#swfc What a frustrating half of football. All blood and thunder from the start, blowing Shrewsbury out backwards in the opening quarter of the game, but, quite inexplicably, we've let them a poor Shrewsbury - calamitous in defence - back into the game and it's one all at HT 1/11
Shodipo tore Shrewsbury a new one down our left going either side of their sorry full back time and again and also drifting in centrally from where he won the penalty. 2/11
He also won the corner we scored from, Berahino allowed to step into the ball almost unchallenged to score. 3/11
Berahino really should've added to that goal before 10 minutes had even passed, when that man Shodipo again wriggled free to clip a cross into a position Berahino had snuck into completely unmarked, but he headed wide. 4/11
That should've been 2-0. When we got the penalty that really should've been 2-0 - and the game shut down as a contest. Instead Bannan hit one of the weakest penalties I've seen in a long time and, predictably, the miss roused Shrewsbury 5/11
Shrewsbury started peppering the channels and Iorfa, in probably his poorest half this season, uncharacteristically struggled to get on the ball first several times (won just one of his four aerial duels), allowing Shrewsbury more than one simple chances, now getting their… 6/11
…wingbacks further up the pitch and penning us back via those simple balls from deep into the channels. 7/11
More than passion we need clearer heads here, as we lost control of a game that should've been so far down in the bag before the half hour mark that it would never see the light of day again. 8/11
Easy to see Shrewsbury's resurgence, when we started being so reactive defensively again instead, clear to see on the minute by minute run of the action, as was our early dominance: 9/11
The goal was ANOTHER dropped ball by Peacock-Farrell gifted to Shrewsbury to stab home. 10/11
Very poor and the knock to his confidence seems to be seeping into a defence now defending more rashly, clearing balls that could be controlled or cushioned to a team mate, allowing the SHrewsbury penned in for the first half hour to control proceedings. 11/11
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#swfc I can see from @DomHowson's player ratings that him and eye did not see the game the same way at all, so I should probably have a longer think and calm down a bit, but writing relieves stress, so here goes:
Created our own downfall once again. 1/37
What on earth have we been doing on the training pitch for three weeks for these players to look MORE like strangers to each other than they did before the international break? 2/37
We're so, so easy to defend against if you shut down the wings as there are no central runs from midfield.
Notice how the penalty came about from Shodipo staying inside making a darting run in behind. 3/37
#swfc Good things: There should be no doubt for these players that this sort of comatose laurel-resting, "big club going away to a lower league ground" sort of non-performance will see us crucified time and again, especially in this league, which has plenty of quality this year.
By some distance the worst we've been this season and at no point of the game did we have much of a handle on it. It looked like we were only seeing Plymouth's passes and movement 1-2 seconds after they were made and only then did we react to them.
We were so easy to play against: No organised pressure on their player in possession, so Plymouth given time to have player drop deep for the wall pass, swivel and run in behind onto a through ball from the first player.
#swfc Probably our worst half of the season so far. Plymouth showing everything we haven't: Tenacity, invention, movement, fluidity, connecting passes. (thread)
Plymouth have taken a leaf out of Rotherham's book and strangled our rythm by marking/pressing high when BPF is on the ball ready to distribute. I expect to see plenty more teams do the same against us considering how successful Plymouth (and R'ham) have been doing so.
There's a weird sense of passivity and lack of energy to us today. Byers, Wing have been bystanders too often and not adept at picking up the runs Plymouth make from central areas towards the sides that have been a simple, yet effective way to open us up time and again.
I'm currently deep into writing a season review/preview thing that also has a lot of financial data and analysis - obviously needs tinkering now the accounts are out 😜
Enough pre-amble, here are some charts:
Revenue likely to be halved in 20-21 and decrease further in 21-22:
If we add on transfer fees received (and what can be assumed to be compensation fee for Steve Bruce), as well as likely Covid 19 furlough compensation, we're up to £13.6m of income in 20-21, which is still half 19-20's:
#swfc have 9 matches left to complete an unlikely relegation escape.
In the thread below, a look at the historical context of what a Great Escape would look like.
The points won by teams at the bottom of this season's Championship are tracking a typical season quite closely:
In general teams at the bottom improve their form more in the last 9 matches than teams further up the table, so we shouldn't assume the helping hand of a collapse by the teams above us:
The variation is quite big, though, and the most a team in 22nd after 37 matches ever won in the final 9 matches was 18 points. The same as the typical team in 1st:
Wednesday's issue this season has been creating chances for the forwards, not the forwards converting their chances. A theme that has continued on from last season.
Our forwards this season are scoring at the same rate they were last season - a goal every third game/0.32 goals per 90 minutes - from the same general quality of chances (Expected Goals (xG) of 0.33 per 90 minutes):
The issue isn't so much our forwards scoring as it is our midfielders (and defenders) not scoring (and not getting chances).
The forwards are par for the course considering the quality of their chances, whereas defenders and midfielders "owe" 7-8 goals; same as last season: