Leeds United vs Ipswich Town Preview & Matchday Thread

[nicscreamer]

God this is awful. Will we ever score a goal again?

[charlton837]

That second goal is all done to players switching off. What they hell are they doing. No excuses for that. And I agree with Mike, why take Edun off? For Ward of all people!

[Charnwood]

Just found the live pass stats.....

At 70 mins Leeds have completed 328 accurate passes compared to our 133.

[Magicmark]

Leeds should be winning 4-0 .Did read somewhere there is a flu virus going about in the Ipswich team,only Hurst knows why he has left some of our argubally best players on the bench.

[nicscreamer]

Hold on..... was that a shot on target? Wooooooo

[Steve and Jo]

Wonders how long can afford to wait before changing the manager.

3 shots, i really feel for PH, he seems a genuine guy but he really seems out of his depth and i'm afraid so is his team

[Magicmark]

God this is awful. Will we ever score a goal again?

Lol I was thinking,will we ever string 3 consecutive passes together again,we are dreadful.

[patthegimp]

15 corners to none. We are crap. Now worst goal difference. Even a win won't take us out of the relegation . Looks like we are being cut loose. Low mood ++

[ashfordblue]

PH will be gone by the weekend, he just aint up to the job,

[Charnwood]

A few comments about our team taken from live commentary in the last 10 minutes of the game....

“Lack lustre
No cohesion
No shape
No confidence
No quality
Lack of belief
Lack of ideas
Can’t see any escape
PH may well be put out of his misery.....”

Pretty depressing really.

[nicscreamer]

I truly hope PH is relieved of his duties in the morning. His position is untenable now and we need some change to at least get a different atmosphere at the club. Things can’t get worse than they are at the moent

[Charnwood]

PH will be gone by the weekend, he just aint up to the job,

In my opinion he should never have come to Portman Road, it was a crap appointment for us and for him too.

I really feel for the bloke because he left a successful position at Shrewsbury to join us and may well find it difficult to get another job better than the one he left.

Even worse for us, who the hell would choose to take over such a dire situation, and if it doesn’t happen soon with support from our owner it’s League One here we come, it’s as simple as that and very disheartening.

I know I eventually jumped on board against MM following some of his disrespectful comments about the Ipswich fans, but my earlier words about “being careful what we wished for” are ringing in my ears.

Holy Moly, I’m off to bed.

A safe journey home for Bluemike and the travelling fans, I really don’t think I could do that anymore.

[Marvinbay1973]

Didn't hear or see the game tonight, not good judging by comments. Was there any improvement from the weekend ?
Sounds like this team is dead in the water.

[Charnwood]

Just found the live pass stats.....

At 70 mins Leeds have completed 328 accurate passes compared to our 133.

Final number for successful passes....

Leeds United 457 v 204 Town....

[Bluemike]

There was virtually no improvement from the weekend. Dreadful team selection, lack of cohesion, cant string 2 passes together, no corners, 1 shot on goal, should have been at least 4-0. If it isn't changed and soon we will be relegated by a distance. The brave new experiment has turned into a deranged Frankenstein like monster.

[Charnwood]

Didn't hear or see the game tonight, not good judging by comments. Was there any improvement from the weekend ?
Sounds like this team is dead in the water.

I only watched it on Sky with pretty average coverage and no replays etc so get a very narrow view of what’s going on regarding movement off the ball and tactical changes etc but I can’t imagine there was much of that going on as we were pretty crap.

Bart did well to keep the score at 2-0 but looked pretty shaky early on but that’s what happens when players are in and out of the team and lose confidence. For me Pennington was our stand out player but even he wasn’t faultless and often gave the ball away but less times than many of his colleagues. Spence did ok but was under a lot of pressure from the pace and movement of Cooper and Alioski down their left side and Knudsen got absolutely roasted by MOM Pablo Hernández.

