Newcastle verdict

[JadeWolf]

Really really really disappointed. Feel a bit let down to be honest and it’s not very often I feel like that with Wolves and definitely not this team. Newcastle aren’t very good, in fact they’re pretty rotten. But we just never showed, lacked fight, lacked bravery, just an absolute nothing performance in a game where it felt like we needed to win if we’re serious about top 7. Thought Jonny was our best player and Boly had a decent game but otherwise not sure anyone gets much credit. Even Bruno had an off night with his selection and subs. And why is it we always seem to lose when we have a two week gap coming up, that’s annoying too.

 

[wwbug]

You say Bruno is a quick learner yet he has played Trincao time and time again when for the most part he has been abject. I posted months ago that it worries me that Bruno thought he was worth game time. If he thinks that on all those showings then for me he isn’t a very good coach. We can all see how **** he has been so for Bruno to overlook it just astounds me. I wouldn’t bank on him not making the same mistake.

I meant that with Neto Podence and Jimenez fit and available . I don’t think he had much option having lost Traore .
For me Hwang is the poorest quality of the front three last night.

 

[rubyloo]

Excellent first team, **** squad.

 

[Woburn Wolf]

Our lack of squad depth showed tonight. Trincao and Hwang were totally anonymous and on this form are squad players at best; the sooner Neto is fully fit and Podence returns the better. We also need to sign a striker in the summer; Fabio worked hard but offered little goal threat and is clearly not ready to lead the line yet and Raul is not the player he once was.

 

[Woz_Wolf]

Grandson: 'I thought we were going to have an adventure today, why arent you happy Grandad? '
Wife: 'leave Grandad alone we can still have a fun day'
Me: and the realisation Wolves have a lot to answer for, they need to care like I do not put in a half hearted weak performance. So if they cant be *****, neither can I today.
Me: ' Come on kiddo, lets go have an adventure'........

 

[Ned]

Last night felt like Palace away where we delayed the inevitable for as long as possible but had no answer to anything the opposition did.

From kick off the best we could hope for was a 0-0 and as soon as we conceded I don’t think anybody on here genuinely felt we would get back in to it.

Such a shame, I’m gutted really. It’s very, very Wolvesy to get ourselves back into European contention and then throw a garbage performance or capitulation into the mix. No doubt we will pick up a few nice results and then have our hopes dashed by losing at home to Norwich.

 

[Vtrpres]

There's no dressing up.

Fosun aren't putting money into Wolves, Wolves have no money for transfers.

Can't buy players with hopes and dreams.

Says it all. Spot on. There will be no more major investment from Fosun. They came in with expectations of being cheaply into an emerging world beating Club. What happened? Wolves happened. One thing the Chinese Face cannot accept is failure.

 

[YouGottaRaulWithIt]

Sa 5
Awful decison to come for the pen. Didn't really have much else to do other than, some of his kicking was dire as well.

Jonny 6
Did ok, ASM did him a few times but always going to and got forward a couple of times.

Kilman 5
Stinker, saved by VAR after goal ruled out and let guys run off him constantly. Looks much better on the right.

Coady 5
Distribution very poor, beat in the air a lot.

Boly 7
Best of the CBs, didn't do much wrong

Marcal 7
Played well, good defensively and put in a brilliant cross that Fabio should have scored.

Moutinho 5
Bossed by Bruno G, rarely passed forwards and dribbled past with ease.

Cundle 5
First half was brutal, as bad as it gets but 2nd half he was ok. Had a big chance to slip Fabio in at the end. Looked better closer to their goal.

Hwang 4
Couple of runs 2nd half were good, but aside from that dire

Fabio 5
Great pass, and a couple of excellent runs. Did ok outside of the box but missed a sitter.

Trincão 3
Disgraceful. Hides constantly, slows down counter attacks because he is glacially slow. Gave the ball away. Was as bad as it gets and not for the first time.

