Match Review: Wednesday in trouble on a Saturday

C & J took another ESDB Football outing to Hillsborough to see Sheffield Wednesday take on Leicester as the Foxes bested the Owls in a wet affair...

Coming into the game it was obvious that these two sides were mismatched on paper in terms of personnel. Wednesday have no discernible stand out stars in their current side to our mind - Michail Antonio and Jose Semedo are good players but neither look to be the next break out stars from the Championship whereas Leicester are chock-full of established Championship players who have seen everything - players like Wes Morgan, Zak Whitbread, Kasper Schmeichel, and Andy King all know how to get promotion (albeit not all from the Championship granted). This was reflected in league positions with Wednesday sitting 4th bottom whilst the visitors were riding high in 5th place.

Hillsborough was rocking before the game and the atmosphere was excellent in this old ground. The England band are Sheffield Wednesday fans on a normal week and they were sitting at the top of the Kop regaling the ground with many classics we have come to hate over the years! The ground makes a nice change from the identikit new ones that have such a lack of atmosphere and there is a lot to be said for the character of the ground. There was a crowd of 24000 and it boggles the mind to think what an electric atmosphere there would be when Hillsborough is full and rocking. It would be nice to see the ground back in the top flight sooner rather than later.

The first half was fairly slow and tepid as it was clear Wednesday were lacking confidence. Mamady Sidibe had signed from Stoke on the loan deadline day and he clearly has yet to gel with his teammates, understandably. It was a bit baffling though to see Dave Jones opt to play both Sidibe and England's own Jay Bothroyd up front together. They were both too similar in styles - both big target men. As a result Wednesday were one dimensional and had no pace. They failed to get in behind Leicester's defence really and had no penetration. Every time Wednesday got the ball in the Leicester half there didn't appear to be any danger.

Leicester had plenty of possession and looked to be best on the counter attack against a fairly slow Wednesday team. Ex Man Utd man Danny Drinkwater excelled at times in the first half as a driving force transitioning the Foxes from defence to attack. It was suprising that Dave Jones hadn't earmarked him as a danger man before the match given his history managing him for Cardiff for 9 games in 2010/11! Drinkwater put Leicester in front just before half time as he did an excellent one-two with Ben Marshall and then proceeded to drill the ball across the face of goal into the bottom corner. It was a deserved lead for the Foxes and it seemed to send the crowd into an all too familiar feeling, as their team's heads began to drop.

The second half continued much like the first as Wednesday failed to trouble the Leicester defence at all, whilst having an equal share of possession but Leicester were a lot more comfortable sitting back and hitting the Owls on the counter.

Jay Bothroyd continued his terrible game in the second half and looked lost. He misplaced numerous passes and appeared to be on a completely different wavelength to his fellow players as he failed to make runs they wanted him to, and then ran from the position they had passed to on countless occasions. He was substituted to boos in the second half and looks like he is ever popular - just as his time at QPR!

Ex-Wednesday man Ben Marshall put the nail in the coffin as he capped an excellent performance with a lovely curling effort from the edge of the box on the 76th minute. He cut in from the right and curled in with his left past the despairing dive of Owls keeper Chris Kirkland.

The dismal performance by the Owls was best epitomised by the fact that their best opportunity occurred when Kasper Schmeichel got caught under a hopeful free kick into the box and flapped and missed the ball, requiring one of his defenders to cover and head the ball off of the line! On this showing Wednesday need something different up front and January could be a key period for them as they look to desperately need some reinforcements!

Man of the match: Leicester's Ben Marshall spent last season on loan at Hillsborough and he sparkled on his return. He was full of energy and got the assist for the first goal and scored the second with an excellent effort. He was clearly popular at Hillsborough and was given a deserved rousing ovation from the whole ground when he was substituted on the 81st minute.

J

Week 3 Review: Deadline Day Dust Settles

Well after the transfer deadline mayhem this was actually a pretty unremarkable week for analysis we thought, without droning on about Liverpool's travails which have been covered in far too much detail everywhere else for us to bore you with our views as well.