The way PH works I guess there’ll be another seven changes on Saturday with Chalobah, Edwards, Ward, Dozzell & Nsiala etc all coming back confidence shot after having been dropped tonight and dreading playing for fear of losing again, and so the nightmare merry go round continues.

[Charnwood]

There was virtually no improvement from the weekend. Dreadful team selection, lack of cohesion, cant string 2 passes together, no corners, 1 shot on goal, should have been at least 4-0. If it isn't changed and soon we will be relegated by a distance. The brave new experiment has turned into a deranged Frankenstein like monster.

You need a bloody medal mate.

[arana peligrosa]

Frankenstein's Monster (?), seeing as another Hallowe'en is almost upon us I guess it warrants the occasion.

No trick or treat here, it's another sorry as* story I got to learn of from today. Top team beating the one in last position can be excused, but stats indicate we were never really in it or made nowhere near enough attempt to take something from the event. Just for the record, Paul Hurst was seen to say this following the game :

"We're going to need every single player to stick together and be ready for some battles that are ahead.

"All I will do is continue to go about the job and until I hear differently. Realistically if nothing's said, I will get on with it.

"If something's said, we'll deal with that message, whatever it is."

The last bit seems a bit ambiguous, not sure what direction this is going to take but realize enough Hurst has proved to be a substantial disappointment.
As team coach he is responsible first and foremost as to what occurs on the field by way of providing results, team selection and motivating players. A few weeks of sub-standard performance and scores could be excused but we're at a stage now where this has continued to such an extent where resignation would seem the only viable option.

No shame, you gave it a try, (but) do the honorable thing and move on. It's the only feasible action many would argue if the club intends to retain Championship status by the end of season.

[Mach_Polish_Blue]

He never stops to surprise/baffle with his decisions regarding the playing personnel. Overwhelming amount of changes in odd hope of getting a result. Spence all of sudden in the team, Nolan playing as a right winger whereas Edwards was left on the bench.

Lost any support for Hurst. Feeling as low as I was during the Jewell era.

To make things even more stupid he takes off our brightest player in Edun to replace him for a pile of crap Ward is. Edun the only player he could offer something today. He and maybe Pennington can come out with credit tonight. Perhaps Bialkowski too for keeping to score low in the 2nd half.
The rest? Hopeless. Nolan in particular. I was so happy when we signed him but he turns out to be a biggest disapointment.

We could have played all night and we wouldn't have scored. The lack of quality upfront was particularly telling. But here is where one of the main problems, the club's cancer in the shape of Evans. Good strikers cost 5,6,7m in this league whereas he refuses to spend money like that on new players. We had money from the Waghorn sale, we let McGoldrick go. Before anyone reminds me about McGoldrick injury problems it needs to be said that he remains a picture of good health ever since joining Sheffield Utd. Likewise another 'sicknote' in Webster at Bristol City.
We lack quality upfront and Evans should have learnt from the Murphy's departure that things like that are very dangerous. But he doesn't give a f**k.

Hurst has created a hell of a mess in such short period of time. Keeps doing random things to get the result. He simply has to go as players are devoid of any confidence.

Millwall on Saturday so as always a few random things from that cretin. Nsiala will be probably back, so will Dozzell, so will Graham, perhaps Donacien too, Ward may start. Edun will obviously be dropped as he was following the impressive performance against Sheffield Wed.

Disastrous owner and his policy that ruins the club, disastrous manager, poor team. The change of a manager is the only glimmer of hope for us but it's going to be a thankless task with this group of players.

The lowest moment for me as a Town fan. Cold wintry Tuesday nights at Rochdale or Fleetwood next season are looming.

[derick_ipsw]

I truly hope PH is relieved of his duties in the morning. His position is untenable now and we need some change to at least get a different atmosphere at the club. Things can’t get worse than they are at the moent

I don't think that will happen until the International break depending on results against Millwall, Preston and Reading unfortunately.

