Ipswich Town lost 4-3 at Brentford in a Premier League match yesterday afternoon. Stuart Watson reflects on the action.
MUCH BETTER
Let's start with the positives, because there were plenty.
Town scored three superb goals. Kalvin Phillips' inch-perfect deep pass and George Hirst's smart turn led to Sammie Szmodics' well-taken opener, Conor Chaplin's perfectly-weighted pass led to Hirst's cool clipped finish for 2-0, while Leif Davis' delicious deep cross was converted expertly on the run by Liam Delap for the late leveller.
Substitute Delap smacked the post, from the angle of the box, deep into stoppage-time too. He's bagged five goals in nine Premier League games now.
This will sound a strange thing to say given four goals were conceded, but Town defended pretty well for the most part. Cameron Burgess got his head on everything, corners and long throws were repelled, while Aro Muric made a couple of smart stops when called upon.
I thought Town showed great character in this game too. Despite major injury/illness blows in the build-up, they started the better side at the home of a team renowned for flying out the traps. Despite two gut punches just before the break, they started the second half on the front foot too. And after going down to 10 men, they managed to ride a storm, settle and equalise. Delap, as mentioned, almost made it 4-4 at the death too.
This performance, on so many levels, was miles better than the error-strewn, confidence-shot showings against West Ham and Everton.
A BIG MOMENT
What would have happened had Jacob Greaves converted a close-range header at West Ham when the score was 1-1?
Might things have been different had Jack Clarke finished a golden early chance against Everton?
For the third game in a row, there was a 'what if?' missed opportunity for the Blues inside the first half.
With Town 2-0 ahead, Mark Flekken played a slack pass out the back and Szmodics seized on the ball. He fired his one-v-one chance too close to the keeper though.
"It was a big moment, there’s no doubt about it," admitted McKenna. "Two-nil up away from home is never a safe result, especially against Brentford, who can attack in waves when they’ve got momentum. Three-nil is a lot harder to come back from though.
"It's a really well executed press from us and a good save from the keeper. It is what it is. Sammie took his first goal absolutely brilliantly."
HARSH ON HARRY
History will show that Harry Clarke's full Premier League debut ended with him scoring an own goal, giving away a penalty and being sent-off. You could argue he was unlucky on all three counts.
There's certainly not much more he could have done when sliding in to try and stop Yoanne Wissa's goalbound shot going over the line in first half stoppage-time. Why that goal hasn't been credited to the Bees front man is a mystery.
I've got less sympathy over the penalty. He's caught out of a position when a quickly taken dead ball goes over the top, is outpaced by Keane Lewis-Potter and makes a clumsy high grapple from behind.
For me, it's a spot-kick because the most significant portion of the foul happens inside the box. Others will disagree and point to where initial contact was made. But here's where we get into a VAR debate again (yawn). The referee initially awarded a free-kick and, given that's a subjective call, surely there was no 'clear and obvious error' to intervene on. Yet, as was the case with the controversial penalty non-award against Everton, intervene the men at Stockley Park did. At least the decision was made quickly this time without the unnecessary theatre of the referee being sent to the monitor.
The red card definitely looks harsh. My first instinct was he got a toe on the ball ahead of stepping across Lewis-Potter on the edge of the box. Replays haven't convinced me otherwise.
ARO'S ERROR
Kieran McKenna put the two goals conceded just before half-time down to a slight drop in intensity and players being 'one or two yards off in our individual actions', but let's also recognise that they were excellent Brentford moves that carved through the field. Those sort of goals can happen at this level. I don't think it was a game management issue.
I've already discussed the penalty, which brings us onto the 90+6 minute winner...
There's no dressing it up. It's poor from Muric. Whether he's expecting Dara O'Shea to head the ball away or not, the big Kosovan can't be letting Mbeumo's (pretty poor) cross bounce beyond him. It wasn't even like the ball squeaked inside the far post either.
It's a shame, because the Blues keeper had had a pretty solid game up until that point. He made a good one-v-one save from Wissa and a smart low stop to deny Mikkel Damsgaard at 3-2. There had been better decision making over when to kick long and when to play short too.
Burnley fans did tell us that he's a mixture of high-profile errors and outstanding stops. I think we've seen more of the latter than the former over his eight games so far (don't forget Brighton away), but it's human nature for the bad bits to stick in the memory.
AN INJURY CRISIS
Left-sided centre-back Jacob Greaves took to the Premier League like a duck to water. He then suffered a hamstring injury in training.
Axel Tuanzebe also made an excellent start to the campaign. He then almost cut his thumb off in a freak washing up accident. Ben Johnson replaced him at right-back at West Ham only to instantly suffer a thigh strain in training a few days later.
Sam Morsy had to sit out this game with a hamstring strain he suffered in the home defeat to Everton. There is a 'big, big question mark' as to whether he can feature in next weekend's home clash against Leicester.
The plan was for Jack Taylor, who produced some impressive cameo appearances for club and country in recent weeks, to make his full Premier League debut at the Gtech Community Stadium. He suffered a hamstring injury late in the training week though and will now miss the next two games at least.
With Massimo Luongo already sidelined (injury unknown), that left the Blues with just two fit midfielders in Jens Cajuste and Kalvin Phillips. Left-back Conor Townsend came on to play the last few minutes in the middle.
Club record signing Omari Hutchinson had been due to start, but he had to pull out after being sick during the night.
On top of all that, winger Chiedozie Ogbene pulled up sharply in the build-up to Town's second goal. The fear is that he's torn his Achilles and will be out for some time.
If you've lost track, that's eight first team players who were unavailable or had to be withdrawn - and only one or two are likely to be back for the next game. Clarke will be suspended too.
George Hirst (knee), Nathan Broadhead (calf), Harry Clarke (Achilles) and Ali Al-Hamadi (groin) have only just returned to action. Wes Burns (hamstring) had a set-back earlier in the campaign too.
Players talk about McKenna's training sessions being intense. That made the Blues ultra-fit last season and contributed to so many late goals. Has it contributed to so many muscle injuries in the opening weeks of this campaign though? That's something that'll have to be assessed.
READY FOR ACTION
The good news is that several players proved to be ready when called upon.
Given he had only had a couple of days back in training following a near five-week absence with a knee injury, I thought Jens Cajuste had a really good game. The Swedish midfielder is tall in stature, mobile and can break up play.
Conor Chaplin, having found chances limited so far this season, was handed the captain's armband. He built on a lively sub display against Everton with some sharp movement and link play.
George Hirst, selected ahead of Delap for his desire to run in behind a Brentford back line that can leave space to exploit, was bright on his first ever Premier League start too.
"I thought he was outstanding against two physically really dominant centre-halves," enthused McKenna. "That was exactly what we needed in the team today - he showed what he can bring to the table.
"It was an incredible effort given that was his first competitive start since May.
"We know Liam’s doing well, but it's his first season in the Premier League, his first season starting every week as a number nine, so he’s not going to start every single game and play every single minute."
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