Aston Villa fans must be going into the international break with a newfound sense of optimism after their performance against Newcastle. After their deadline day dealings we were fearing the worst for the Villains. Their signings consisted of League One players and a 21 year old striker from the Belgian league. Villa have very little experience in their side and it says something when Stephen Ireland is one of the most senior players in your squad. The thing about young players though, as commentators love to remind us, is that they are fearless and Sunday’s result could show this. It’s about time Shay Given was dropped after his terrible Euros and start to this season, but the central defence seems too inexperienced. James Collins was sold which is strange considering Richard Dunne is still injured from the Euros. Up front, Villa look very light weight, as mentioned in previous posts, and it really does seem like they will struggle this year to score goals. But if one man can do it it’s Paul Lambert. He weaved his magic with Norwich bringing in League One players such as Elliott Bennett and Anthony Pilkington who made the step up with aplomb, and he must be hoping Jordan Bowery and Ashley Westwood do the same, and who knows maybe they will?

In the football league, Sheffield Wednesday fans finally found out that Dave Jones does not in fact walk on water and is still a horrible, bitter man and the sorest loser in football. After his first defeat as boss of Wednesday, he blamed the officials for changing the game by changing their minds about giving a penalty against his team, claiming it incensed the Crystal Palace crowd and created a feeling of injustice which spurred the Palace players on to victory! Ridiculous.

Roundup

QPR produced arguably their best half of the Premier League season away at Manchester City on Saturday evening. In spite of what the clueless Jon Champion and Chris Waddle might have made you believe, the R's did offer something to the game at the end of the first half and through most of the second half. They began playing some neat passing football after half time and were rewarded for being more daring with a goal to make it 1-1 and have City worried. Perhaps they could even have scored a second if the ball had fallen to someone other than Ryan Nelsen. Maybe City took their foot off the gas, but given how abject our football has looked this season to date, this was tons better from Rangers and gave the away support plenty of encouragement that all these signings might actually gel to form a decent team. (Note from J – as a United fan the most annoying thing of this game was that when QPR put some passing together their football was excellent, but this happened all too infrequently – one friend said to me Mark Hughes is the wrong manager for the new crop of players and I’m starting to agree).

After 2 games of this season Manchester United have already recovered more points from losing positions this season than they did throughout the whole of last season (6 v 3, thanks Opta Joe!). The signing of Robin Van Persie already looks like it is paying off and United look very confident in front of goal. He has taken no time at all to bed into the team and looks totally at home in this team, even praising Paul Scholes to the heavens yesterday. It seems like this is a match made in heaven and hopefully it will inspire Wayne Rooney and Chicharito and Welbeck to keep up with RVP as well. The defence is still looking susceptible to goals and the time may come sooner rather than later to see how Alexander Buttner can adjust to being thrown into the first team as Patrice Evra’s form continues to slip. The problem with him and Rafael as full backs is that their main strengths are both attacking rather than defending, though Rafael is improving - but he had no chance against Rickie Lambert on Sunday!

A return to winning ways for the mighty Crewe was most welcome. The Railwaymen saw off a sorry looking Coventry thanks to a scrappy looking goal from Max Clayton after he'd missed a sitter earlier in the game. Who needs Nick Powell or Ashley Westwood eh? Let’s hope the fabled academy produces someone else to step up though as there is a lot of burden on Abdul Osman and Luke Murphy at the moment!

Unfortunately, the news on Monday night wasn't quite so positive from the Alten Försterei as 1.FC Union Berlin went down 2-1 at home to city rivals Hertha BSC. Union pulled the game back to level terms but, just like the City v QPR game, parity lasted just a few minutes. On a side note, we were surprised to see that Ben Sahar has turned up at Hertha!

What we learned this week:-

-  Steven Fletcher looks like exactly what Sunderland needed and is already looking like he can justify his price tag
- As expected, Andy Carroll and West Ham looks to be a match made in heaven
- Liverpool could do with another striker before the transfer window clo-... Oh.
- The Albion continue to make a mockery of J's league prediction
- Neil Warnock and El Hadji Diouf are best friends, honest!
- Paulo Di Canio will take you off after 21 minutes if he thinks you're having a bad game, whatever position you play in, and then criticise you for reacting badly when substituted even though he demanded to be substituted in a game against Bradford City in 2000!
- Finally J got the first correct score of the season with the City v QPR result – psychic I tell you!