Boro team news is in: No Van den berg
Dijksteel in at right-back, with Ayling moving to centre-back
Just as I'd finally worked out how to copy images like the above from the Teesside Live site, I discover that you'd beaten me to it by about two minutes, KP!
It's certainly looking a bit thin in defence with only youngsters Hunt and McCormick on the bench covering centre-back and left-back
@werdermouth. Yes fingers crossed that Ayling and Clarke stay fit or we could be seeing a repeat of last seasons injury problems. 😎
@lenmasterman Good post Len.
As much I like MC and pleased to see him extend his contract, I do belive he has to learn to be more flexible in his approach and management of the situation in real time.
There are also issues within the squad which leave us vulnable. We have signed forwards galore, but with a shortfall around the defence, which we can see now.
We did not score sufficient goals last season. We appear to possibly not score sufficient this season.
Then it is all down to no mistakes and keeping a clean sheet.
Let's see if they can improve this afternoon.
@stircrazy. Sorry, I will leave it to you on Tuesday so you can practice and hone your new found skill. 😉😎
Just seen the team news
I rest my case.
Also continuing with Azaz. ☹️
Questions have been raised about our injury issues and it’s probably legitimate to ask why we appear to have so many players falling prey to injuries that last longer than one would expect. Are we just unlucky or are we poor in our rehabilitation skills or taking longer than usual to declare people fit. With it being so early in the season and with a larger squad than before, it’s not a crisis but it does bear watching.
UTB
@stircrazy. Sorry, I will leave it to you on Tuesday so you can practice and hone your new found skill. 😉😎
Cheers, KP. 🙂
0-1 after two minutes?! I'm suffering from shell-shock.
Now where's that Oracle gone?
UTB,
John
0-1 after two minutes?! I'm suffering from shell-shock.
Now where's that Oracle gone?
UTB,
John
CJ:
Boro behind! Terrible start for Boro. Engel charges out of the defence but doesn't get there. As Pompey go beyond him, Boro's defence are dragged over. Lang puts it across the penalty box and Saydee is arriving to finish from close range.
🙁
Clarke equalises nine minutes later - CJ:
Boro level! Clarke against his former side. Heads home an Azaz corner, right into the bottom corner, in off the post by the looks of it. Important for Boro to get the goal back quickly after falling behind.
Clarke equalises nine minutes later - CJ:
Boro level! Clarke against his former side. Heads home an Azaz corner, right into the bottom corner, in off the post by the looks of it. Important for Boro to get the goal back quickly after falling behind.
Pompey back in the lead in the 25th minute! CJ:
Disaster at the back! Long throw spins up towards the Boro box off Ayling's head. Saydee continues to chase and Dieng, with no real need to, leaves his area and challenges Clarke in the air. It leaves Saydee running through to an open goal.
Clarke equalises nine minutes later - CJ:
Boro level! Clarke against his former side. Heads home an Azaz corner, right into the bottom corner, in off the post by the looks of it. Important for Boro to get the goal back quickly after falling behind.
Pompey back in the lead in the 25th minute! CJ:
Disaster at the back! Long throw spins up towards the Boro box off Ayling's head. Saydee continues to chase and Dieng, with no real need to, leaves his area and challenges Clarke in the air. It leaves Saydee running through to an open goal.
CJ again:
Awful from Boro
Having got themselves back in the game and established control of the game, they throw it away in a moment of madness. It looks like a massive Dieng error. He can just hang back in his box and allow Clarke to head it back to him. He erratically rushes out the box and challenges his own man to gift Saydee the open goal. What you would say is, it's not easy to tell from here, did either shout? There needs to be communication in that moment.
When you watch it back, Clarke is actually leaving it for Dieng until the very last moment when he panics about Saydee's presence and gets involved. Needed to be better communication from the offset and Clarke taking charge of that.
Just moments later, there's another moment where Dieng erratically and needlessly rushes out of his box to head one when there's no need to. This one doesn't present Portsmouth a chance, but understandably angers Boro fans. So poor.
Deckchairs beating Burnley by 1-0 at the Stadium of Sh!te. 🙁
So frustrating.
Boro clearly the better side but only between both boxes. Huge gaffes at either end and you’d have to say that, somehow, we deserve to be behind.
Such a good Championship side in so many ways but we can’t give goals away like that and equally continue to miss clear openings at the other end.
