S25/26 | The Official Match Thread | Sheff Utd 3 Swansea City 3 | Att: 26,457 | 03.04.26 | The EFL Championship | Bramall Lane

[jackharris]

 

[Swans Jack]

Considering the time he had out. He showed a lot of intention and looked like he wanted to kick on since his Wrexham goal. Cullen should take note.

 

[eteb]

Inoussa to come back next year too. Like what I've seen from him and will be better under matos

 

[Cinio Dydd Sul]

Great to come back after being 2 down.

But some perspective needed. Some of the hyperbolic posts on here are pretty wild.

We drew with the team 17th in the championship. We are 16th.

If this is 'head n shoulders' and 'best in class' it shows how much we have fallen as a club.

In so many ways.....

 

[Frankie Burrows Cap]

Great to come back after being 2 down.

But some perspective needed. Some of the hyperbolic posts on here are pretty wild.

We drew with the team 17th in the championship. We are 16th.

If this is 'head n shoulders' and 'best in class' it shows how much we have fallen as a club.

In so many ways.....

Agree about having perspective but football supporting generally isn’t like that. It’s always feast or famine!

3 points between 9th and 16th and very little to choose between any of those teams. I’d throw Sheffield United in that group and we could easily finish in any of those places by the start of May.

Personally, i don’t think we’re far away from Derby, Hull and Wrexham either, but all 3 of those seem to have quite a few players who’ve chipped in with 5+ goals (the stats might say I’ve made that up but they don’t seem as reliant on 1 player as we’ve been).

We’d all like to see us stop conceding silly goals and bring in a top quality centre half, but looking at the league table what we need to push into that top 8 is finding a way to score 10-15 more goals from elsewhere in the squad.

 

[Menston4128]

Back from the game and not gone through the posts but here's my take on the game.

Firstly I really enjoyed the game and a draw was a fair result.

I thought the Swansea started really well and controlled the ball really well in the early stages, Widdell seemed a real threat down the left and was linking well with Tymon and Yalcouye. Then pretty much against the run of play the defence gave Hamer all the time in the world to stride forward and score with a decent enough strike on goal.

The Burgess seemed to lose all focus and started giving the ball away and was at sixes and sevens for the rest of the half.

Good response though and well taken penalty making the score 1-1 at the half which was pretty fair.

Both teams were poor to start the 2nd half, but Swansea fashioned a great chance for Widdell (which he should have buried) that was somehow cleared off the line and Sheffield promptly went straight down the other end and scored within about 10-15 seconds.

Then Tom Cannon scored with a great strike and I thought it was all over.

10 mins or so later Matos then brings on Idah and Fulton. This didn't particulary fill me with confidence as I have been a big critic of Idah and whilst Viptonik had been largely ineffective, I just didn't have any faith in Idah (wasn't worried about Fulton as I thought Stamenic had been poor today).

How wrong was I, Idah was fantastic and whilst it was only a 20 minute cameo if he can produce like that then I will be eating a full portion of humble pie.

A few points of note,

The subs today were excellent (apart from Cullen who didn't do much and I would have liked to have seen Walta rather than him) so kudos to Matos for that.

The starting XI started well but lacked a cutting edge with Ronald again being the main culprit. The midfield missed Galbraith and whilst Franco and Yalcouye were full of running they lack the final pass. Stamenic was dissappointing and just failed to drive the team forward.

Defence is a major worry, it's well documented but the CB's are not good enough (together) and will not propel this team to the playoffs. We need a ball playing athletic CB as Burgess is a liability although the last 20 mins or so he got his sh!t together and was great (but we can't afford the 40 odd min in the middle where he was plain awful). Obivously we need a RB and whilst Ward did OK today he's not the answer and he is still a better defender than Key.

Great cameos from Nunes, EOM and Fulton today.

Ronald has to make way, he would be behind Nunes, EOM, Widdell (and probally Key) if I were picking them team.

Now last but not least Idah, he was excellent today by far the best I have seen from him and if he has that level of performance in him and Matos can keep him producing like that then we will have two great options upfront (and on that showing Idah offers a lot more than Viptonik).

 

[TruckerJack]

The league is so tight that league position isn’t really the story. 3 points behind 9th so it all depends on the perspective you want to put on it.

 

[Pacemaker]

Back from the game and not gone through the posts but here's my take on the game.

Firstly I really enjoyed the game and a draw was a fair result.

I thought the Swansea started really well and controlled the ball really well in the early stages, Widdell seemed a real threat down the left and was linking well with Tymon and Yalcouye. Then pretty much against the run of play the defence gave Hamer all the time in the world to stride forward and score with a decent enough strike on goal.

The Burgess seemed to lose all focus and started giving the ball away and was at sixes and sevens for the rest of the half.

Good response though and well taken penalty making the score 1-1 at the half which was pretty fair.

Both teams were poor to start the 2nd half, but Swansea fashioned a great chance for Widdell (which he should have buried) that was somehow cleared off the line and Sheffield promptly went straight down the other end and scored within about 10-15 seconds.

Then Tom Cannon scored with a great strike and I thought it was all over.

10 mins or so later Matos then brings on Idah and Fulton. This didn't particulary fill me with confidence as I have been a big critic of Idah and whilst Viptonik had been largely ineffective, I just didn't have any faith in Idah (wasn't worried about Fulton as I thought Stamenic had been poor today).

How wrong was I, Idah was fantastic and whilst it was only a 20 minute cameo if he can produce like that then I will be eating a full portion of humble pie.