Neto looked sharp when he came on, if he is on at HT we win I think.

Lage didn't really have much choice with the starters (although Jeff tied his hands with midfield) but the lack of subs was inexcusable. Horrific.

Shameful display. To create that little against that Newcastle side is shocking.

If they recruit more players like Bruno then they will be a force though. Absolutely dominated us

I think you have been very generous with your marking. Do you not have a - on your keyboard?

 

[Jonzy54]

We started off slowly,we sat in and were unable to get into the game .I kept banging on that if they scored ,which they did ,where was our Plan B when Plan A was clearly not working ?

 

[Parkfieldswolf]

I meant that with Neto Podence and Jimenez fit and available . I don’t think he had much option having lost Traore .
For me Hwang is the poorest quality of the front three last night.

Fair play I was just highlighting I wish Bruno had learnt quick to realise Trincao should not be getting as much game time as he has been. I know Traore wanted to go but I would imagine seeing Trincao playing ahead of him most weeks would have hardened his stance. Traore was still under contract we should have played him more.

 

[Stafford]

The targeting of the front 3 is missing the point of what happened in that first half last night. We couldn't string 2 forward passes together and get out of our own half. The squad were clearly uncomfortable. Did you expect them to come even further back then take on the whole Newcastle team like a Traore?

 

[Tarcisio Mifsud]

I was extremely disappointed with the team selection and the performance. In the first half according to the statistics presented by the Premier League, our team did not pass the ball in the Newcastle half not more than 5 times and almost all the 45 minutes were played in Wolves half and this when the overall possession was in our favour. This shows that our players just passed the ball forward and backward in the same half. That is a disgrace for a premier league side sitting in the 8th position, and we were playing Newcastle, a team which did not have one shot at goal.

The selection was clear from the start, we did not intend to take more than a point from this match and again we gave away another unnecessary penalty. Mr. Roberts please teach SA how to avoid giving away penalties and when there is a penalty against us, he should stay stand still on the line, as each time he is unable to guess the penalty direction, we had 7 penalties against us and they were all scored, inspite of SA efforts. Yesterday it was not an immaculate penalty and if he stood still he might even have saved it.

No player deserve a higher mark than 5.

 

[S G Wolves]

That first half was woeful. Remember seeing Fabio having a clear run into the box but he stops and checks back, we all thought wtf is he doing at the time. Terrible first half, can't dress it up any other way.

Second half only slightly better. We decided to play when we went a goal down. Was still a desperate performance.

Nine hour round trip for that. The only saving grace, can say possibly our 3 or 4 best performing players were missing.

But still Newcastle are ****e and we played into their hands. If we had a go and played like we did in the last 20mins we win that comfortably. Hugely disappointing.

 

[WalsallWolf]

There's no dressing up.

Fosun aren't putting money into Wolves, Wolves have no money for transfers.

Can't buy players with hopes and dreams.

Hwang Hee Chan.

What is that all about then?

 

[TheConcourse]

Hwang Hee Chan.

What is that all about then?

Think most of us are asking the same question..

 

[YouGottaRaulWithIt]

4-2-3-1 for rest of the year **** it build for next year

Our defence has been the best bit of our team. If we move to a flat 4 we lose width from wingbacks and without pace at the back we will concede loads.

Besides, it's not the formation, it's the players. The first team if fit is up there with Spurs, ManU etc. But we have no depth.
The team that played last night was missing Neves, Dendonker, Semedo, Jiminez, Podence and effectively Neto. If they had available we would have smacked Newcastle.

We all know what the solution is. It's not change the coach or change the formation. That is called moving the deckchairs.

 

[sc91]

Hwang Hee Chan.

What is that all about then?

14mil gets you 6 goals.

 

[Bacon Sandwich]

Some thoughts now I’m slightly calmer.

