What's happening??

Another very poor game to watch. What's happening, we seem to be light years away from the football we playing last season. What's happened to the Spanish style of football Ollie wanted us to play? Ok, we've lost Adam, Vaughan and Campbell, but hey, the bulk of the side is still the same. Like I've said previously, we've started the season in a steady rather than inspiring way. If I was Ollie I would get my defence sorted out pretty damn quick. We had the worst defensive record last season and although we have not let in as many so far this season we still look extremely shaky. He doesn't seem to have a fixed back four in mind like other teams. I don't think the Cathcart/Evatt combination works and I don't think full back is  Alex Baptiste's best position either.  I would have him as a centre back covering Evatt. Cathcart to often finds himself out of position and he is not commanding enough in the air. I'd have Crainey, Evatt, Baptiste and a n other at right back. Eardley is to inconsistent for me and lets his head drop too quickly when things aren't going his way. Ollie must try someone else in this position who perhaps he hasn't tried before. Midfield is an area we have completely lost this season. Barry Ferguson just does not do it for me at all, neither does Keith Southern both are not creative enough, the latter especially. To be honest I've never been a Southern fan. Ok, he's been a loyal servant, blah, blah, blah. But he has never been a goal scoring midfielder or creative. He only looks comfortable when he passes the ball backwards. What I can't understand is, last year we seemed to have a glut of midfielders all vying for a permanent position there. Yet this season they all seem to have disappeared along with Adam and Vaughan. GTF, again is too inconsistent for me. One week he plays out of his skin and produces a match winning performance and the next like today he's anonymous on the pitch. Kevin Phillips is exempt from criticism because the guy is class and is always likely to produce something out of nothing. At this moment in time I feel we are not good enough to be pushing for promotion and see us having a a pretty uninteresting season. But what do I know. Anybody agree?

Seasiders hit the 'ammers buffers...

Well it was bound to happen, a 4-0 drubbing by a team managed by an ex-manager, namely Sam (I got sacked for not getting them promoted) Allardyce. He's had the hoodoo on us since it happened all those years ago. He was manager at Blackburn last season when they came to Bloomfield Rd and beat us 2-1. It's always the same when someone from the club, whether it's a player or management comments on how well we're going to do prior to a game. It was Steve Thompson who said mid-week how after the international break the players were raring to go and looking forward to the West Ham game. Yeah, well so was I Steve, but that was before the game. After it I was embarrassed and disappointed with the way we played. Even after last week's 5-0 beating of Bristol City I was still apprehensive about our ability to mix it with teams who were not frightened to splash the cash on players. West Ham being one of them. Losing players like Adam, Campbell and Vaughan, who together made things happen for us over the last two seasons was always going to be a blow. For me Barry Ferguson has not made the impact expected and when you team him up with Keith Southern in midfield you just know we're going to struggle. I've always thought our start to the season has been steady but nothing to shout home about. Once again Ollie has been forced to rely on loanees, which on the one hand allows you to get rid of them if they don't perform but on the other hand if they do, their worth increases, which makes it even harder to agree a fee at the end of their loan spell. I thought Ollie's decision to play Baptiste, Hill, Evatt and Crainey in this back four formation to be a mistake. Baptiste and Evatt should be the central partnership with Crainey at left-back and a n other at right back. We play Doncaster at home on Tuesday night and I hope we can put Saturday's game behind us and start to play something like we did last season.