LOPETEGUI: “IT HAS BEEN SIXTY GOOD MINUTES, BUT INSUFFICIENT. IT’S A HARD DEFEAT”
Yes it was a good 60mins until you balls it up by changing our entire midfield. 
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Very disappointing result. 3 straight losses in the league. Worrying times and the next 2 home games are must win now.
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60? I counted 40, at most…
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Yup first 20 of both halves, 25 at a push.
I think we are suffering from too many games at once. We just don’t have the squad to cope with it. I also think we are lacking a little bit of motivation to go again this season. We had momentum for end of last season and it carried us through. There was no real rest after though and there has been a hangover from that.
This season the team look a bit drained. We seem to be prioritising the champions league too. I really think the fact there are no fans and the pandemic continues to worsen again isn’t helping the situation either. We all crave for normal times but they still seem so far away. It’s definitely affecting many teams and our players and manager now.
Rakitic has not adapted that well on his 2nd return to club. He looks like a downgrade on Banega at moment. Hopefully he improves and can still find his best again in time. The defence is back together but I think kounde getting Covid affected our momentum a little and although he’s back now the defence as a whole we have lost a bit of shape. Acuna looks decent but he’s still a work in progress. He needs more time for him to get used to his new team mates and for them to adapt to his style.
We started very well and scored a good goal. However, we just don’t go to kill teams off enough. If there is a criticism of lopetegui it is that his defensive nature can get in the way too much. He seems happy to see out the win but when you on top you have to get the second or third goal to kill the game off. If not it will comeback to bite you as athletic Bilbao had their 25 minute spell and scored twice. We could only score once in 55 mins of domination and it’s not good enough.
Ocampos isn’t playing as well this season as last. That is obvious and our results have dipped as a result. So many times last year we won close games we could have lost and he bailed us out a lot.
Naval is an awesome player and true professional but he’s coming towards the end of his career at 34. We still rely on him like he’s in his prime and we really needed a top right back but we never got one. That’s hurting us a lot now too.
I’m pleased YEN scored and at least him and De Jong are off the mark early this season with a few goals. Last season it took several games for our strikers to score. That is a positive so far.
A big game next in champions league and a win there will set us up well for qualifying. I’m just frustrated with the scheduling this year. Due to Covid the European competitions are trying to cram all these games into a short calendar. It’s criminal and teams can’t cope and leads to injuries and fatigue. To be honest they really should have just done a mini tournament knockout again and scrapped group stages especially considering how the pandemic is kicking off in Europe again. Teams travelling around Europe is suicidal at moment with countries having surging infections and now lockdowns again.
Let’s hope though we win midweek but next 2 la liga games are crucial now as we out of form and our confidence has been hit. Vamos Sevilla!
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Everyone else who is in Europe is playing the same number of games, that shouldn’t be an excuse.
Ps. 16th at the moment, lose our next game we could be in the bottom 3.
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It doesn’t matter what the tactics, team or substitutions do if the ref pins you back with a series of decisions. If the fouls go 70-30 you lose, if they go 60-40 you’re going to have it tough.
It might not appear more than just a ten minute blip in the game, it appears entirely innocent, but to me it’s clear and a wee-bit criminal.
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Are we the 2020 Valencia?
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The fouls were 17-19 on paper so pretty even. I mean there were some terrible fouls and Garcia should have been booked with that silly Trump type handshake. We talk about that a bit on the podcast how maybe Garcia changed the match.
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