen him better
JFC - 7 Showed some neat touches
Crofts - 8 He's been excellent this season and he put in another great all-round performance
Buckley - 7 Frustrating player, moments of brilliance and then will squander great opportunities
Conway - 5 Showed some good touches but far too ineffective
Barnes - 8 MoM for me. Worked his cock off, took some knocks uncomplainingly and made some great lay-offs

Subs
Lita - 6 - Doesn't look fully fit but provides another option, Barnes looked happier when he came on
Calde - n/a - Wasn't really on long enough to mark

 

[Jesus Gul]

Upson should get marked up for playing in classic Adidas World Cups in the age of silly lumo boots. (as spotted on the Beeb website's report)

 

[DavidinSouthampton]

Can't believe some of these ratings. 5s and 6s? We just drew with one of the best teams in the Championship with half a side missing. Every single player worked their nuts off. Nobody had a 'poor' game overall and several excelled. So glad I'm in the WSU now where you can really appreciate what goes on. The movement was excellent for the first half an hour or so and the odd misplaced pass in midfield only came from trying to play fast one touch football. A couple of worrying ones at the back but that settled down. The one big shocker was the dodgy start to the second half - otherwise, superb team performance that shows loads of promise once we slot in 3 or 4 of our most gifted players.

I agree, especially after getting home and seeing some of it from the recording off the telly as well. It says something that the opposition goalkeeper was Skybet man of the match.

 

[Pintos]

kuszczak 6
bruno 6
greer 6
upson 7
ward 7
andrews 7
crofts 8
jfc 6
conway 7
barnes 8
buckley 8

lita 6
calde n/a

 

[Brighton Mod]

Can't believe some of these ratings. 5s and 6s? We just drew with one of the best teams in the Championship with half a side missing. Every single player worked their nuts off. Nobody had a 'poor' game overall and several excelled. So glad I'm in the WSU now where you can really appreciate what goes on. The movement was excellent for the first half an hour or so and the odd misplaced pass in midfield only came from trying to play fast one touch football. A couple of worrying ones at the back but that settled down. The one big shocker was the dodgy start to the second half - otherwise, superb team performance that shows loads of promise once we slot in 3 or 4 of our most gifted players.

I agree with the sentiment, can't understand why some are being so hard on the players. Thought they worked hard last night and deserved at least the draw, must come out more motivated after the break, thats twice now. I am happy with the performance.

 

[JTR938]

Kuzsczak - 6

Bruno - 3.5
Greer - 5 Should of cleared that ball alot quicker!
Upson - 7
Ward - 6

Andrews - 6.5
JFC - 5
Crofts - 7

Buckley - 8
Conway - 4
Barnes - 6 first half 8 second

 

[One Love]

Marked that an average performance and what we should expect from a player is a 5.

Kusczack 7.5
Bruno 5.5
Greer 5 Just clear it. Really got away with that goal line mess.
Upson 5.5
Ward 7.5 Made one amazing last ditch tackle that saved a goal. Really is putting his heart and soul in the game.
Andrews 5
JFC 7 Much better. More forward looking and not just passing backwards.
Crofts 7. Nearly won it for us.
Buckley 8 I love the guys who don't see what he does but at halftime they highlighted how dangerous he was on Sky. Second half he petered out but why oh why is he moving inside towards the latter part of the game? Without him we would have nothing going forward at the moment.
Conway 4.5
Barnes 6

Lita 5
Calderon 5

Once again we are vulnerable after the break at half-time. I reckon it's been noticed by the opposition.

Every time we have a corner, if the ball is cleared to the edge of the box, we never have anyone there to take advantage.

The stereo-typical "We scored too early" I think helped us. If I was a Watford fan I would have wanted the team to finish us off with a second instead they let us dominate possession. Only coming alive when we scored.

 

[strings]

I don't get the low scores for Bruno. Other than the near penalty, he had a good game.

I watched the match on TV, and it looked like he was on a one-man mission to get sent off before half time. He seemed to calm in the second half, although did very nearly give a penalty away.

 

[Thunder Bolt]

Kusczack 7
Bruno 6
Greer 6
Upson 6
Ward 7
Andrews 5
JFC 6
Crofts 7
Buckley 8
Conway 6
Barnes 6

 

[symyjym]

I would say that we looked more threatening and contained them better than the last time we played them at home.

I thought the defence and defensive midfielders broke up the play well and were often first to the loose ball.
Bruno and Buckley combined well and Barnes did well too.
Upson is a very efficient defender and as such, maybe does not look good when he actually is.
Crofts was good and JFC was too in patches.

All in all, I thought it was a decent team performance, nothing like as bad as I thought it would be having read NSC for the last few weeks. Other than the missing playewrs back (Ulloa and Orlandi in particular), confidence and belief are the two things we need to move on, I would say.

Completely agree, it was a highly entertaining game. To go one down after a cruel deflection after 4 mins we did a fantastic job, scored a great goal, created lots of opportunities and broke down Watford's attacks time after time.

Absolutely no complaints from me and more of the same please.

The biggest disappointment has been the performance on here by the forever disgruntled plenty.

