Went along to Millwall yesterday for my occasional day job, taking a Milwall fan back to the New Den who'd been unable to go for the last three months due to illness.
Stockport kept Millwall deep with ease for the first fifteen mins of both half, before utterly appalling og's were scored. Difference being Millwall actually had limited players who could be bothered to put themselves about in both phases when they were on top and when they were struggling.
I hadn't see Liam Trotter since Scunny last season, and the boy was utter quality. Big, strong, positionally solid and was able to pass to a team-mate or turn away from trouble it just made me lament the talented but positionally inept and 50-50 dodgers in our midfield - apart from Bailey. Put Bailey and Trotter together and you'd have an excellent champ cm let alone league one cm. Parky has managed to to acquire one player this season who's been positionally effective - Dailly - great shame we weren't sniffing around Trotter.
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Millwall were never struggling and their "limited players" did ok. I think the 22 (count 'em) chances tells the story. It was the sort of game that once the first went in you knew more would follow.
Stockport did however manage more shots on target than Charlton and Leeds put together. In fact they had more open-play shots on target than Charlton had in two games versus Millwall this year.
Trotter is doing well now he is fit. Played well yesterday.
And what a fine job he did with painting those railings.....
Always enjoy your analysis CT, don't really know anything about Trotter
You said we were missing a certain type of player in midfield months ago and more recently I've seen what you meant. What sort of midfielder is he, I mean would he replace Semedo but add a bit more going forward, or would he purely free up Bailey to get forward?
How did he compare to Keith Keane? Would you still like us to go for him now you've seen Trotter?
The crowd is very much divided on him, as too often he looks very very lazy. But he does get things done. He is a lump (he looks like Tom Huddlestone build etc), and wins almost every centre midfield header and uses his strength to win the ball. He also rarely gives the ball away and can pick out some incisive passes.
Would still like to see him be a little more mobile but him & Jimmy Abdou are doing a good job.
Still love the way Charlton fans call our players 'limited' and think we are in joint second purely through hard work & physicallity! The arrogance is very amusing.
I would say most League 1 players are 'limited' in as much as a majority of them has a weakness. This is harder to spot as you go up the leagues. It's not the same as saying your players are poor, which is quite evidently not true.
With our players weaknesses they're limited themselves, though we have some fans that like to blame their performances entirely on Parky and believe we have a top 6 Championship midfield. Not sure that's arrogance, more not realising the gaps not as big between us and a lot the league as they hoped/expected it to be.
It's something that affects most teams who come down, think they will walk the league and due to your recent 'success' (premier league etc) a lot of your fans probably feel you don't belong at this level, that you're too good for it and this season would be a walk in the park.
What fans forget though is the reasons why a team got relegated in the first place and what their weaknesses are and they start to become apparent over the course of a season which is happening now.
This league is pretty tight, the league above is even tighter, not much to choose between a lot of teams. Norwich, us & yourselves could go up this year and mount a play off challenge next year. Alternatively we could both miss out on promotion, lose a few players, and be looking at relegation to the 4th division next year!
It's a very fine line, most teams are much of a muchness, a lot comes down to team spirit, determination etc, something that Leeds keep lacking each year!
Watch your spelling etc Scoham; Little Lion will pounce on you for it (GRRRRRR)......when he's not on a Millwall site that is.
It's something that affects most teams who come down, think they will walk the league and due to your recent 'success' (premier league etc) a lot of your fans probably feel you don't belong at this level, that you're too good for it and this season would be a walk in the park.[quote]
SLL....meet OohaahMortimer.
In reality, stay with me chaps, it's simply not true. Yes Millwall work harder and have better team spirit than most in this league, but they also have more ability.
The back four are among the steadiest around at the level at present (last season's POTY is now 3rd/4th choice). We do havea hard-working, holding centre midfield, Abdou and recently Trotter (who is improving with every game it seems), this enables us to attack in numbers or with out and out wingers. And we have goalscores (once again), Harris just turns into a different player when he pulls on a Millwall shirt, hard to explain, just think of Gary Nelson, but with ability, and it looks like Morison has a bright future despite getting his break relatively late.