Sa – has conceded three penos this season. That said, one was Dele Ali and one was Watkins, and I don’t think there’s many on here would say both of them were pens. He’s mad, but that’s what you get with Sa. In my view we’d be about 14th with Patricio, so I’m more than happy with Sa

Coady – for the first time last night I found myself thinking ‘I wouldn’t mind if Coady were sold.’ Right at the end of the first half he played Kilman into trouble simply because he doesn’t have a left foot. Result – free kick outside our box. He’s a brilliant ambassador for the club, but I’d probably take £30m. But dare we sell our captain and vice-captain in one summer?

Trincao, Hwang, Marcal – it’s all been said. Francisco, old son, there’s a plane for Barca at lunchtime.

Moutinho – absolutely no to another year at £100,000 a week. ‘Pass to Joao’ is a comfort blanket for too many players. Fantastic player, but his time in the PL is up.

Bruno – I swear to God there are posters on the Mix who genuinely think Bruno tells the team to play badly. With Donk and Pod out, what could he do with team selection? Once the players cross the white line it’s on them – and on experienced pros like Coady and Moutinho to see where it is going wrong and fix it. The time to judge Bruno is when he has his own players. Not until.

Their goal – FFS, foul someone in the build-up. Block Wood’s run. Take a yellow for the team! Such an easily preventable goal.

 

[Beeches wolf]

Glaringly obvious our midfield has been neglected for a lot of transfer Windows.
Came back to bite us last night.

 

[wolfgar]

The build up to the goal they scored and the one they had disallowed were complete embarrassments. We turn up to do zero attacking and then defend like that. Absolute waste of everyones time.

We’ve had 3 average to **** summer windows in a row. There can be no excuses for this run to continue. None of this we couldn’t find the right players at the right price so we didn’t bother *******s

 

[Darvo]

A very frustrating and disappointing performance

 

[Big Saft Kid]

If this summer, as I fully expect, we sell the crown jewels (Neves), retire off Moutinho, sign off on Traore and sign up dross like Trincao and Hwang, AND we don't buy any proper replacements for those who leave, that will be the conclusive proof, if it's not already obvious, that FOSUN have given up and are no longer interested. I'll be honest and I say I don't care and the sooner they find a buyer the better. I will wave a cheery goodbye to the pre-match flag wavers, the fireworks and to being 'Little Portugal'. And they can take Sellars with them on the way out.

 

[Sussex Wolf]

Some thoughts now I’m slightly calmer.

Sa – has conceded three penos this season. That said, one was Dele Ali and one was Watkins, and I don’t think there’s many on here would say both of them were pens. He’s mad, but that’s what you get with Sa. In my view we’d be about 14th with Patricio, so I’m more than happy with Sa

Coady – for the first time last night I found myself thinking ‘I wouldn’t mind if Coady were sold.’ Right at the end of the first half he played Kilman into trouble simply because he doesn’t have a left foot. Result – free kick outside our box. He’s a brilliant ambassador for the club, but I’d probably take £30m. But dare we sell our captain and vice-captain in one summer?

Trincao, Hwang, Marcal – it’s all been said. Francisco, old son, there’s a plane for Barca at lunchtime.

Moutinho – absolutely no to another year at £100,000 a week. ‘Pass to Joao’ is a comfort blanket for too many players. Fantastic player, but his time in the PL is up.

Bruno – I swear to God there are posters on the Mix who genuinely think Bruno tells the team to play badly. With Donk and Pod out, what could he do with team selection? Once the players cross the white line it’s on them – and on experienced pros like Coady and Moutinho to see where it is going wrong and fix it. The time to judge Bruno is when he has his own players. Not until.

Their goal – FFS, foul someone in the build-up. Block Wood’s run. Take a yellow for the team! Such an easily preventable goal.

Good post. Only thing I’d differ on is Moutinho and Coady. Moutinho I think could still play a part in the squad for another season, but we absolutely need some strengthening in that area. Cundle has potential but he’s still a year or two away from regular starts. Coady didn’t have a great game, but as a captain he will take some replacing.

