EFL cup. Notts Forest v NUFC

[Toondes]

I didn’t watch tonight as I was at Kevin’s bridges show in Newcastle . Looks like it was worth swerving .

[Aldridge Prior]

So, what positives can we take from tonight?

HIV

[Bruuuuuuuuce ()]

So, what positives can we take from tonight?

Joselu played s****.

Benitez is one game closer to leaving.

[Toondes]

So, what positives can we take from tonight?

Joselu played s****.

Benitez is one game closer to leaving.

Do you want him to leave ? Be careful what you wish for. We’d struggle to do any better .

[ALF]

Rafa needs to be held accountable. He's got the Mike Ashley excuse every single time but Mike Ashley isn't the guy that's failed to motivate a side for the 3rd game in a row. He's also not the guy apparently falling out with 2 or 3 senior players.

[Donkey Toon]

Rafa's got to take a lot of stick there. How he could have looked at Sterry and Longstaff in training and thought they were ready is completely beyond me.

And after half time our performance didn't change at all, we seemingly only know how to play as the underdogs (and even then we're not that good).

Sterry and Longstaff were far from the problem tonight.

Kenedy, Atsu, Muto, Clark, Schar were our worst tonight. Rafa definitely gets some blame too, too late with subs and the decision to play Clark at LB was just poor.

Agree with this. The kids did pretty well considering the established players were so s**** on the night.

[bodacious benny]

Despite the result I didn't think we played that badly last night. I've certainly seen us play MUCH worse on god knows how many occasions.

And yeah, Longstaff and Sterry did alright too.

[Toondes]

Rafa needs to be held accountable. He's got the Mike Ashley excuse every single time but Mike Ashley isn't the guy that's failed to motivate a side for the 3rd game in a row. He's also not the guy apparently falling out with 2 or 3 senior players.

He hasn’t fallen out with them though has he ? Thought they were injured ?

[Don Sholeone]

Anyone expecting us to compete for a cup with the current level of squad investment is clearly setting themselves up for disappointment, our squad isn't strong enough to focus on anything other than the PL.

Secondly people getting angry over the start of the season is pretty ridiculous imo, We have the hardest start in the league and people are already getting on the team and Rafas back, its insane, and people still wonder why we get labeled as deluded.

[vrabbit]

Darlow was okish ... not really at fault for any of the goals but shaky in other occasions when he got luck Forest didn't score.

Sterry was fine, got up and down the right side and was willing to put balls into the box. Has work to do defensively although that Lolley did look a handful (he looked better than Manquillo against Cardiff's Murphy).

Schar was crap, beaten to the spot by a dude 40 years older than him just two minutes in and taken to school several times by that same player throughout the game. Then his lack of hustle in stoppage time allowed Dias to comfortably get to a long ball in the left wing and bring it all the way into the box for the hard-hit ball Darlow was able to deflect but Cash was able to score on.

Fernandez was good and I think he's solidified his place as the starter alongside Lascelles.
Clark ... I thought he had had solid performances next to Lascelles so far this season, but he was kind of done a disservice being played at left back. Besides getting up and down the line pretty well he offered very little offensively and didn't look as good defensively as he has at centre back.

Atsu has some good, some bad, nothing great, nothing awful, just simply didn't make much of an impact, especially for someone who played 90+ minutes.

Longstaff didn't start out so well but really settled as the game went on and I was pleased with his
performance. I'd like to continue to see more of him whenever it's appropriate to give him a run.

Ki was alright, better than vs Chelsea for sure. He was better in ball recovery, overall defense, and the passing game. Big difference between Chelsea and Nottingham, but at least it makes you curious about how he would perform against a mid-table team in the PL.

Kenedy ... feel free to go back in this thread and look at my posts about him. I don't want t pour it on but he was bad. Lacked confidence, constantly lost the 1v1s, doesn't seem to have his head in the game, and was mainly at fault for Dias' goal by exhibiting very poor ball control and a pass back from Ki that should had been extremely easy to deal with.

