The “Boring” tag

[Thornburyswan]

I’ve seen multiple times this season now in games we’ve won, lost and drawn, opposition fans calling us boring. Granted sometimes we do tend to pass with no purpose, first half tonight was probably as dull as I’ve seen all season, but are we really THAT boring to watch? Or is it boring for them because they’re not the team with 70 odd percent possession? Personally, I’ve not enjoyed watching us this much for a few years now, certainly including the last 2-3 years in the prem.

Guess it gets impacted by (1) the ultimate result in the game, always less boring if you win & (2) pre-match expectation on both counts last night we were ahead of the curve - can’t imagine many Barnsley fans had paid much attention on how we had been playing before last night.

RM is clearly wedded to the possession based, ball retention & short passes philosophy - for him that reduces the opposition’s chance of scoring & gradually wears down their players concentration/fitness from chasing shadows over long periods of time. Worked perfectly last night with 80%+ possession & two late goals as they tired & our effective subs had fresh legs.

Challenge for us, for me anyway, falls into a few areas :-

1. With Obafemi, Whittaker & Cullen all currently struggling with RM’s philosophy we are very thin in the final third & means Piroe, Pato & to a lesser degree Ntcham have to shoulder a LOT of pressure - can address this in Jan if funds allow.
2. We still lack true pace anywhere on the pitch - possibly Laird aside - so difficult for us to release a runner which our strong possession & passing should allow. Tends to lead to lots of overly cautious ball retention plus sideways/backwards stuff rather than taking the risk of the through ball.
3. Whilst our good ball retention suggests a solid defensive platform & plenty of clean sheets however when we face the real top sides they can get cut open e.g. Fulham, Bournemouth etc.

All things considered a very decent start from RM & his team but suspect we’ll have some frustrated periods ahead & a top 10 finish would be acceptable.

 

[3swan]

We were in total football control of the first half and both managers stated it was not the best of watch. For the neutral it could be switch off decision. We can see the style is building but are missing the killer ball and tempo in attack. Second half it changed with the introduction of Ntcham against a clearly tiring side.

 

[Pegojack]

I’ve seen multiple times this season now in games we’ve won, lost and drawn, opposition fans calling us boring. Granted sometimes we do tend to pass with no purpose, first half tonight was probably as dull as I’ve seen all season, but are we really THAT boring to watch? Or is it boring for them because they’re not the team with 70 odd percent possession? Personally, I’ve not enjoyed watching us this much for a few years now, certainly including the last 2-3 years in the prem.

Guess it gets impacted by (1) the ultimate result in the game, always less boring if you win & (2) pre-match expectation on both counts last night we were ahead of the curve - can’t imagine many Barnsley fans had paid much attention on how we had been playing before last night.

RM is clearly wedded to the possession based, ball retention & short passes philosophy - for him that reduces the opposition’s chance of scoring & gradually wears down their players concentration/fitness from chasing shadows over long periods of time. Worked perfectly last night with 80%+ possession & two late goals as they tired & our effective subs had fresh legs.

Challenge for us, for me anyway, falls into a few areas :-

1. With Obafemi, Whittaker & Cullen all currently struggling with RM’s philosophy we are very thin in the final third & means Piroe, Pato & to a lesser degree Ntcham have to shoulder a LOT of pressure - can address this in Jan if funds allow.
2. We still lack true pace anywhere on the pitch - possibly Laird aside - so difficult for us to release a runner which our strong possession & passing should allow. Tends to lead to lots of overly cautious ball retention plus sideways/backwards stuff rather than taking the risk of the through ball.
3. Whilst our good ball retention suggests a solid defensive platform & plenty of clean sheets however when we face the real top sides they can get cut open e.g. Fulham, Bournemouth etc.

All things considered a very decent start from RM & his team but suspect we’ll have some frustrated periods ahead & a top 10 finish would be acceptable.

Top analysis, top post.
To call our possession football boring is to miss the point. I posted on the match thread at half time that we were wearing them out and had them chasing shadows, we just needed to show some greater attacking intent in the second half. That's exactly what happened. It won't always work against the top sides, but give me this over Cooperball any day.

 

[CygnusX1]

Im not surprised they thought it was boring. They couldn’t get the ball off us' so had nothing to watch.
The only thing missing was some attacking intent until Ntcham came on.
When teams like Barcelona (not that I think we are anywhere near that league) keep possession like that to control the game, people are purring over it.