Grrr.
Not the early goal I was thinking of to get Boro on course and the second was once again another calamity to add to Jones's back-pass last week. There's been plenty of possession again and once again Boro have been lacking the final ball and shot - it certainly looks like early-season rustiness and lack of concentration that has been compounded by injuries to key players again. Hopefully Boro can have a Leeds-style second half as another defeat will not help the cause!
Conway on for Azaz in the 69th minute.
Conway on for Azaz in the 69th minute.
Barlaser & Hamilton on for Morris & Engel in the 80th minute.
According to Bet 365, Boro's had 68% possession & 24 shots at goal, six of them on target. Pompey's picked up FIVE yellow cards!
CJ: Jones fouled after a lovely ball from Dijksteel into his path. Conway to take.
Conway gets his maiden Boro goal in the 90th minute! 🙂 Seven minutes of injury time. Here's hoping the lads can now hold out till full time. *prays*
And it finishes at 2-2. 30 shots on goal, eight on target.
Boro's scored six goals so far this season in all competitions & there have six different scorers!
Well at least Boro avoided defeat but a game Boro should have won after having 30 (THIRTY) shots on goal - in the end it was a late penalty that saved our blushes - put away well by Conway - though it was defensive errors and further profligacy that stopped Michael Carrick's side taking all three points. Surely more to come but it's a slow start so far and a story of missed opportunities.
Deckchairs beating Burnley by 1-0 at the Stadium of Sh!te. 🙁
And that's how it finished. They top the table with the maximum nine points & a GD of +7. 🙁
Only positive we didn't lose, some very poor decision making especially in defence for the two goals and to top it off makems top of the league
Another game we should have won slips by. In the last two games five points have been dropped due to defensive blunders and a misfiring attack. Gifting the opposition one or two goals a game makes it a lot more difficult to take three points. Tighten up the defence and sharpen up the finishing and we might do some damage. I just hope it happens before the teams occupying the top two league positions are out of sight.
Echo player ratings an 8 for Conway for 20 minutes' play:
And the Gazette's:
Plus more comments & some gossip from Boro News - Maddo not at all happy:
Boro supporters need to get used to the after match comments for Burgzorg along the lines of “ it would be better if he passed the ball more” . “ He could be more effective if he lifted his head up and passed the ball”. That’s 2after the match comments already along the above lines.
When at Huddersfield last season he drove the supporters mad with his selfish attitude of not passing the ball and they couldn’t wait to get rid of him.
So, can Carrick and co sort him out?
Meanwhile, a poor performance by too many individual players and collectively by the team.
Lots of improvement needed.
Here in Huddersfield the locals are very pleased with their start of played 3 and won 3.
Philip of Huddersfield
☹️👎👎
Another game where the opposition keeper gets MOTM 😱. I get the feeling after 3 games some on here are starting to question Carrick, we are making lots of chances unfortunately they just not going in at the moment. I believe it will come good, 9th and 1 point off the playoffs, with 3 CB’s injured, but that’s not good enough for some 😱.
Come on BORO.
3 games gone and 1 point off the playoffs. Give over!!
At this rate just do the sums.
At this rate then after say 30 games we will be 10 points off the play offs!! Will that be ok ? Possibly .
But look at it a different way. Only 3 games played with 4 points. Already 5 points behind the leaders !! So, at this rate , after say 30 games we’ll be -nowhere !!
obviosly , we can prove anything with figures.
The reality is that points win prizes and 4 points after 3 games with 2 games at home is unimpressive. You can’t put any other spin on it.
The start , in terms of points, is not what we hoped for.
So, yes it’s not good enough. The team have to improve in terms of defending, creating chances against teams with 10 players behind the ball and taking chances. So, it’s not just one part of the game needing improvements but it’s all over the pitch.
I would be interested in other views especially as some of you may think I’m being a bit harsh.
Philip of Huddersfield.
👎☹️👎
@exmil. Sorry exmil, but it is not good enough for me
Derby and Portsmouth just promoted and Swansea.
The defence still has mistakes in it. We could not score enough last season and it appears at the moment, we cannot score enough this season.
I think most would agree we have a reasonable easy-ish start to the season.
If we are really serious about the top six and promotion then these three displays have not been good enough.
Let's see how many points we have after 5 games. I expected 12..