Ali-1874 Posted February 23, 2009 Share Posted February 23, 2009 I find this is the most frustrating thing about watching Hearts just now. Forget not having a centre back or a striker for a moment, the thing that cost us two points on Saturday and could have potentially cost us another four points against Aberdeen and Inverness is how deep we sit after scoring a goal! You can see the players retreating and backing off the opposition players until they are nearly in our own box! This allows the other team time to move up the park and lob balls into our box. I mean thats potentially fine if you have a defender who's dominant in the air but at the moment we don't. I would be a lot more comfortable and confident if we held our defensive line a bit higher up the park after we've scored than we did against St Mirren and Aberdeen in the past couple of weeks. I've only recently started going back to games but has it been like this the whole season? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Victorian Posted February 23, 2009 Share Posted February 23, 2009 I find this is the most frustrating thing about watching Hearts just now. Forget not having a centre back or a striker for a moment, the thing that cost us two points on Saturday and could have potentially cost us another four points against Aberdeen and Inverness is how deep we sit after scoring a goal! You can see the players retreating and backing off the opposition players until they are nearly in our own box! This allows the other team time to move up the park and lob balls into our box. I mean thats potentially fine if you have a defender who's dominant in the air but at the moment we don't. I would be a lot more comfortable and confident if we held our defensive line a bit higher up the park after we've scored than we did against St Mirren and Aberdeen in the past couple of weeks. I've only recently started going back to games but has it been like this the whole season? i've just commented something similar on another thread. we are not confident enough to hold our shape and continue to play football throughout the game, we are panicking and booting it anywhere and inviting the opposition on to us. csaba will know that and has to get it sorted out soon because it just makes it even harder to win that it should be, even against pish like st.mingin. we got away with vs the sheep but we wont very often. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dazo Posted February 23, 2009 Share Posted February 23, 2009 I find this is the most frustrating thing about watching Hearts just now. Forget not having a centre back or a striker for a moment, the thing that cost us two points on Saturday and could have potentially cost us another four points against Aberdeen and Inverness is how deep we sit after scoring a goal! You can see the players retreating and backing off the opposition players until they are nearly in our own box! This allows the other team time to move up the park and lob balls into our box. I mean thats potentially fine if you have a defender who's dominant in the air but at the moment we don't. I would be a lot more comfortable and confident if we held our defensive line a bit higher up the park after we've scored than we did against St Mirren and Aberdeen in the past couple of weeks. I've only recently started going back to games but has it been like this the whole season? You can't forget about not having centre backs playing because they control the line. I have no doubt if we had 2 centre halfs playing we would not be so deep and we would not have conceded that goal. Even a bombscare like Zal would have made a difference on Saturday. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Erik Posted February 23, 2009 Share Posted February 23, 2009 We've been like this for a long time now, since before Csaba was on the scene. I agree we need to sort it out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
magicTs Posted February 23, 2009 Share Posted February 23, 2009 It's happened the entire season and whilst the last few home games have seen it highlighted more with both ICT and St Midden scroing late and Aberdeen coming mighty close there have been several other examples of us almost conceding late equalisers in home games (Falkirk 2-1, Hamilton 1-0, St Mirren 2-1). Of course a huge problem is we simply don't score enough goals and therefore kill teams off. We have led by 2 goals at Tynecastle just once this season and even then for only about 2 and a half minutes ! (v Rangers) so any result we have had has seen us hanging on big time toward the end. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tiberius Stinkfinger Posted February 23, 2009 Share Posted February 23, 2009 I find this is the most frustrating thing about watching Hearts just now. Forget not having a centre back or a striker for a moment, the thing that cost us two points on Saturday and could have potentially cost us another four points against Aberdeen and Inverness is how deep we sit after scoring a goal! You can see the players retreating and backing off the opposition players until they are nearly in our own box! This allows the other team time to move up the park and lob balls into our box. I mean thats potentially fine if you have a defender who's dominant in the air but at the moment we don't. I would be a lot more comfortable and confident if we held our defensive line a bit higher up the park after we've scored than we did against St Mirren and Aberdeen in the past couple of weeks. I've only recently started going back to games but has it been like this the whole season? Yes,its been like it all season and it would seem that all the other teams in the league have spotted the fact that we cannot seem to put the game to bed. We are therefore always wide open in the closing stages because teams have figured out that we keech our pants with 10-15 minutes to go and completely lose our shape. We also lose our attacking options at the end of games because our talismatic centre forward is usually kanackered by then and we encourage the opposition to come onto us with little or no threat in return. We are a young side and will learn and hopefully in the not to distant we will give someone a battering. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ali-1874 Posted February 23, 2009 Author Share Posted February 23, 2009 You can't forget about not having centre backs playing because they control the line. I have no doubt if we had 2 centre halfs playing we would not be so deep and we would not have conceded that goal. Even a bombscare like Zal would have made a difference on Saturday. Yeah I suppose but Berra played against Inverness and I seem to recall that we sat pretty deep against them. I also think the midfield is to blame, no one wants to come forward and close the man with the ball down. Thus giving him time to get the ball into the box. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dazo Posted February 23, 2009 Share Posted February 23, 2009 Yeah I suppose but Berra played against Inverness and I seem to recall that we sat pretty deep against them. I also think the midfield is to blame, no one wants to come forward and close the man with the ball down. Thus giving him time to get the ball into the box. I think since Elvis left we have had no one to organise the defence/team properly. Csaba can only do so much and I don't think Berra was ready for the role as team organiser. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rudi must stay Posted February 23, 2009 Share Posted February 23, 2009 We've been like this for a long time now, since before Csaba was on the scene. I agree we need to sort it out. why fix something that isn't broke. It's not great to watch but teams aren't sure how to play against us. It's also a system that only works if every player is trying their hardest and at the moment atleast, they are. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Erik Posted February 23, 2009 Share Posted February 23, 2009 why fix something that isn't broke. It's not great to watch but teams aren't sure how to play against us. It's also a system that only works if every player is trying their hardest and at the moment atleast, they are. If it "worked" we'd have taken 3 points on Saturday surely....? Inviting teams to come play in our own box whilst defending narrow leads is asking for trouble. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rudi must stay Posted February 23, 2009 Share Posted February 23, 2009 If it "worked" we'd have taken 3 points on Saturday surely....? Inviting teams to come play in our own box whilst defending narrow leads is asking for trouble. its asked for trouble all season. We're still in 3rd though Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dazo Posted February 23, 2009 Share Posted February 23, 2009 If it "worked" we'd have taken 3 points on Saturday surely....? Inviting teams to come play in our own box whilst defending narrow leads is asking for trouble. I think it is working to the extent that we are sitting clear in 3rd place. The frustrating thing for me is we could be closer to the OF and certainly a lot clearer in 3rd spot. We have dropped some points against poor teams that we really should be beating IMO. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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