 

[FelindreJack]

“You're probably right. Though the fact that Poya completely nullified Swansea for 70 odd minutes on less than a week's training does give some hope. If he can incorporate so fresh attacking ideas while keeping us solid then we might have a chance of turning the ship around.”

So apparently we were “completely nullified” another fan said he’d hate to watch us if we play like that every week. So he’d hate to have his side completely dominate possession and score goals? Weird bunch that Barnsley lot.

 

[K23]

For fan of a team who sat in two banks of four hoping to stifle us then i think it is a bit of a cheek, we kept the ball they ran around a lot by 65 minutes they tired, gaps appeared and we scored, if they had been a bit more positive then they would have seen more of an attacking display from us.

Like under Rodger’s and Martinez some teams will set themselves up for a point or to hit us on transition but the accuracy of passing and fitness of the Swansea players does make that harder and harder for the opposition. I hope it continues, it did make a difference when subs come on and then run directly at the gaps as well.

Indeed. If they didn’t want us to have the ball they could have a) tried to take it off us or b) stop giving it straight back to us when they got it.

Or they could have just brought their own? :lol:

 

[Dewi1jack]

Personally, I found us a little toothless going forward in the 1st half.
Seemed to be the passing for passing's sake. Or a novel way to park the bus. Can't lose if the opposition can't get the ball
Korey Smith seems scared to run at players at times and like Kyle Naughton sometimes does, stops dead to have a look around to see who he can pass it to.
Look around again.
Have a think.
Look around. Think.
And pass it back to the keeper, no matter who is in acres of space

But then again, I fully understand Barnsley fans calling us boring, rather than face the reality that their team set up for a draw, parking the bus at home.
Trying to win 0-0 at home. I'd be fuming if that was us week in week out

Like our Eastern cousins playing 5 centre backs against us when they decided to offer themselves up for a training game to help us out- no intention to win, just a mind numbingly boring, hoof team trying not to lose.
Trying.
But failing miserably!

 

[WalterBoyd]

Barnsley were toothless and sat back and let us control the game, apart from a 10 minute spell in early second half.

Our game plan seems to be wear teams down in first half with our possession, after n initial 10 minute spell of getting into our stride.

Second half, lull them into a false feeling of some hope, us make changes then score a few and another 3 points.

It's a good game plan and seems to work more often than not. First half yesterday was a bit more pedestrian than usual, bit frustrating, but came good in the end and looks like it went to plan in the end for Russell, which is the main thing.

 

[Jack2jack]

Bollocks, just sour grapes.

 

[magicdaps]

What do they mean by do nothing? We scored 2 very worked well goals, away from home. Sure, considering the amount of the ball we had you'd have expected us to score more, but 2 goals was enough to win the game.

As for them, at home in a game where they needed to get a result, they hardly got a pass in and created a grand total of zero chances of any threat. That's what I'd call boring.

 

[Barryballbag]

When you control a game from start to finish, I can't see how it can be boring. They changed their game to combat ours. Tough to break down but you just knew it was going to happen. I personally think it was their game plan to nullify our style which created a less entertaining game for their fans not ours, I enjoyed the game personally. Class above.

 

[FelindreJack]

I’m glad it’s not just me that thinks they’re talking dross then. I don’t know why, but it pisses me off a bit when I see other fans calling us boring and dull, especially when we’ve beaten them. But as has been said, I guess it is boring when it’s not your team with 80% possession and coming away with a convincing win. And as a side note, if they think we’re boring to watch, I’d hate to know what they thought of us under Cooper

 

[K23]

Exciting games are when both teams are trying to win the game and are playing well resulting in 'end to end stuff'. When one team is 100% committed to not losing and make no effort to win the game other than by a stroke of luck, it stifles the other team as they will struggle to break down a 10 man defensive mindset and the game becomes a war of attrition and boring. If yesterday's match was boring, it was because the Barnsley mindset made it boring and not the Swans' style of play.

 

[JackFish]

Exciting games are when both teams are trying to win the game and are playing well resulting in 'end to end stuff'. When one team is 100% committed to not losing and make no effort to win the game other than by a stroke of luck, it stifles the other team as they will struggle to break down a 10 man defensive mindset and the game becomes a war of attrition and boring. If yesterday's match was boring, it was because the Barnsley mindset made it boring and not the Swans' style of play.

Exactly. We played the same way at Coventry a few weeks ago but the difference was they were also trying to attack and it made for a really open end-to-end game.