Aye, what could Mair have done in the game? I don't think he put a foot wrong and he did what was required when put under pressure, got rid of the ball or played it to another player in red.
The centre of defence was pretty solid, Mair and Diamond did all that was asked of them. In actual fact, defensively we did alright last night, it was going forward that was the problem. As soon as the defenders played the ball forward the attacking players had no f*cking clue what to do with it. I turned to my mate after about 10 minutes and said that we were lacking an urgency in the game. The time it was taking them to spread play was painful to watch. For some unknown reason the majority were guilty of holding onto it for way too long.
Aluko tried to stay as wide as possible for most of the game to stretch play and did alright when he had it. The amount of time he was standing free shouting for the ball but not getting it was unbelievable. But again the movement when Aluko did get the ball was shocking. No angled runs across defenders, no runs in behind the defence, no-one screaming to collect the ball. No-one willing to stand up and take the game by the scruff of the neck.
It was horrible watching so called professional players stand in the middle of a pitch looking for a pass whilst his team-mates just stood around scratching their arses.
I really felt sorry for Kerr as there was a number of times he had the ball looking for a pass and there was absolutely no movement at all from Mackie/Maguire/Smith/Severin. I can't even think of a time where Severin ran past him to give him the angle. Even the fullbacks would run up in support then just stop when they got level with the player on the ball. There was absolutely no drive or direction from anyone bar Kerr, Aluko and Diamond late in the game.
This continued for God knows how long until we started playing the long ball, an absolutely disastrous tactic considering we had Maguire and Mackie up-front.
F*ck sake, I've just wound myself up again... :hammer: