Crewe Alexandra 0-1 Wolves
By Tom Bason
July 26 2014
Wolves pre-season continued with a 1-0 victory over Crewe, thanks to a late goal from Nouha Dicko.
- Wolves lined up in a 4-2-3-1 formation, which mirrored Crewe’s 4-1-4-1. This was a slight change to Kenny Jackett’s normal midfield – for much of 2014, Jackett chose one of the two systems below; either Kevin McDonald holding by himself with Lee Evans and David Edwards pushing forwards, or McDonald joined by Jack Price in a double pivot, with Michael Jacobs given a free role ahead of them. Today, Jackett changed it up by giving Evans more of a defensive role, essentially playing as Price did last season. Evans is a different type of player to Price, whose strength is quick passes that keep the ball moving. But Evans was very good today constantly pinging balls to the other side of the pitch. I do wonder whether he’s been put on a bit of a fitness regime over the summer, as he seemed a lot more mobile than he has done in the past. As Evans sat deeper, Edwards was playing more as a second striker than an attacking midfielder, and at times I felt the gap between McDonald/Evans and Edwards/Clarke was too great.
- The main problem we had today was a lack of width, something that was perhaps out of Jackett’s hands. Bakary Sako was initially supposed to start, but picked up a knock in the warmup and was replaced by Rajiv van La Parra. This actually pleased me a little as I was eager to see our new Dutch winger. He generally held his position on the right, but wasn’t necessarily as effective as he could have been. On the other flank was Michael Jacobs, who as usual played anywhere but. Quite often Scott Golbourne got reasonably far forward down the left flank, but then didn’t have a forward passing option and so was forced inside to McDonald or Evans. Invariably, Evans and McDonald were forced to play a difficulty, straight ball into the penalty area which were dealt with reasonably easily. Another issue with Jacobs’ wandering and Golbourne being high up the pitch is that if possession is lost, we can be quite easily caught out. A couple of times we were caught in transition, and better passes would have played Crewe’s wingers in. Indeed, Crewe’s left winger had a decent effort that flashed across Carl Ikeme’s goal from this sort of position.
- So, Rajiv van La Parra. I suspect he will be quite frustrating this season. He has oodles of pace, and a bag full of tricks but doesn’t necessarily yet know when to use them. Twice in the opening 20 minutes he selfishly fired over when he was in a decent position to cross. He’s quite one footed, I’m not sure I saw him use his left foot at all. His main problem was that he always took the more difficult option, when there were generally easier choices. I suspect that he will end up looking an excellent highlights player, but I’m not sure how effective he will be over 90 minutes. Then again, what do I know; I didn’t rate either Jacobs or Henry on first glance either (although I still have deep reservations about Jacobs’ use on the flanks).
- Chances were few and far between in a game that Wolves dominated but lacked the cutting edge to really press home the advantage. Perhaps, this is where Jack Price excels, with his quick passing setting a tempo that we never achieved without him today. Our best opportunity in the first half came from a Crewe corner, as Jacobs won the ball on the edge of our penalty area. He then ran half the length of the pitch, but in a 3 on 1 situation, his pass to van La Parra was poor and the opportunity went begging. Crewe had a chance in the dying moments of the first half, with a long range shot forcing Ikeme into an acrobatic, but comfortable save, with a header from the resultant corner hitting the bar. Crewe hit the bar again in the second half after a good move down the left saw the ball cut back well into the penalty area. It wasn’t only a lack of tempo that caused us problems going forward, we seemed to have very few players in the penalty area. Quite often when we got in behind Crewe’s defence, there were only two or three players in the penalty area, making it virtually impossible to pick out a Gold shirt.
- As is his wont, Jackett’s substitutions were minimalist, taking off van La Parra, David Edwards and Leon Clarke for Eusebio Bancessi, James Henry and Nouha Dicko. This saw Michael Jacobs move into his more favoured position behind the striker, but struggled to really make an impact from here. Bancessi played on the right, where he struggled a little to get into the game, while James Henry sat on the left. It will be interesting to see how often Bancessi plays this season, especially with Zeli Ismail out on loan to Notts County. The winning goal came out of nothing; Evans received the ball on the right in our own half. He played a fairly nothing ball down the right hand channel which Dicko chased, somehow (and I’m really not sure how) went around the goalkeeper before rolling the ball into the empty net from a narrow angle.
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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2014:08:10:21:11:43 by toomb.
toomb's twitter
I have to say at times I was left wondering whether Jacobs will be able to cut the mustard at Championship level, but then he took a crack at goal in the first half which brought a good save, and looked a bit more useful in the 2nd.
I tought Van La Parra was too eager to impress really, and perhaps when that settles down he will play his normal game and make some good runs and passes.
Once again McDonald ruled the roost with a real confidence whilst in possession. However the concern expressed by those sitting near me was "What will happen if he gets injured - we've no-one to replace him", which seems to me to be a viable concern.
I left the game doubting that our squad is actually strong enough to mount a serious challenge to some of the more established teams in the Champ, but also recalling Mick McCarthy's mantra that he hated pre-season because it tells you nothing, so let's hope Kenny has a cunning plan!!