WE can do it on a cold Tuesday night at Stoke.
After the first ten matches, we have taken 2,1 points per match. Not bad.
Up the Boro! The Boro is going up ...
@werdermouth “Can you write them every week? Can you write them every week?”
@werdermouth and don’t forget the assist. 🤣
Two awful goals to give away compared to the three we scored. I appreciate, not sure of the percentage, that mistakes create chances make goals, but why do Boro excel in that department.
Berhalter makes too many I am afraid in that dangerous area in the middle and is it tired legs maybe. A draw would have made 15 points dropped since April according to Sky. And far too many this season already before tonight.
However, a brilliant team display and drive right until the end, something we never had in the past. What a turnaround for Neto Borges.
One piece of bad luck for a deflected first goal and one bad decision by Ayling. We seem to have the odds against us when it comes to defending. The back three were dominant but still conceded two goals.
I thought that Brittain and Morris were superb and the Brittain-ACD axis will worry any club in the league. We're also seeing Borges get forward more and more effectively. It says something for his skill - and Arfsten's adaptability - that we ended up with Borges scoring the winner from an Arfsten corner after he came on to replace ACD. When you look at the four substitutions - Conway, Joseph, Arfsten and McGree - you get a sense of how difficult we must be to play against.
UTB
Well done, werder! You’re on a roll!
We never make it easy for ourselves, do we? I hope your hearts are ok, OFB and John, after this rollercoaster performance. I was tense throughout the second half. That Stoke second equaliser was an absolute sickener and once again I thought we’d thrown away 2 points with some woeful defending. But all credit to the lads: we kept on hammering away at Stoke when it might have been tempting to take a point and ultimately we got the deserved win. Phew!
We played some lovely flowing football at times and had an impressive 20 attempts on goal with 8 on target. We also showed we’re not afraid to mix it when necessary with some robust tackling and grappling. I do think we still miss a midfield enforcer at times, though. Once or twice Stoke forwards found themselves in acres of space between the midfield and our back line - their first goal resulted from just such a gap opening up. Morris does a superb job but he can’t be everywhere and he doesn’t always get the help he needs from Berhalter, who looked a bit jaded tonight. Perhaps we’ll see Barron brought on soon to plug the gaps?
Morris does a superb job but he can’t be everywhere and he doesn’t always get the help he needs from Berhalter, who looked a bit jaded tonight. Perhaps we’ll see Barron brought on soon to plug the gaps?
I agree with you about Berhalter. I think that he is a tremendous player with great delivery but he looks tired after four games in the US during the international break and then two games in 4 days. I think that he needs a rest and, were it not for his hamstring injury, I would expect to see Pustkas being used as an alternative. With him unavailable, Barron is one obvious option to help Morris, even if Malanda gets pushed forward again.
UTB
@selwynoz One piece of bad luck for a deflected first goal and one bad decision by Ayling. We seem to have the odds against us when it comes to defending. The back three were dominant but still conceded two goals.
I also thought that the defence was superb and the three at the back worked a treat, but we still conceded two goals. Borges deflection was rank unlucky, with the well covered. Ayling just had a moment, but that could, probably should of been Vitek’s ball.
I said the same in my post, Berhalter does not look to be at the races, and does lose his man too often, even in games before the American trip. He has some very good attributes, but defending the lines is not one of them, and we suffer at times from that waekness, which is not helped by Hellberg’s pressing system.
Yes it is a shame about Pustkas, Pearl-Harris could have been the answer, but isn’t, Barron would have been a gamble last night.
I will belated add my thanks to Weder for the intro - only managed to get caught up due to a dodgy internet connection yesterday. Well, that and it being hard to see the IPad screen in the sun.
Managed to watch the game though again it kept going down and a reboot needed) but having read all the excellent comments above, from the bits I saw, I would say that in some respects we got out of jail with 3 points. Not that I am complaining mind! There have been many times in the past when we would have lost so credit to KH and the players for not giving in.
Lanky Will is very much on fire and in the mold of a certain B Slaven and a proper poacher - like the way he, and the others were chasing down Stoke players and putting pressure on them.
We have a great squad as shown by the subs coming on although the silly mistakes are costing us goals - last night it was Berhalter making the initial error following by an inexplicable error from Ayling although there were a couple of other occasions where we caught on the break and on another night they would have scored more.
I do think that at times, we do need to slow it down a tad to reduce the errors in the middle of the park - a few instances again were evident.
A pulsating game which had me swearing at the TV, both when the Internet went down and when we conceded which had Mrs BBD wondering why I bother!
2nd in the table, above the magic 2 points a game, a squad that has strength in depth and a very positive manager and approach. Just need to keep it up for the rest of the season and be untypical Boro!
UTB
Great result last night and watched the highlights this morning and was still unsure if we'd snatch a winner! Thought Brittain was exceptional and certainly helps provide space for Cozier-Duberry, who looks top class in this division - plus Morris was everywhere on the pitch.
In my exuberance of celebrating a stoppage time winner yesterday to get another preview victory, I may have mentioned something about being on a hat-trick - just checked my next preview is West Ham away...
@clive-hurren - I'd like to get a sight of Barron, to see what he can do!
@forever-dormo I will assume he played in the “behind closed doors” match that Jarkko posted about. If he did, did Hellberg see enough to gamble on a team inclusion. He didn’t last night
@pedro - It may be that certain players may get time on the pitch in certain games, according to the circumstances at the time. On the other hand, unless a player gets his chance you'll never find out how good (or otherwise) he is. For example, had Michael Carrick not been sacked and had Leo Percovich not given Hayden Hackney his first league start before the new manager was appointed, would we ever have discovered immediately that he wasn't merely "quite good" but the best player in our squad!
Whilst I don’t like criticism of,players especially my own Boro team I’m afraid AYLIMG is looking past it against certain opposition. He is making mistakes in most matches and is slowing down in thought and deed.
i can see why he’s picked by the management team for his leadership qualities and a dvd on the team bus on the way to the game is an example where he’s laughing and jpking with Tommy Conway.
i think Brittain should be made our permanent captain and he’s certainly developed into a great player this season.
Good effort by Boro with a never say die effort a great improvement on last season.
still unsure about our keeper though!
OFB