Muto I don't know what to make of. He's active, works hard, but doesn't find the ball enough and doesn't look threatening with it consistently enough for my liking. I've never thought he's a #10 and I think he's better off working alongside a striker or maybe even out on the wing. And yes he was alongside Joselu at times last night but I think he might partner up better with Rondon.

That's because Joselu fails to impress me in a target man role. He's done well so far this season in the box but outside of that his holdup play has been poor. I expected more from him against a Championship side.

As far as the subs, Murphy didn't make a significant impact in the left wing but even his performance there was better than Kenedy's (who actually looked better at LB outside of his late blunder). I thought Perez made more of an impact even prior to the awful non-call for the PK in stoppage time and he had a nice assist for Rondon's goal, and Rondon did as much as he could in the 10+ minutes he got, offering better holdup play and obviously doing well with his goal.

[vrabbit]

Anyone expecting us to compete for a cup with the current level of squad investment is clearly setting themselves up for disappointment, our squad isn't strong enough to focus on anything other than the PL.

Secondly people getting angry over the start of the season is pretty ridiculous imo, We have the hardest start in the league and people are already getting on the team and Rafas back, its insane, and people still wonder why we get labeled as deluded.

fans really need to not lose sight of this. At City and vs Arsenal in our next two. Then a couple of winnable games before a visit to Man U who may sort out their business by then. The mid-October to mid-Decmber schedule is where we need to really get good results and rack up some wins: vs Brighton, at Southampton, vs Watford, vs Bournemouth, at Burnley, vs West Ham, at Everton, vs Wolves, at Huddersfield, and vs Fulham. By then we'll really know whether we're headed for a relegation battle or not. End of 2018 and the start of 2019 hits us with at Liverpool, at Watford, vs Man U, at Chelsea, vs Cardiff, vs City, and at Spurs so we need to get ourselves in a good position in the table before then to go into that string of games with some peace of mind to manage results (minus the Cardiff game which needs to be a W, maybe at Watford as well).

[TJR]

Anyone expecting us to compete for a cup with the current level of squad investment is clearly setting themselves up for disappointment, our squad isn't strong enough to focus on anything other than the PL.

Secondly people getting angry over the start of the season is pretty ridiculous imo, We have the hardest start in the league and people are already getting on the team and Rafas back, its insane, and people still wonder why we get labeled as deluded.

Spot on on both points.

The overreaction to our start has been ridiculous. Especially considering how we've started this season is very similar to how we started last season.

[bodacious benny]

According to morons on Twitter we're virtually heading for League 2.

[overseasTOON]

According to morons on Twitter we're virtually heading for League 2.

Be a hell of a ride though!

[Acid Hippo]

I feel like we looked okay on the ball at times but ultimately there was zero end product. Spent too long playing out wide with no one decent to cross it in and no one decent to cross it to. Forest were just quicker than us as well. Quicker to react, quicker to the ball, and quicker on the break. Penalty or no penalty, we did not deserve anything from that game - we were second best all over the pitch.

I'm not too gutted. We played without the spine of our team and we will definitely play much better than that this season. Cup run would have been nice but it just wasn't to be!

I still hate Forest though.

[Bruuuuuuuuce ()]

According to morons on Twitter we're virtually heading for League 2.

Fingers crossed might eventually get rid of Ashley when people stop going.

Mugs.

[Remember Colo]

Until we have a better midfield, we won't dominate play against anyone. Maybe I overstate that, but especially when Shelvey is missing, there's nobody to control play. We won't ever create enough, and will too often be on the back foot.

[ALF]

Anyone expecting us to compete for a cup with the current level of squad investment is clearly setting themselves up for disappointment, our squad isn't strong enough to focus on anything other than the PL.

Secondly people getting angry over the start of the season is pretty ridiculous imo, We have the hardest start in the league and people are already getting on the team and Rafas back, its insane, and people still wonder why we get labeled as deluded.

Anyone can compete for a cup. It all depends on the draw. If we're going to bang average Championship teams and getting outplayed then we have issues. Wigan won the FA Cup 5 years ago.

We have got an absurdly difficult start to the season, which makes it all the more annoying that we didn't look remotely interested against Cardiff.