 

[Fenrir_]

I meant that with Neto Podence and Jimenez fit and available . I don’t think he had much option having lost Traore .
For me Hwang is the poorest quality of the front three last night.

Why did he lose Traore though? Do you think starting him in five out of twenty games and most of those behind Trincão and/or Hwang might have played a part in Traore not wanting to be here?

 

[Fenrir_]

If this summer, as I fully expect, we sell the crown jewels (Neves), retire off Moutinho, sign off on Traore and sign up dross like Trincao and Hwang, AND we don't buy any proper replacements for those who leave, that will be the conclusive proof, if it's not already obvious, that FOSUN have given up and are no longer interested. I'll be honest and I say I don't care and the sooner they find a buyer the better. I will wave a cheery goodbye to the pre-match flag wavers, the fireworks and to being 'Little Portugal'. And they can take Sellars with them on the way out.

They wrote off the £126m they've loaned us, I don't think Fosun are the bad guys

 

[kennyB]

Some thoughts..agree we were very poor, in part due to injuries and suspension and you can't blame Bruno for that. Hwang,,Trincao ...what is the point? Campbell, although not in his normal position showed more effort them with his cameo appearance. Perry not ready for the Prem, not his fault he was selected but not up to scratch. The penalty was a blatant dive which should have resulted in a yellow for the diver. Referee very poor. Although we didn't deserve anything from the game that was the biggest dive I've seen this season! We are wasting money on no-hopers so can't plead poverty.

 

[blackbullyV2]

Patricio also made the gaffes but without the brilliance. Sa has a better command of his area, is braver, a better shotstopper. Sa is a far superior keeper to patricio and will be Portugal's number one for sure. Patricio has been dropped for Portugal because he's had a rubbish season at Roma.

It says it all when a defender thinks he knows about goalkeeping.

 

[Big Saft Kid]

Some thoughts..agree we were very poor, in part due to injuries and suspension and you can't blame Bruno for that. Hwang,,Trincao ...what is the point? Campbell, although not in his normal position showed more effort them with his cameo appearance. Perry not ready for the Prem, not his fault he was selected but not up to scratch. The penalty was a blatant dive which should have resulted in a yellow for the diver. Referee very poor. Although we didn't deserve anything from the game that was the biggest dive I've seen this season! We are wasting money on no-hopers so can't plead poverty.

Cundle, not Perry mate. Agree on the pen. Perhaps it's because old-timers like us remember a time when cheating hadn't been raised to a praiseworthy art that we think it was laughable to give a pen for such blatantly unsporting behaviour.

 

[The Wolf In The North]

There's one thing that Fabio does, that some other players don't do, that will always mean I think more kindly of him, whatever his flaws. It was supremely evident last night. When he receives the ball and lays it off, he moves IMMEDIATELY. He hasn't yet developed the nous to always make the right decisions, but he always moves and runs and looks for space, or draws a defender, in the anticipation that (bless him for his naivety) he'll get the ball played forward again.

The contrast with Hwang and Trincao last night was marked. These two are our wide forwards, for goodness sake, and they are utterly static. They receive the ball (and often have the body language that this is some major surprise, that the ball's come to them), and will either then lose it straight away, or pass it away, or - every so often - they'll give the ball to another gold shirt, but then THEY DON'T BLOODY MOVE. Neither of them seem to have the instinct to react instantly, to immediately move into a dangerous position. Is it because they're thinking, ah, there's no point, the ball's just going back to Coady/Sa? Or do they simply not have that aggressive drive and mentality to give the players behind them a better option?

Fabio moves, Neto moves, Podence moves, Jonny moves. They stand out because of it.

Hwang is far better in the box, he has that ability to pull away from a defender and give himself a yard of space, but outside of it, he's dead weight. It's purposeless to play him wide on the left, he doesn't have the awareness, and it would be better to actually play Ait-Nouri there because at least he knows how to hover on the touchline and cut in across the full-back.

