Astra - Home - Thursday 25th August - Europa League 2nd Leg

Lukerz

I don't have a problem with Calleri. He'll score some goals. Gets into good positions, chances come his way. Just needs that bit of luck/confidence to bury one.

The issue is we've just stuck him right in at the deep end in a make or break knock-out game, and relied on him to get us through. That's not fair on him. Personally wouldn't have subbed him.

Just so disappointed with the intensity of the performance, especially first half, because it's been a theme in all three of our opening games. We got away with it v Bournemouth but we could easily be sitting here come Monday with 1 point from 3 league games and out of Europe. As it is we nabbed the three points so we will be able to avoid that level of negativity.

The front three tonight didn't deliver, and that is what we needed to happen. Anybody from Antonio, Tore, Calleri, Fletcher or Valencia needed to grab the game by the scruff. The defence weren't tested and the midfield did what they did. But with no link between the middle three and front three, and no stand-out performance from the attacking lads, we had no chance and in the end relied on Sam style desperation footie, praying for a break.

I just hope this lack of intensity is not due to the first XI being no better than last season. Players get complacent and sloppy mentally. They need quality, first XI players coming in to keep them on their toes, not squad members.

WHU_Champo_league_in_7_years

What I don't get is the hypocrisy of the criticism

G&S should've brought in a striker thats better than the ones we got......but they wasted too much time on strikers that are...wait for it....better than what we got

G&S should've stumped up the cash and overspend to get deals over the line....but when they do players reject us....and the one we get is "overpriced"

G&S haven't given us a big enough squad.....but they've spent too much on squad depth players

G&S are all talk......even when clubs have confirmed our bids and speaking to these top calibre players

G&S need to get rid of some of the fringe players.....but get abused when they get rid of our 4th choice CB ..... and how they should be at fault because sakho failed a medical

OldCastleSwift

Antonio, Tore, Calleri, Fletcher and Valencia.

Had it not been for injuries that could have read Feghouli, Payet, Carroll, Ayew and Lanzini.

SuzanneClaret

Well that was really rather appalling.

The problem with my really good view was that I had a really good view.

WHU_Champo_league_in_7_years

Feel one of the biggest misses of tonight was no Masuaka

I really like Burke and think while he got caught out think the brunt of the blame should fall on byram who ran for too long and then made a poor cross field ball, but he got in some good positions on the left but had to cut back and slow the game down, whereas Masuaka could've put a lot of prssure on their back line and could've got to th byline which we didn't do all game

With a right footed left winger in Antonio we needed a overlapping full back to add balance and missed that and had cresswell or Masuaka played think the whole team would've clicked better

thornburyiron

pity nobody was standing in front of you Suze

Lukerz

Champo - do you not feel slightly underwhelmed by our business?

I do.

Maybe I'm wrong or/and I expected too much? Maybe?

But after last season, the football we played, the success, the new stadium, Europe...

I just felt we'd really have a go in this market and I just don't feel we have.

And what we saw tonight was a result of that. Everybody gets injuries.

DawudMarsh

Fletcher should have been on earlier.

DawudMarsh

Or even started.

SuzanneClaret

thornburyiron said:

pity nobody was standing in front of you Suze

Truedat

Jorderz_Moyes_will_be_Moyes

WHU_Champo_league_in_7_years said:

What I don't get is the hypocrisy of the criticism

G&S should've brought in a striker thats better than the ones we got......but they wasted too much time on strikers that are...wait for it....better than what we got

G&S should've stumped up the cash and overspend to get deals over the line....but when they do players reject us....and the one we get is "overpriced"

G&S haven't given us a big enough squad.....but they've spent too much on squad depth players

G&S are all talk......even when clubs have confirmed our bids and speaking to these top calibre players

G&S need to get rid of some of the fringe players.....but get abused when they get rid of our 4th choice CB ..... and how they should be at fault because sakho failed a medical

Spot on IMO ;ok

WHU_Champo_league_in_7_years

Slaven_A_Laugh_Lukerz said:

Champo - do you not feel slightly underwhelmed by our business?

I do.

Maybe I'm wrong or/and I expected too much? Maybe?

But after last season, the football we played, the success, the new stadium, Europe...

I just felt we'd really have a go in this market and I just don't feel we have.

And what we saw tonight was a result of that. Everybody gets injuries.

Yes I am underwhelmed, but because I had unrealistic expectations I put on us

What I don't like is the attack on the owners

We've tried what we could, but we are west ham and have a budget and we just can't attract Lacazette, Batshuyai, Bacca etc because we are where we are

The owners have had a go and it's backfired as they didn't give up the "marquee" hunt sooner but if we get zaza i'll be pleased

A lot of our business was going to be reliant on sales the board expected of Valencia and Sakho and we could've recouped £25mil but both fell apart

I can't blame them that Ayew and feghouli, 2 of our biggest names we got in, got injured and I was happy with the signings of Masuaka, Fletcher, Tore and Nordveit

We are west ham, when we lost the quartet of Payet, Lanzini, Sakho and Carroll we went 7 games without a win and looked awful
Now we are missing them 4 as well as Cresswell, Feghouli & Ayew and again we look poor so isn't a surprise to me

A lot went wrong today but we were shocking last Europa league (when we had no injuries) and went on to finish 7th so gonna try keep the faith

Lukerz

It would be spot on if it were true. Especially if somebody shared all the points you make Champo. But nobody has said all those things at once.

Yes they went after big name strikers. What do they want? A medal? A pat on the back? Good effort?