 

[Marshy]

Kuszczak - 6
Bruno - 6 -
Greer - 6 -
Upson - 7
Ward - 7
JFC - 6
Andrews - 6
Crofts - 6
Conway - 6
Buckley - 8 -
Barnes - 7

 

[symyjym]

kuszczak 6
bruno 6
greer 6
upson 7
ward 7
andrews 7
crofts 8
jfc 6
conway 7
barnes 8
buckley 8

lita 6
calde n/a

That's a fair player rating without any bias or predisposed judgment.

 

[symyjym]

Kuszczak - 6
Bruno - 6 -
Greer - 6 -
Upson - 7
Ward - 7
JFC - 6
Andrews - 6
Crofts - 6
Conway - 6
Buckley - 8 -
Barnes - 7

This is also fair

 

[symyjym]

Kuzsczak - 7 Solid enough, not much to do
Bruno - 7 Nightmare first 15 mins when he kept giving the ball away, settled down and was attacking threat but still had couple of wobbles
Greer - 5 Misplaced passes galore and nearly gave goal away
Upson - 7 Solid enough
Ward - 7 Looked good tonight, went forward well
Andrews - 6 Seen him better
JFC - 7 Showed some neat touches
Crofts - 8 He's been excellent this season and he put in another great all-round performance
Buckley - 7 Frustrating player, moments of brilliance and then will squander great opportunities
Conway - 5 Showed some good touches but far too ineffective
Barnes - 8 MoM for me. Worked his cock off, took some knocks uncomplainingly and made some great lay-offs

Subs
Lita - 6 - Doesn't look fully fit but provides another option, Barnes looked happier when he came on
Calde - n/a - Wasn't really on long enough to mark

Also a fair and honest assessment

 

[Greavsey]

Agree with most of the comments on here, but a couple of points that stood out for me:

Pros:
Buckley - started to look like something approaching his better form, when he can be unstoppable. Love watching him when on form, so very exciting news.
Entertaining game - have really enjoyed the last couple of home games, which is strange when one was a 3-1 defeat and the other a "fortunate" draw. Didn't realise quite how methodical our play was under Gustavo until now.

Neutral:
Bruno - scary liability. Positive force. A high risk player, and can see why he is being played in order to offer an attacking threat while we are depleted of creativity, but a couple of times he was just strolling back from attacking positions while Watford flooded forward against an out manned defence.


Cons:
Dreadful corners - a continuation from last season in my opinion, when will we have a centre half who actually looks to attack the ball!?
Andrews - seems to be getting some average marks, but personally I thought he was way below average. Giving the ball away, tackling his own team and painfully slooooow. He had a good few games initially in the Bridders role, but think his age is suddenly showing. Great news that Liam is nearly ready for a return he will make a world of difference to us.

 

[crodonilson]

Kuzsczak - 8 No chance with their lucky goal, did everything else impressively
Bruno - 7 Great attacking outlet after half time, solid enough at the back
Greer - 7 Shaky at times but came through against a classy Watford front line
Upson - 8 A collosus
Ward - 8 Really strong attacking outlet, did little if anything wrong, always solid in possession and didn't let the freak deflection for their goal get to him
Andrews - 8 Always showing for the ball, keeps us ticking, so under-rated a real quality performer at this level, like a Rolls Royce
JFC - 7 Showed some neat touches
Crofts -8 Top drawer display, great finish
Buckley - 7 Watford were bricking it every time he ran at them, didn't always pick the right ball but so much energy and trickery
Conway -6 Plenty of effort, slightly dissapointing end product
Barnes - 9 Heroic display up-front leading the line, a fine performance
Subs
Lita - 7 PL class in abundance, more to come
Calde - 7 Some nice touches

 

[One Love]

Buckley 5 - To win the ball off buckley all you have to do is run across his path and he'll give it to you. I don't see how he made man of the match.

Maybe because he contributed towards the 4 biggest goal-scoring chances in the match apart from the goal.

He crossed for Barnes to have a free-header 6 yds out.
He crossed for Conway to miss a big headed chance
He crossed for the goal mouth scramble
He laid the ball back for Crofts to bring a good save form Almunia.

Give him a 5 though.

 

[Acker79]

Maybe because he contributed towards the 4 biggest goal-scoring chances in the match apart from the goal.

He crossed for Barnes to have a free-header 6 yds out.
He crossed for Conway to miss a big headed chance
He crossed for the goal mouth scramble
He laid the ball back for Crofts to bring a good save form Almunia.

Give him a 5 though.

He ran down the channel and when trying to pass to an overlapping bruno hit it straight at a watford defender
He ran down the line headed into the box got distracted b the watford player running across him and hit the ball too far in front of him gifting it to the watford player
He came back to defend then just stood there and let the watford player run past him.
He "chased back" at a canter behind the watford player
He got the ball in the corner and tried to pass it to a team mate but hit the watford defender again.

By all means highlight that I gave him the same rating as 8 of his teammates.

 

[One Love]

He ran down the channel and when trying to pass to an overlapping bruno hit it straight at a watford defender
He ran down the line headed into the box got distracted b the watford player running across him and hit the ball too far in front of him gifting it to the watford player
He came back to defend then just stood there and let the watford player run past him.
He "chased back" at a canter behind the watford player
He got the ball in the corner and tried to pass it to a team mate but hit the watford defender again.

By all means highlight that I gave him the same rating as 8 of his teammates.

I give up. You are either choosing to save face and not admit you're wrong. Or you're stupid.