It really makes me wish the situation with MGW was different, because I'd be intrigued to see Silva and Hwang as a proper front two with MGW behind them, all three in their best positions, just to see if it would work.

 

[Contrarian]

It’s happened far to many times to be labelled as anything else. Even dates back to Nuno being in charge. We lack real winners in this squad.

A few of us need to remind ourselves what "mid-table" looks like. Even higher than that - it wasn't that long ago we were stuck in the Championship going through very similar patterns of results. Would get a few wins together, get on edge of promotion place, then go and lose to Grimsby or Port Vale in the relegation zone. It was as baffling and infuriating then as now. The point is, this is how it is for everybody from 6th-ish to 16th-ish.

What we are seeing is pretty much what football is for the clubs not title challenging and relegation battling. It's hardly ever a tidy "beat all the clubs below you, lose to the top few". It's generally a few inspiring performances against the top clubs that raises hope, then awful performances that are baffling. That is what mid-table looks like.

Luck plays a part. We started last night very similarly to how we did against Leeds, Watford and Villa. The difference being that Newcastle didn't generously give us defensive howlers and slips on our first attack, gifting us an early lead.

Totally agree that it dates back to Nuno. So much of last night was the same as we've for so much of the past few years. Far from being the "worst performance ever", we played about the same as we have for at least 30% of the past 4 years. And for a lot of last season, we were even worse! We've had so many matches with no movement, slow passing round the back, just one or 2 key moments going our way and putting gloss on a rather dour performance.

 

[Wolf316]

Hwang Hee Chan.

What is that all about then?

South Korean shirt sales and Twitter followers.

 

[lobodelsur]

Abysmal performance which made me realise we really are nowhere near good enough to qualify for Europe (let alone the CL !) Kilman, Hwang and Trincao the worst out of a poor evening for all. I couldn't understand the team selection. Without Podence we had no-one to manipulate the ball in tight situations. The only player with similar qualities is RAN, but he was left out (not that Marcal had a particularly poor game). OK Bruno went with Trincoa after 2 reasonable performances, but by HT it was obvious he was making no impression, so why not give Chiquinho a run at Targett (who continues to be rubbish) ? And I don't get this policy of wasting half the match to look at how the oppo are set up. After their hammering at Spurs, Newcastle were a team that should have been attacked from the off; put them on the back foot and get them worried.
In conclusion, somethings gotta change. If we come out in August with few changes to the squad and still playing 3-4-3 we'll know the writing is on the wall...

 

[wwbug]

Why did he lose Traore though? Do you think starting him in five out of twenty games and most of those behind Trincão and/or Hwang might have played a part in Traore not wanting to be here?

My personal opinion is after many years in English football Traore wasn't going to improve, so Trincao and Hwang were thought to be the future .
As it is both are not good enough , Hwang is a £10 million striker in his prime - cheap and just a shirt filler !!
And Trincao can and will be a lot better given game time. But we need men of a completely different calibre if we are going to get in to Europe next year.

 

[SingYourHeartsOut]

They wrote off the £126m they've loaned us, I don't think Fosun are the bad guys

I can't see any way that anyone can think they are the bad guys. They did what they said they would, invested to raise the status of the club and then used us to develop and sell on young players to make money in the long term. They've invested less than £200m total and have a club worth more than that. Maybe at some point they'd have wanted to use us more as a vanity project, but if that was ever the case the Chinese government killed the idea.

 

[Contrarian]

You think Lewandowski, Kane, Ronaldo score 30 headers a season? Ronaldo who by far and away leads has 66 headers out of 400+ goals in last 10 years. Lewandowski 48 goals out of 300+
When you look at the list the most prolific with their heads as a proportion of goals seem to be kind of meh players.

