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Our defence- a real problem?

Sat Nov 03, 2018 9:53 pm

Last year our defence was excellent, the rock on which our promotion was built.

But this year they have been found seriously wanting and it's costing us big time. We all know the struggles we are having up front but it's almost as bad at the back.

Only two clean sheets in eleven games against two of the worst teams in the division (one of whom played for 30 mins with ten men, the other of whom missed a penalty!) means that we have a real problem at the back.

I excuse Etheridge as he's been generally excellent apart from some of his kicking.

Bruno is NOT a right back. Even Stevie Wonder could see that but Warnock insists on playing him there. He is caught out of position so often and yet again the goal today originated down his side of the field. I'm a Bruno fan but he has to be played at Centre half. It seems that everybody with the exception of the management could see that we needed a quality right back in the summer and the lack of one is now costing us.

Morrison and Bamba were magnificent in the Championship but both are struggling badly in the PL. Morrison's lack of pace is being exposed more often and he's certainly not as dominant in the air as last season. Sol has struggled against better quality players but still gives it 100% every game.

I know many on here like Bennett but to me he's a liability. Always seems to be out of position - seems to be constantly on the edge of the box when the ball is played out to a winger who then has a clear run at him. Lacks awareness of what's going on around him as seen today when he lost their player who scored the goal.

It may seem extreme but for me if we are going to have a realistic chance of staying up we need two new full backs and a new centre half to play with Bruno come January.

Either that or the players we have are going to have to improve dramatically and stop leaking goals at the current rate and though their effort can't be faulted, do they have the ability to do so?

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Sat Nov 03, 2018 9:57 pm

davids wrote:Last year our defence was excellent, the rock on which our promotion was built.

But this year they have been found seriously wanting and it's costing us big time. We all know the struggles we are having up front but it's almost as bad at the back.

Only two clean sheets in eleven games against two of the worst teams in the division (one of whom played for 30 mins with ten men, the other of whom missed a penalty!) means that we have a real problem at the back.

I excuse Etheridge as he's been generally excellent apart from some of his kicking.

Bruno is NOT a right back. Even Stevie Wonder could see that but Warnock insists on playing him there. He is caught out of position so often and yet again the goal today originated down his side of the field. I'm a Bruno fan but he has to be played at Centre half. It seems that everybody with the exception of the management could see that we needed a quality right back in the summer and the lack of one is now costing us.

Morrison and Bamba were magnificent in the Championship but both are struggling badly in the PL. Morrison's lack of pace is being exposed more often and he's certainly not as dominant in the air as last season. Sol has struggled against better quality players but still gives it 100% every game.

I know many on here like Bennett but to me he's a liability. Always seems to be out of position - seems to be constantly on the edge of the box when the ball is played out to a winger who then has a clear run at him. Lacks awareness of what's going on around him as seen today when he lost their player who scored the goal.

It may seem extreme but for me if we are going to have a realistic chance of staying up we need two new full backs and a new centre half to play with Bruno come January.

Either that or the players we have are going to have to improve dramatically and stop leaking goals at the current rate and though their effort can't be faulted, do they have the ability to do so?

This season is going to pass us by because of our lack of talent in key areas.

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Sat Nov 03, 2018 11:18 pm

Got a point here today's goal came from a player not looking or concentrating! Like a lot goals we concede it's usually down to a defender not doing his job properly? Whilst we lack talent all over the park the hard work is being undone by poor defending :old:

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Sun Nov 04, 2018 12:43 am

it wasn't a great championship squad with a small summer budget...not sure what you expect..

only 2 clean sheets but that's not the worse record in this league its the same number as Arsenal and 1 more than Man Utd have...


surely this is a collective thing ,its not 1 area is short of quality its the whole squad..

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Sun Nov 04, 2018 9:50 am

20% possesion and no srikers is the problem. Average strikers in this league will cost you 20mill.

Where's the fun in getting beat every week

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Sun Nov 04, 2018 10:19 am

Not sure where BlueMoon got his 20% possession stats from as according to Match of the day we had 40% possession. Whilst even that figure is poor I don't think it helps if people are being critical and making things worse than they are. I know it was a poor 2nd half performance but we were in a no win position regardless of the result.

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Sun Nov 04, 2018 11:28 am

What did we know in the summer? We needed a right back, a defensive midfielder and a striker and I don't think any of these were covered.

I think a striker able to hold up the ball is more of a concern than defence. I still can't believe we didn't sign a Right back the one position that was obvious last season that we needed better. Transfer wise we had a poor transfer window last season and its costing us.

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Sun Nov 04, 2018 11:51 am

I always remember what a villa fan said on our forum when we were on about going up he said be careful what you wish for.he said it’s not nice getting beat regularly and was enjoying the wins in the championship

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Sun Nov 04, 2018 12:08 pm

Very simple for me Warnock needs to adjust defence massively and stick with it, I’d go with this back 4

RB Jazz
CB Manga
CB Mozza
LB Bennett

Manga is quicker than our captain so can help him out and both wing backs are actual wingbacks

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Sun Nov 04, 2018 12:19 pm

There's a 15/20 feet elliptical area half in and half out of our penalty area and directly in front of our goal where we make most of our important mistakes and fail to cover people . I can see why this occurs because people are covering other potential threats but my knowledge is insufficient to work out the answer without creating other problems.
I can only suggest that we try and bring in some defensive coaching expert very urgently indeed.
Let's also face the fact that we don't have a single player capable of playing right back and do something about it

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Sun Nov 04, 2018 12:24 pm

actionman wrote:I always remember what a villa fan said on our forum when we were on about going up he said be careful what you wish for.he said it’s not nice getting beat regularly and was enjoying the wins in the championship


I wouldn't change it, what's the point in winning every so often if the end product is nothing.