A few points of note,

The subs today were excellent (apart from Cullen who didn't do much and I would have liked to have seen Walta rather than him) so kudos to Matos for that.

The starting XI started well but lacked a cutting edge with Ronald again being the main culprit. The midfield missed Galbraith and whilst Franco and Yalcouye were full of running they lack the final pass. Stamenic was dissappointing and just failed to drive the team forward.

Defence is a major worry, it's well documented but the CB's are not good enough (together) and will not propel this team to the playoffs. We need a ball playing athletic CB as Burgess is a liability although the last 20 mins or so he got his sh!t together and was great (but we can't afford the 40 odd min in the middle where he was plain awful). Obivously we need a RB and whilst Ward did OK today he's not the answer and he is still a better defender than Key.

Great cameos from Nunes, EOM and Fulton today.

Ronald has to make way, he would be behind Nunes, EOM, Widdell (and probally Key) if I were picking them team.

Now last but not least Idah, he was excellent today by far the best I have seen from him and if he has that level of performance in him and Matos can keep him producing like that then we will have two great options upfront (and on that showing Idah offers a lot more than Viptonik).

Matos said post match that Cullens role was to close down Utd and keep a midfielder tied up tracking his runs which he was pleased with his efforts. When he said it i could see what he wanted to do and maybe goes to show the difference between a fans view and a coach or player.

 

[Frankie Burrows Cap]

The league is so tight that league position isn’t really the story. 3 points behind 9th so it all depends on the perspective you want to put on it.

Very true. Posted earlier that we could end up anywhere from 9th to 17th on 60-65 points.

Shouldn’t get carried away at either end of that, but need to be working hard on and off the field to identify how best to get an extra ~10 points & goals next season which would likely guarantee a top 8 playoff place.

 

[Pacemaker]

The players could easily have gone into beach mode, after Wrexham and Cov, but are still playing as if we could get into playoffs.

 

[Cinio Dydd Sul]

Agree about having perspective but football supporting generally isn’t like that. It’s always feast or famine!

3 points between 9th and 16th and very little to choose between any of those teams. I’d throw Sheffield United in that group and we could easily finish in any of those places by the start of May.

Personally, i don’t think we’re far away from Derby, Hull and Wrexham either, but all 3 of those seem to have quite a few players who’ve chipped in with 5+ goals (the stats might say I’ve made that up but they don’t seem as reliant on 1 player as we’ve been).

We’d all like to see us stop conceding silly goals and bring in a top quality centre half, but looking at the league table what we need to push into that top 8 is finding a way to score 10-15 more goals from elsewhere in the squad.

We aren't far, but every club in the congested mix will also be saying the same.

This playing well against good teams doesn't mean a lot unless we start scoring at opportune moments and stop conceding silly goals.

And we cant feel hard done by by being 16th, the table doesn't lie. We dont get a special caveat next to our name at 16th in the table saying 'only 3 points off top 10' or some other arbitrary target.

Matos has achieved his first goal of survival he (and the recruitment team) still has plenty of work to do to move onto the next landing out of lower midtable purgatory.

 

[Frankie Burrows Cap]

Matos said post match that Cullens role was to close down Utd and keep a midfielder tied up tracking his runs which he was pleased with his efforts. When he said it i could see what he wanted to do and maybe goes to show the difference between a fans view and a coach or player.

See also Craig Bellamy’s comments about him. Doesn’t mean that Cullen wasn’t poor against Bosnia and has been at times when starting this season for us.

When coming off the bench he usually does what is expected and prior to today, I think, had more goals from the bench that the rest of the squad combined this season.

 

[magicdaps10]

We aren't far, but every club in the congested mix will also be saying the same.

This playing well against good teams doesn't mean a lot unless we start scoring at opportune moments and stop conceding silly goals.

And we cant feel hard done by by being 16th, the table doesn't lie. We dont get a special caveat next to our name at 16th in the table saying 'only 3 points off top 10' or some other arbitrary target.

Matos has achieved his first goal of survival he (and the recruitment team) still has plenty of work to do to move onto the next landing out of lower midtable purgatory.

Lots to work on and positives to take from things also.
If we want to push on then we need to be upfront and honest about things. I have no doubt that Matos will be brutal in his assessments with the players and will learn a lot in these remaining games.

 

[Frankie Burrows Cap]

We aren't far, but every club in the congested mix will also be saying the same.

This playing well against good teams doesn't mean a lot unless we start scoring at opportune moments and stop conceding silly goals.

And we cant feel hard done by by being 16th, the table doesn't lie. We dont get a special caveat next to our name at 16th in the table saying 'only 3 points off top 10' or some other arbitrary target.

Matos has achieved his first goal of survival he (and the recruitment team) still has plenty of work to do to move onto the next landing out of lower midtable purgatory.

Agree that 16th shouldn’t come with a caveat and neither should 9th. You finish where you deserve to finish after 46 games.

My point was that the position shouldn’t alter the thinking/plan for the summer. I think most supporters and those inside the club know what we need, irrespective of how the next 6 games pan out.

Being able to deliver on that is why Gorringe, Worth, Matos et al are being paid what they are. I’ll judge that next May!

 

[Cinio Dydd Sul]

Lots to work on and positives to take from things also.
If we want to push on then we need to be upfront and honest about things. I have no doubt that Matos will be brutal in his assessments with the players and will learn a lot in these remaining games.

Hope so, and hope that also leads to abandoning players who wont be here next season / aren't good enough and giving as much playing time as possible to ones that should have a future here, Parker, Walta, Govea etc.