5 players who have scored the most headed goals in top 5 European Leagues since 2009/10

There are a number of top strikers in the world today, but there are very few who are good when it comes to scoring via headers, with the art of heading the bal

www.google.com

10 goals a season without headers ahaha. What a load of absolute drivel.

Fair enough, yes, it's not as important as I first thought. But still important, as is just about every goal. Especially in a team that struggles to score. We've scored more recently, however several of those were freebies gifted by opponents. Newcastle weren't so helpful as Watford, Leeds, Villa and Spurs.

I still don't see any sign that Fabio will developing into being better than one of those "meh" players. 10 goal a season at their best at this level. Could well be wrong, I often am. I dearly wish him to score every match, I'm just being honest when I say I still don't see what is so exceptional that we paid so much for.

 

[Big Saft Kid]

I can't see any way that anyone can think they are the bad guys. They did what they said they would, invested to raise the status of the club and then used us to develop and sell on young players to make money in the long term. They've invested less than £200m total and have a club worth more than that. Maybe at some point they'd have wanted to use us more as a vanity project, but if that was ever the case the Chinese government killed the idea.

I didn't say they were 'the bad guys'. But it is undeniable that they have stopped investing in us in the way they originally implied they would when they talked about their long term project being to get us to the top of the tree. That level of investment simply isn't going to happen for reasons we can only guess at, and which may be nothing to do with FOSUN directly and everything to do with current geopolitics My concern is that we just get put on the back burner until somebody eventually comes along to buy us, which could be a (very) long wait. Meantime we will putter along (if we are lucky) in midtable with just enough investment to keep us afloat as a saleable PL club but no more. I think it may have already been as good as it's ever going to get under the present owners and that we can look forward to a period of stagnation and slow decline. Needless to say, I'd love to be proved wrong.

 

[sc91]

They wrote off the £126m they've loaned us, I don't think Fosun are the bad guys

They converted it into equity because to them their work here is done. Write off, no, just adding to how much Wolves will be worth to them on sale.

 

[sc91]

I didn't say they were 'the bad guys'. But it is undeniable that they have stopped investing in us in the way they originally implied they would when they talked about their long term project being to get us to the top of the tree. That level of investment simply isn't going to happen for reasons we can only guess at, and which may be nothing to do with FOSUN directly and everything to do with current geopolitics My concern is that we just get put on the back burner until somebody eventually comes along to buy us, which could be a (very) long wait. Meantime we will putter along (if we are lucky) in midtable with just enough investment to keep us afloat as a saleable PL club but no more. I think it may have already been as good as it's ever going to get under the present owners and that we can look forward to a period of stagnation and slow decline. Needless to say, I'd love to be proved wrong.

People would jump to buy Wolves, be assured of that.

 

[YouGottaRaulWithIt]

South Korean shirt sales and Twitter followers.

I might well be wrong, but I don't think the club make much out of shirt sales, certainly not in Korea for an average player like Hwang.

 

[SA Wolf]

Awful performance. Too many didn't seem to care enough last night. Front 3 showed no movement. Trincao and Hwang lightweight. Silva did try for 15 minutes at the start of the second half. Midfield two were cowardly and tried the safe option too many times. Even the usually consistent Kilman had his poor moments.

I said on the Villa verdict, words to the effect that Sa needed to curb his bull-in-a-china-shop moments as it cost us against Spuds, had cost us against Villa and would ultimately cost us again. I was called an idiot from someone who finds it easier to insult than debate. Well, it cost us again! Too many times this season, the otherwise superb Sa has done this and each time it has resulted in a goal.
Not Sa bashing per-se, but he needs to take on board what the situation is.

Season is pretty-much over. Europe is pretty-much off the agenda failing one or two of the other clubs imploding and gaining a few more wins will consolidate 8th place. That would be more than most fans expected at the start, but it's typical Wolves to steal defeat from the jaws of victory. Oh, what might have been!