Everton v F.C. Porto, August 3rd, KO 16:00pm.

[AulleTa]

Saw a clip on twitter of Besic doing dirty things with the ball - was he good then?

I moved my kids to the other room mate

 

[Chang Elephant]

Fuming here

 

[Eggs]

.....thought Stones looked classy the more the game went on.

 

[Furey1878]

Not a bad match, considering Porto are a good side who are far more into their pre-season than Everton are. I loved when the Gwladys got into the match towards the team picked up its second wind. Absolutely gutted Ossie never scored that header, too. That would have been a boss goal to cap off testimonial. A few notes:

• Besic looks an absolute player, worthy of the #17 jersey.
• Naismith is still boss
• Some good creative pass from the midfield today, particularly from Ossie, Barry and Besic.
• Jags was boss today.
• McGeady frustrated but kept at it, sadly he got took off just as he was getting into the game. I think it should be him and Kev as our first choice wingers. And I'm not a Pienaar hater by any means.

All in all, shame we couldn't have been sent home with a win, but another good workout. Looking forward to having Rom and Kev back soon as we've just lacked that quality up top this pre-season.

 

[AJC5]

We play our game at a relatively slow, measured pace anyway, but when there's no adrenaline in the players' veins it becomes snail-paced, lacking energy, thought and direction. Today was such a game. Very poor.

One thing Martinez has got to find a way round is the opposition pressing our back line. Whenever our keeper was in possession, whether in play or looking to play out a goal kick, Porto put a man on at least 3, and sometimes all, of our back line. That back line remained very close to the edge of our box in these instances so we just never got the ball through the back line and into our middle men, never mind our attackers. Strikes me that if teams are going to do this to us then we're going to have to push the back line further up the park now and again when looking to receive the ball from the keeper. How you do that and still retain possession I'm not sure.........over to you Bobby.

Chile did this in the world cup. If you pass it around at the back the opposition have a choice, they either sit off and let you have possession which probably means that we will dominate possession or they commit men forward and press you high up the field. This will generally involve 3 players pressing high up on our two centre backs and the deep midfielder forcing us to kick long. Although this looks like a success for the pressing team what it actually means is that it is seven on seven in their half of the field. If you have a keeper with good distribution you can actually make that in to a 5 on 5 one one side of the field and 2 on 2 on the other. If you have a keeper with a accurate distribution you're now in the perfect position to counter attach while the opposition have three men up the field. All it takes is winning the header and second ball to be in a 1 on 1 or 2 on 2 situation. Lukaku needs to get better at winning flicks on to make this work and our keepers need to improve the accuracy of their kicking.

 

[bugsy]

what was the att today?

 

[ilikecheese]

Its already fallen in mate. Catalan Clown shouts all over the place.

Gosh...I hope we don't get relegated.

 

[bourneblue]

Saw a clip on twitter of Besic doing dirty things with the ball - was he good then?

Groucho is this you denying you watched the game on erm, a "dodgy" stream ?

 

[Groucho]

Groucho is this you denying you watched the game on erm, a "dodgy" stream ?

Sorry mate no, genuinely saw posts on (shudder) twitter.

 

[LinekersLegs]

what was the att today?

According to O'Keefe 19,757

 

[toffeejack]

Sorry mate no, genuinely saw posts on (shudder) twitter.

that was his first touch groucho ha, wonderful first things in blue

 

[bourneblue]

Sorry mate no, genuinely saw posts on (shudder) twitter.

Work commitments I gather ? Let me add he was impressive very impressive,we should have given him more of the ball.

 

[Groucho]

that was his first touch groucho ha, wonderful first things in blue

Wowzers

Work commitments I gather ? Let me add he was impressive very impressive,we should have given him more of the ball.

Not really sure why that's worth a mention, but at least Besic looks good.

 

[marty mcfly]

Chile did this in the world cup. If you pass it around at the back the opposition have a choice, they either sit off and let you have possession which probably means that we will dominate possession or they commit men forward and press you high up the field. This will generally involve 3 players pressing high up on our two centre backs and the deep midfielder forcing us to kick long. Although this looks like a success for the pressing team what it actually means is that it is seven on seven in their half of the field. If you have a keeper with good distribution you can actually make that in to a 5 on 5 one one side of the field and 2 on 2 on the other. If you have a keeper with a accurate distribution you're now in the perfect position to counter attach while the opposition have three men up the field. All it takes is winning the header and second ball to be in a 1 on 1 or 2 on 2 situation. Lukaku needs to get better at winning flicks on to make this work and our keepers need to improve the accuracy of their kicking.

The best way to beat this trap is for the keeper to clip the ball out to the wingers or straight to midfield bypassing the front press which is relatively risk free. Germany are good at this with Neur who plays like an extra defender.

 

[Connor]

Zero to worry about here, Porto were a good side, they're in the CL next week so they'll ahead of us physically.

We'll be sound lads, absolutely sound.