[AylesburyBlue]

I have never seen a more boring clueless team, genuinely think it’s impossible for us to survive with this current regime.
My next game is Reading away. I really hope Tim Sherwood is in charge by then. I don’t think he’s a fantastic manager but he is certainly charismatic and he would stick a massive rocket up those players arses. Also when at Villa he put a lot of faith in youth.
I didn’t think it was possible to watch worse football than last season. Still stand by the decision to sack MM however, things got very stale.

[Tangfastic]

When you make 7 changes you have to think Hurst’s mind is shot ... and is stumbling around in desperation. The players must also see that too.

[BLUEBLOOD]

Just found the live pass stats.....

At 70 mins Leeds have completed 328 accurate passes compared to our 133.

Careful Charnwood with those Stats some people think it means nothing.

After the Swansea game I got hacked to pieces about the stats now 2 games later and 2 defeats MAYBE! I was right about shots on target being a concern.
BlueBlood,Lets not get carried away a great result but looking at the stats is worry.
3 shots on target and 3 goals says it all about our problem upfront.

Charlton837 ,You can look at stats all you like but means nothing.
Ipswichtownno1,Really blue? We just got that first win and still gloom n doom
Tangfastic,I truly think people need to get away from stats,If people get turned on by stats... go w*nk off a statistician.

Doom and Gloom maybe I saw the bigger picture and not the result against Swansea.

[charlton837]

Just found the live pass stats.....

At 70 mins Leeds have completed 328 accurate passes compared to our 133.

Careful Charnwood with those Stats some people think it means nothing.

After the Swansea game I got hacked to pieces about the stats now 2 games later and 2 defeats MAYBE! I was right about shots on target being a concern.
BlueBlood,Lets not get carried away a great result but looking at the stats is worry.
3 shots on target and 3 goals says it all about our problem upfront.

Charlton837 ,You can look at stats all you like but means nothing.
Ipswichtownno1,Really blue? We just got that first win and still gloom n doom
Tangfastic,I truly think people need to get away from stats,If people get turned on by stats... go w*nk off a statistician.

Doom and Gloom maybe I saw the bigger picture and not the result against Swansea.

Take a look at passing stats last season in many games. Would shoe a similar picture but we finished in a relatively stable position.

[Charnwood]

Some stats are meaningless BB but I know exactly where you’re coming from. Possession stats for example can be meaningless because teams who concede possesssion and play effectively on the break can win games, eg in Seville last week England won 2-3 with only 27% possession and 3 shots on target but these delivered 3 goals and a win.

I used the pass stats last night because it was obvious we were giving the ball away too much and didn’t seem to want to keep it, even worse nobody in our team seemed to want the ball for fear of not knowing what to do next.

I’m sure managers use stats to analyse games and analyse individual player performances, but these have to be used indicatively and not in their entirety.

Here are some Match Fact summaries from last nights game taken from a professional analyst site which makes for gloomy reading.

Leeds Strengths

•Were effective at creating goalscoring opportunities through individual skill
•Were effective at creating goalscoring opportunities from the flanks
•Were effective at creating goalscoring opportunities from set-pieces

Ipswich Strengths

•The team had no particular strengths.

Leeds Weaknesses

•Were caught offside often

Ipswich Weaknesses

•Were poor at finishing
•Were aggressive
•Lost possession often
•Were caught offside often

Leeds Style

•Dominated possession
•Favoured short passing

Ipswich Style

•Played with width
•Attacked down the right side
•Favoured long balls


You can definitely look at stats and they rarely mean nothing, but they can sometimes be misleading if not used looking at the bigger picture.

[Magicmark]

From what I saw last night we'd even struggle in league 1 .Hopefully Evans will do the right thing and put Hurst & the supporters out of their misery.
Not sure who could come in and get the best out of the players we have.Oh well we've been in a simular position before and come good,things can only get better.

[Charnwood]

You’re right Mark we have been here before when that chump Paul Jewell was in charge, first rule don’t employ a Paul !