As you know, you don't get a +28 GD by hard work and grinding out results. It's mentioned above that hard work and team spirit are important factors in getting out his division, this is true but you also need a goalscorer. In such a compressed league with many tight games these players can win you games you had no real right to - which is exactly why leads are 2nd, for the time being of course.
From what I've seen this season there is just one Charlton player who would get in the Millwall side, or be looked at (by bigger clubs) if you fail to go up - Bailey. Vice-versa I expect there to be more than one name?
I think it's too lazy to blame two things; hard work and team spirit. It's also about being simply good enough, once you are you then need a manager to bring out the aforementioned attributes.
No idea about this Racon fella though, didn't notice him in our two games and seems to divide opinion on here a little.
Bailey is one of the best I have seen in this league.
daos - yep, fair enough.
Morrison is incredibly limited, I can't believe people don't just man mark him, with his lumbering brain freeze play if someone goes tight on him. I'm not arguing we have better, but without Harris' movement in the first half Morrison mobilised like the Maginot line. I was very impressed by Harris, whilst being quite impressed by Hackett and Schofield. Having seen Schofield before, I'm well aware how limited he is, but when up against Stockport's loose full back/midfield unit they were willing to go outside and inbetween lines. Something our wingers rarely want to do.
As soon as Stockport scored an OG you could see it'd be a bagfull. Stockport were to eager to play a bit stretched out and higher up the pitch, as soon as the confidence went Schofield and Hackett were able to push up with single cover on them. Trotter held everything together nicely, whilst Abdou was able to break a little more because of that.
If it's one thing we've missed for years it's a reliable screen in front of defence, that breaks things down and passes it forwards effectively getting things going again. I wouldn't underestimate how important that is, if Trotter plays like that week in week out. He does move about and look like Huddlestone, but unlike Huddlestone he plays tight on his position/role; whereas Huddlestone has to go loose for space as his only effect is glory-balls, and is always that little bit late getting there to even bother make a strong tackle. I hope Trotter stays with Millwall if they go up, otherwise yes from what I saw he'll be a vast improvement on what we have and on Keith Keane. We need height and someone else other than Bailey who's willing to back himself in a 50-50.
Yes Millwall were far superior than us, both in footballing and commitment terms. I really don't know what Parky is talking about spending money and getting a side, as their first 11 looks far better than anything we've put out in two seasons.
Hilarious
No One Knows Us.....
You slag
Sam on his day is one of the best wingers in the league, but he's very inconsistent and lacks a bit of belief/drive, because of that there are probably more effective right wingers in the league who just play to their ability more often.
Although to be fair, your innane contributions are short, whereas I ramble unlimited amounts of boredom inducing drivel.
A debate about which Charlton players will make it into Millwall's team when they get promoted ? No I don't have anything to add to that.
You can have all of them.
i stand by the fact we don't belong at this poor level, (one season in the previous 34 at this level and 81 seasons of english league football average finishing position of 30th as opposed to millwalls 45th proof that this isn't where we usually dine) but i also acknowledge that we are tosh hence we are at this level and i have to converse with millwall fans about football...
i think you'll find i never expected us to go back up or walk this league and know that our prestigious history wont win us promotion , just like leeds' wont ... but i'm not gonna deny our heritage and pretend it never happened , i'm just thankful we had the glory years !
Pretty much what I thought. I assume Palace rank just a few places above you though? & will start to slip lower....
I know you nearly made Europe once in recent years, but with United winning the cup it mean the FA Cup runners-up got that spot - ridiculous rules in my opinion.
That old chestnut. I notice you never roll out the head-to-head stat. Why? I suppose because it's as irrelevant as that stated above.
PL54 doesn't really get going until he's bought up something about a smashed toilet. He's done well to resist thus far.
As for the football.................Jackett out!
spending 7 consecutive years in the top flight with a host of internationals playing for us including England Internationals who made their debut whilst wearing the colours of our club , these are glory years in my eyes.....
and yes you are are our bogey team FACT
My football team brings all my worth to the yard, and I'm like we're better than yours and we're like... oh I'll just have a fooking milkshake.
That actually made me laugh out loud. I'd say 'lol', but men who write 'lol' really need a bit of a chat with themselves.