They haven't delivered. Bottom line.

Jorderz_Moyes_will_be_Moyes

What have they done so wrong in your opinion, out of interest?

Or rather, what should they have done so differently?

OutcastLondoner

I hope we see more of Fletcher during this season. He looks great.

WHU_Champo_league_in_7_years

You'd be surprised most of the things I've heard have come from the same people

They got us Ayew and Calleri, one got injured and one has only just got back from the olympics

Now you are gonna tell me they aren't the calibre we need etc and then it comes back to the point where they are getting abuse for not landing the big name striker then if they didn't get Ayew or Calleri we would be left with....no one then you'd get mad at them for not even getting a normal striker

ASLEFshrugged

We were rubbish

MarkNobleLocalHero

Nice stadium though.
;hmm All fur coat and no knickers

imagelost

WHU_Champo_league_in_7_years said:

2 games into the season and you'd think we are going to get relegated

4games

SuzanneClaret

OutcastLondoner said:

I hope we see more of Fletcher during this season. He looks great.

The only good thing about tonight.

Oh and the Maltesers, I had a bag of Maltesers.

WHU_Champo_league_in_7_years

imagelost said:

WHU_Champo_league_in_7_years said:

2 games into the season and you'd think we are going to get relegated

;doh

4games ;doh

See forgotten about the Europa league already

;cool

CleverTrevor

There is good news - we get Saturday football back!!!

Clactonite

Yes we were really poor and deserved everything that we got but if that's the standard of refereeing in the Europa league plus with the play acting and time wasting, I'm quite glad we're out of it as don't think my blood pressure could take it!

claretandbluesky

As much as I really would have liked to get through my instinct says we dodged a bullet. We are not ready to compete in the Europa league as tonight proved, the reason being we have (when fit) a very decent first eleven but our squad has no quality in depth and as we could not expect Payet and the others to play Thursday and Sunday's we would need enough squad players to take points from the Europa group stage, and what tonight proved is that we don't have that. There are a lot better teams than Astra in that draw tomorrow, in fact Astra will likely be eliminated comfortably at the group stage. I think it may have been better to find out now rather than play 6 more matches and affect our Premiership matches just to be knocked out as Astra will likely be.

I also think our recruitment has been a shambles this summer, lots of cheapo bargains and no make things happen players, we tried do it on the cheap in my view. Nordvelt, Tore, Calleri are bringing very little and to still need play Valencia tells you that whether it be for want of trying or bad luck if you were in charge of recruitment this summer, you didn't make it happen. If you ask why did we not beat Astra it was the same reason we didn't threaten Chelsea, and got out of jail late against a terribly poor Bournmouth, we have no attacking force which carries any threat, we all knew this at the end of last season and it should not still be the case entering September.

tomkinsworldclass

Super disappointing performance and result. Needed more players to take individual responsibility for themselves, kept trying the same things over and over again. Pretty underwhelmed by Calleri and Tore; not really sure what Calleri brings to the the team (hopefully im wrong), whilst Tore has to be more adaptable/intelligent, too often he goes short or wants it to feet. Very frustrating night. The only real positive was Ashley Fletcher who was excellent when he came on and showed the qualities that the others were lacking; based on Astra+Bournemouth, Fletcher looks a much better asset than Calleri.

DawudMarsh

tomkinsworldclass said:

Super disappointing performance and result. Needed more players to take individual responsibility for themselves, kept trying the same things over and over again. Pretty underwhelmed by Calleri and Tore; not really sure what Calleri brings to the the team (hopefully im wrong), whilst Tore has to be more adaptable/intelligent, too often he goes short or wants it to feet. Very frustrating night. The only real positive was Ashley Fletcher who was excellent when he came on and showed the qualities that the others were lacking; based on Astra+Bournemouth, Fletcher looks a much better asset than Calleri.

Agree with you about Fletcher, I was wondering why he didn't come on much earlier.

Tore - just can't seem to get his foot under the ball to get a decent cross in at times - he reminds me of Faubert.

Slaven_Cups_His_Beard

Slaven_A_Laugh_Lukerz said:

Champo - do you not feel slightly underwhelmed by our business?

I do.

Maybe I'm wrong or/and I expected too much? Maybe?

But after last season, the football we played, the success, the new stadium, Europe...

I just felt we'd really have a go in this market and I just don't feel we have.

And what we saw tonight was a result of that. Everybody gets injuries.

No if I'm being honest. What they did get wrong was they didn't go big or early as Slav asked them and this is the result. Anyone with one eye on the finances would knows we weren't about to spend 50-100m yet.

If we get Zaza we're at 55m net which seems a long way from Sam Baldock and John Carew.

Sullivan opening his mouth has caused most of this but they have still backed the manager to the hilt

We will be fine, teams get injuries but not many get 9 players unavailable at once and their most creative ones

;ok

Slaven_Cups_His_Beard

Underwhelmed the new word

File it somewhere with marquee

Slaven_Cups_His_Beard

Slaven_A_Laugh_Lukerz said:

It would be spot on if it were true. Especially if somebody shared all the points you make Champo. But nobody has said all those things at once.

Yes they went after big name strikers. What do they want? A medal? A pat on the back? Good effort?

They haven't delivered. Bottom line.

And Payet is still here, you're worried I can tell

;biggrin

EXETERHAMMER

Didn't see or hear any of the game, just the result. Not good enough to lose at home to this lot. I am now worried as we have a lot of players expecting games, but not enough games for them all to play in. I think Bilic mentioned something along those lines when questioned about more signings.