At this time in that season we only had 7 points compared with our current 9, but the difference then was that we had some half decent players in the squad like Aaron Cresswell, Carlos Edwards, Luke Chambers, N’Daw, Lee Martin, Daryl Murphy, DJ Campbell, Nigel Reo-Coker, Jason Scotland and Jay Emmanuel-Thomas and in those names you can see a few goals, unlike that in the current squad. I think McCarthy added about another 10 players in the January transfer window, nearly all freebies and loans.

I think McCarthy held a nickname called the Magician and that’s exactly what we need now.

Can it be done twice, I sincerely hope so but I’m not feeling very optimistic this morning.

[charlton837]

Whilst we were a mess under Jewell I agree we had some better players in there who were underachieving. This time round I don't necessarily see that. I felt most of the new players in the early weeks looked OK, it was some of the other experienced ones letting us down. But I am questioning whether the new players were playing at 100% and they have no more to give, now their confidence is shot to pieces and we are seeing players who just don't know what to do to pull their way out of this.

I want to be optimistic but feeling pretty down in the dumps this morning about it. I don't see what we can do here. Ive felt this club has been in a slow painful demise for a while now, we needed radical change and I think most would accept that can go one of two ways, its not looking like its going to the way we hoped, we have to be honest. I don't put it all on PH but he has to take much blame as recruitment is down to him along with some of the tactical decisions we are seeing. The bigger problem is Evans, its clear that our budget is very small, we can look at the summer and say we did spend, that is true but overall we made money and have ended up with a weaker squad.

PH is starting to make comments to suggest he is far from happy with a few things, to me ME wont allow that to continue for long as it could shine the light further on him, but equally im wondering why anyone in their right mind would want to take on the Ipswich job at present, even if we do end up in League 1 theres no gurantee we would be competing financially with those at the top end there. Ive said before I don't think League 1 is the end of the world but with the way the club is at the moment we are a long way from being any kind of competitive team. In the coming weeks we are going to see what ME is really made of, this is the most precarious position we have been in under him, we will find out with who the next appointment is (if PH leaves) and what sort of players we try to sign in January just how much Evans values staying up. Whichever way we look at it its going to take a mammoth effort. Think I saw based on historic years we are already looking at needing 1.1 points per game to have a chance of getting enough points, considering we are on 9 points from 14 games with no sight of a good run that's only likely to increase, if it hits 1.2-1.3 I don't see us getting them.

[Bluemike]

Well that was worth falling into bed at 2.45AM for, NOT !!! You all saw it for yourselves so a report is pointless but my views on it are so mixed up right now I do not know which way we should bloody turn. One thing which is abundantly clear is that this is not working how I or many others hoped it would, in fact it is turning into a disaster bigger even than those of keane & Jewell, that is fact and for that reason something has to change and very very fast or it will be terminal.

To a degree Paul Hurst is a bit of a victim himself in some respects, the departures of Waghorn, Webster, Garner & Didsy can't really be blamed on him, when players want away for whatever reason they will go, that is the way it is, I believe it to be true that all of these wanted away and would have gone even if we had begged them to stay. I also think we could by now have expected to see the likes of Huws, Bishop & Adeyemi all contributing, Three players who at their best would be assets to this team, how the hell can they keep being injured, again and again and again, it's ridiculous, some blamed it on the fitness regime under MM well it's still happening now under Hurst and co who pride themselves on all this modern technical bullshit.

I wanted Hurst, everybody knows it, not afraid to admit to it either, why should I be ? However, I expected much much more in terms of seeing a new era slowly being built, I always believed we would probably be bottom Third this season and that was fine by me if we could see stuff falling into place in other areas, but so many things have not been done correctly, so much so we now find ourselves as virtual relegation certs.

*** The handling of our kids, Woolfenden, Morris, Cotter, Folami, McLoughlin, they all looked more than ready to me to make strides this season and bolster the squad, but no Hurst doesn't feel it to be the case, clearly knows better than Klug.