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Sun Nov 04, 2018 12:25 pm

actionman wrote:I always remember what a villa fan said on our forum when we were on about going up he said be careful what you wish for.he said it’s not nice getting beat regularly and was enjoying the wins in the championship


Very true but do we hear Leicester fans saying that? Or even those of Wolves, Watford, Brighton, Burnley, Bournemouth, Southampton or Palace?

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Sun Nov 04, 2018 4:51 pm

What’s going on with Jazz Richards? Is he injured again?

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Sun Nov 04, 2018 7:55 pm

Cardiff dyskinesia wrote:What’s going on with Jazz Richards? Is he injured again?



strange...loads of our players get regular slaughterings on here but this one seems to fly under the radar...

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Sun Nov 04, 2018 8:07 pm

morrison and bennett are good enough to not need replacements. manga can play centre back but not right back. we need a right back anyway. bennett is not bulletproof in defence but his passing game is decent and he can put in a decent cross.

bamba is popular and tries hard, but lacks discipline and is highly prone to lapses in concentration. he has cost us on so many occasions this season.

the lack of goals is also a huge concern, but if funds are tight, it is much cheaper to remedy a dodgy defence at the price and quality bracket we would be shopping in.

a decent striker would cost at least £10-15m.

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Sun Nov 04, 2018 9:15 pm

Our defence was our strength last season however it’s a huge step up having quality strikers/wingers coming at you.

Saying that we have given some ‘sloppy’ goals away this season where the opposition have been more switched on, smarter & quicker e.g. Gray getting in from of Bennett, Bamba with 2 of the Arsenal goals and Cunningham with one of the Burnley goals. There are others. If we were to cut out the mistakes then things would look better. Also going to be difficult when for the majority of games we have a lot less possession than the opposition.

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Sun Nov 04, 2018 11:27 pm

northernbluebird wrote:morrison and bennett are good enough to not need replacements. manga can play centre back but not right back. we need a right back anyway. bennett is not bulletproof in defence but his passing game is decent and he can put in a decent cross.

bamba is popular and tries hard, but lacks discipline and is highly prone to lapses in concentration. he has cost us on so many occasions this season.

the lack of goals is also a huge concern, but if funds are tight, it is much cheaper to remedy a dodgy defence at the price and quality bracket we would be shopping in.

a decent striker would cost at least £10-15m.


And £10-15m is probably £15-20m in January. It would have been better value to have spent that first as last in the summer. For any club that has serious ambitions of staying in the Premier it's just the going rate.

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Mon Nov 05, 2018 12:20 am

There are enough defenders in this squad to sort out the problem ... or do we need to get new faces in ???

Most on here are saying we need a striker of forward minded players - since we started this season .

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Mon Nov 05, 2018 12:55 pm

TopCat CCFC wrote:There are enough defenders in this squad to sort out the problem ... or do we need to get new faces in ???

Most on here are saying we need a striker of forward minded players - since we started this season .



Enough defenders but are they good enough? Saturdays goal was typical of ones we let in This season!
Attacker on the move before the city player notices and it's to late, quite few goals scored because defenders to slow to get to opposition.

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Mon Nov 05, 2018 1:04 pm

TopCat CCFC wrote:There are enough defenders in this squad to sort out the problem ... or do we need to get new faces in ???

Most on here are saying we need a striker of forward minded players - since we started this season .


Quantity over quality! Doesn't work at this level.

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Tue Nov 06, 2018 9:01 pm

Cardiff dyskinesia wrote:What’s going on with Jazz Richards? Is he injured again?



Don't like to have to say this, but he can't do it. He'd be far better off in the championship. Same applies to Ralls and Madine I'm afraid and we can't afford to be pretending differently at this point. I aporeciate all of them but that's the brutal truth

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Thu Nov 08, 2018 11:11 pm

City Slicker wrote:
TopCat CCFC wrote:There are enough defenders in this squad to sort out the problem ... or do we need to get new faces in ???

Most on here are saying we need a striker of forward minded players - since we started this season .


Quantity over quality! Doesn't work at this level.


I asked the Question ??? - Focus on this board come Jan is more attacking players ( looking at most threads ) .
If we have to start again from the back - Gary Cahill who wants 1st team football at Chelsea,but only gets Europa League games would be the type of player to start with ( loan ) .

Re: Our defence- a real problem?

Fri Nov 09, 2018 7:05 pm

City Slicker wrote:
northernbluebird wrote:morrison and bennett are good enough to not need replacements. manga can play centre back but not right back. we need a right back anyway. bennett is not bulletproof in defence but his passing game is decent and he can put in a decent cross.

bamba is popular and tries hard, but lacks discipline and is highly prone to lapses in concentration. he has cost us on so many occasions this season.

the lack of goals is also a huge concern, but if funds are tight, it is much cheaper to remedy a dodgy defence at the price and quality bracket we would be shopping in.

a decent striker would cost at least £10-15m.


And £10-15m is probably £15-20m in January. It would have been better value to have spent that first as last in the summer. For any club that has serious ambitions of staying in the Premier it's just the going rate.


it's clear we tried to get someone in, but were hopelessly outbid by rivals. after all we're all looking at the same players.

either you live in the present and pay the prices, or you don't, and you don't get anyone in. arsenal did this for years and have gone from being the biggest, best team in the country to the 5th or 6th best. still don't think van persie was worth £250k a week?