How do we approach the rest of the season? What formation do we use? What tactics should come in to play?

Plus a sourced update from Si.....

Good Afternoon Ladies and Gents,

Today I am writing an opinion piece on how I think we need to approach the rest of this season, I want to clarify that unless stated all of this article is opinion based.

So first and foremost for me I believe that the FA Cup needs to be our absolute priority, that doesn’t mean stop focusing on the league it just means that anything less than a semi-final in The FA Cup is a pure failure in my eyes, we got arguably the second easiest draw we possibly could have got and leaves us a good opportunity to progress further albeit against a really good side.

The League, we need to be a little more consistent and just push as hard as we can to move as high as we can, it is unrealistic to think of anything above 7th, if we win our game in hand we will be 3 points from 7th and 5 points from 6th. There are 6 or 7 clubs in the fight for the last 2 European places in the league (6th and 7th position).

Realistically we should be challenging those places and we are currently, all of the teams involved including us are incredibly hit and miss with their form and anything could happen.

We still have to play 4 of the teams challenging in and around those places with 3 of those games being at Stamford Bridge. 7 of our remaining 12 games come at Stamford Bridge with Arsenal (A) & Spurs (H) to be re-scheduled due to our FA Cup and Carabao Cup involvements in recent weeks.

Looking at the above fixtures (& Arsenal (A) / Spurs (H) inclusive) we have some really good chances to pick up points, in the reverse fixtures we accumulated 14 points which in my opinion would not be enough to reach 7th position in the league, so if we can improve a couple of the poor results from earlier in the season then we can reach Europe.

It is not the hardest run of games regardless of the current feelings around the club and the manager right now.

I know what you will all be thinking by this point is “Yes Luke, but Poch is still in charge” and I get it, I do, he is lucky to still be in his job, purely because of how he has handled the media recently and the responses he is given and I am onboard with most of your thoughts, BUT I do think he is being slightly overly scapegoated right now because he is the face of it all when a lot of the issues have stemmed or are coming from above him and above his pay grade.

He is a decent manager and can put a run of games together however much most of you believe this is incorrect, it is factual, whether HE WILL is a completely different subject. The likelihood is in my opinion that he will be our manager until the summer, we need to ACCEPT that and get behind the team, if we make The Bridge a fortress for those 7 home games then we can easily qualify for Europe for next season which is important.

Moving on to formation I am unsure whether I prefer us in a 4 or 3/5 at the back right now, the personnel available last weekend and the opposition we were facing warranted a back 3 in my opinion and that was one of the first times for a while where I was impressed with Poch because he realised that situation and changed his tactics and was flexible to change formation.

I really enjoyed Palmer being closer to Jackson and I think that improved Jackson’s game as well, Gusto as a wing back was even better than as a full back and I think it did improve our build up as and when we decided to play. I do think it limited some of the key attributes our young squad have which is getting in behind creating pockets of space etc. but that could also be down to how much of a low block Brentford play.

We can be very fluid with it in my mind, against teams with a lower block I would go with a 4 atb and play the below lineup, there or thereabouts with a couple of players arguably going in or out.

Against teams who are likely to try and come at us and overplay I would look to play a back 3 and use our pace on the counter, we have proved against City and at times against Liverpool in the final we can be incredibly dangerous and creative on the counter, it just comes down to being clinical with our finishing. I would play a similar lineup to this with a 3 atb.

It’s a really tight call between Thiago and Trev, right now Trev just nicks it just for his athleticism and pace over Thiago, but if Thiago plays in a back 3 he would be at his very best I have no doubt.

In this formation we have the likes of Madueke, Mudryk & Sterling who can come on and make us a more attacking and pacey team and the likes of Carney and Nkunku would go ahead of all of those guys when returning from injury.

Those are my thoughts, please respectfully give me yours in the comments.

I have a small sourced update from Si;

“Heard Chelsea still doing all they can to follow through this season with Poch. No change right now but more poor performances and FA Cup exit could change things. My opinion is they’re desperately trying to save face rather than admit yet another mistake.”

My response/thoughts to Si;

“I actually don’t blame them for saving face after yet another mistake, hold on for a split in the summer looks a lot better on them than sacking another manager mid season! Trying to cover their arses aren’t they!”

Which realistically if any of us make a mistake or repeated mistakes in our work place our natural reaction is to cover our arses. I am FAR from defending the but I do understand their logic right now. In my opinion Poch will walk in the summer anyway which also looks better on them.

Thank you all for reading

Luke Rushbrook