*** Bizarre team line ups, game after game we are seeing 6 or 7 changes, how can any team gel and form an understanding ? To me it is just scraping around trying to stumble across a winning formula through sheer luck. The treatment of some players is crazy, Tayo Edun for one, always looks bright and capable and yet for weeks was not even in the match day squad, Gwion Edwards, probably the best of out lower league signings and the only one who looks dangerous being either subbed off or consigned to the bench, players that for weeks are in the wilderness suddenly return(Jordan Spence) classic case in point.

*** Square pegs in round holes all over again, something that really angered the fans under McCarthy. We've already had to suffer a CB at RB and a RB at LB etc etc now last night we get Jon Nolan who was dropped from his natural position being brought back to play at RM instead of Edwards who is our best hope !! Trevoh Chalobah, frustrates everyone but against QPR was one of the better players of a crap bunch gets dropped and in comes Flynn Downes to play alongside Skusey, virtual clones of each other. i have also lost count of the number of times our substitutions beggar belief, we always seem to take off our most effective player.


The list just goes on and on, the high pressing game which never appears , the lack of man management, rumours of disharmony, stupid quotes like "we aint rock bottom" he is a dead man walking in my eyes, out of his depth which disappoints me as he looked to have all the attributes of a manager who tries to do things the right way and by that I mean starting in non league and working his way through the lower leagues, earning his big job, not like the Frank Lampards & Steven Gerrards of this world who have landed jobs at big clubs with huge budgets and would find it hard to fail and for that I respect Hurst but he has to help himself and he just doesn't.

I have read and heard a few comments that last night was better than Saturday, errr no it wasn't, our passing was woeful, we hardly ever put more than Three passes together, our movement was rank bad, several times I screamed for someone to bloody move, to show for a team mate and want it, it barely happened, a killer creative pass never ever materialised, for me players are scared and as soon as they scored they went hiding, the opening twenty minutes wasn't actually that bad, unless I am totally losing it that is but once behind all the failings creep back in. Humping long aimless balls up to Jackson & Sears and just praying something falls our way will not be enough.

We are playing League One football of that there is no doubt, aside from Swansea and maybe the opening Five or Six games of the season it has slowly got worse but it is gaining momentum now, in those early games I genuinely did see hope, something that we were going to build on but it has gone backwards, the fans are clearly wanting a new direction already, I did not speak to one single fan last night who was prepared to stick with it for longer believing it would come good, there aren't many around now.

I don't think it takes a brain surgeon to know Hurst will be on his way soon, it cannot be any other way, I think the next International break could be the time, the next Three games are massive for us, Millwall (A), Preston (H) and Reading (A) just have to glean a minimum of Six points, even then I still expect Hurst to be removed from post, anything less and he may go before Reading, failure to do so would be suicide on the part of Marcus Evans, as it is I still wonder if we are doomed even with a new man at the helm, we may just stumble along until January but what funds will be given to the new incumbent ? More to the point who the hell will want to come here given our plight ? It is a woeful position we find ourselves in in such a quick space of time.

Already I have taken to looking at Rotherham, Bolton and Hull, they for me are our only hope, the Three we may just be able to crawl above as the season progresses, all Three from what I have seen are every bit as bad as us and will no doubt be down there come next April, the big question is can we better the results of all Three of them ? As a safety net I have already looked to see how many new grounds I may be able to do next season, as it stands it's between 16-18, oh the joy, Walsall, Coventry, Rochdale, Wycombe, Southend, Blackpool (plan the weekender), Scunthorpe, and maybe even Forest Green Rovers, We're coming for you !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[charlton837]

You think he will wait until next international break? I think he may well be gone after Milwall game if we lose. Reason being these next few matches are huge. He may put klug in charge of them and hope for best thinking/hoping we may pick up a win. Klug and Nash had us playing in a competitive way (mostly) towards end of last season although what they could do with this squad is another question.