Players make individual mistakes, it happens (particularly at this level), and sometimes those mistakes cost games (like tonight).
What’s more concerning to me though is the level of performance seems to have dipped in the last two games. Or had it just simply spiked in the three before it?
Whatever it is, knowing the level of performance that is achievable and not hitting that’s level consistently is increasingly disappointing.
Big game Saturday now.
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Did we will those first 3 games under Bowyer because there was a radical change from the slow 4-5-1 under Robinson? It's hard to say really.
I think one or two people need to have a look in the mirror and ask themselves if they earned their wages tonight.
This is the first real test of Bowyer as an aspiring manager - he needs to be brave enough to make some changes (which the previous encumbent was unwilling to do) and have some very serious conversations with a few of the players who were out there tonight.
We all have bad days at the office but for this group of players that has happened one too many times this season and they can't hide behind and blame KR this time.
As to the why, I do think teams make it hard to play at this level. And the physical nature of individual games, let alone a season, must take their toll. I don't know, I wish I knew, but we looked unrecognizable to the team from two weeks ago, but completely consistent with the one a month ago.
Seems to me that Saturday is a big game. Because it's looking like it's the penultimate home game before RD decides which players he flogs in the Summer and which if the U23s gets promoted to replace them.
I've not felt this bleak for a long time.
So I’m not surprised about tonight’s result, we have got a tough run, I’m not sure whether this group of players collectively have got the mental strength to get over the line?
Maybe I’m being a bit harsh, but always thought it would be one heck of an achievement to go up this season.
We can’t just give up though, players need to get the fans back on board again.
I think our players ARE collectively / potentially good enough to be successful at this level
But what goes up must come back down to original level.
There are lots of reasons why it didn't click tonight, and it's likely a combination of all those things that lead to the utter shambles we all witnessed tonight. I think it's likely the reason we saw the team we did is because Bowyer is looking at the Scunthorpe game and the need to keep them below us, and he probably underestimated the fight that AFC would up. He was saving players. I think it's also why Reeves came off early and Kaikai despite his complete lack of any use, managed to get a few more minutes. I expect to see a full strength squad out there on Saturday and hopefully the players will have the same attitude they had in Bowyer's first three games in charge, as opposed to his last two.
Look, Wimbledon are a tough, physical side set up to sit deep, hit teams on the counter, and generally make life miserable for the opposition. They don't concede many, in fact they've conceded few than us despite being 14 places lower.
This is the type of team I would have expected us to struggle against going in to this season. And if this were the exception rather than the mean, you could say "bad day at the office against a team of well drilled cloggers." But we've had this exact type of performance against various teams, in various conditions, with different personnel in different formations. And to me, someone sat here in their living room, it looks like we do a lot of the basics wrong--not enough movement off the ball, not looking to play triangles, getting too far apart in possession, struggling to build from our center backs. It's hard to play the kind of football we play, Inter Milan versus Barcelona over two legs in the Champions League a few years back springs to mind. But it's not like we're creating chances and not taking them, or even having moves break down in the final third, we can't even get there.
We've played Wimbledon three times this season and avoided defeat only once. Bit we've flogged the player who scored in the win.
Much as I would love for us next season to be playing teams like Southampton or Stoke who are currently in the Prem, it's clear that we are not good enough to beat teams who are close to be playing in League 2 next season.
So that's the reason I don't think the players can't be blamed. They're simply not very good.
Maybe our expectations were too high, after all he inherited the detritus left from our worst RD era manager.
Grateful that he has at least given us a sniff of the play-offs as we were going in the opposite direction before Oxford came to our rescue.
And before anyone says Shrewsbury they've had a very special season that I'd imagine will be a bit of a one of for then. Sometimes that happens
They all know they will be returning to their parent clubs in a few weeks time so they don't have the same urgency at this time.of the season as players who are fighting for their future at the club.
I know Da silva has played well this season and at times Mavadidi has too.
But if possible next season I would like to have more permanent signings and only a couple of loanees.
No surprise that on the poorer pitches where you need to win ugly, the loan players don’t want to play ugly, physical football putting themselves at a greater risk of injury and we don’t perform as a team.
I think 1 or 2 outfield loanees is the maximum we should have on the field at any time.
Team wins three matches under Bowyer's leadership.
Club puts out a message that he's got the gig until the end of the season.
Team doesn't win again.
It's quite elementary my dear Watson; Duchatalet is sheer poison. We'll never enjoy positive consistency all the time he owns us. Time to step up the pressure. Forget about play-off dreams; if it happens, it happens but the real prize is getting Roly to sell.
On our day we're good enough but anyone from Rotherham to Scunthorpe can say that. I imagine we all have similar weaknesses such as not having enough goalscorers, relying on our better players etc.
If we do go up this squad would need a lot of investment to stay up in the Championship.
Everyone predicted that we'd lose one or two and to do that you usually need to have a poor performance... Would much prefer to have lost one of the last two than one of the six pointers that are coming up.
Dont think we're missing Fosu as much as people are thinking
It was 0-0 when he went off against Rotherham and we coped well without him