A couple of years ago I was at a cricket match in Tunbridge Wells and I had the honour and the pleasure of talking to George Cohen from the 1966 World Cup. George was telling me about the 1970 game against Germany and how Ramsey subbed Bobby Charlton and it cost us the match, because it allowed Beckenbauer to go forward and dominate the midfield. The point is that Flitcroft does that all the time with Mellis and takes the pressure off the opposition. Mellis' value is not just in what he does but what he stops the opposition doing. Mellis subbed at 3 - 0 on 65 minutes, final score 3 - 2. Please stop subbing Mellis, anyone else, but not him.
Can't agree, he was playing poor and probably should have gone off earlier. Not his fault, he's just lost out on the wing. I think we started to look leggy up front, and Fox and Perkins passing sideways caused un-needed pressure on our flimsy looking back 4, that said, I thought Cranie had a decent game, and for the most part M'Voto looked assured.
He was far from poor. But agree with a few bits. Think Pederson Shkukd of been taken off instead of mellis for Scotland. To add strength and pressure on the opposition
Mellis was not at all poor and I agree with the OP entirely. Our bad spell came about once Mellis was subbed. It's happened before. And Fox and Perkins retreated which gave Boro all the time they needed to keep putting balls into our box under no pressure. Perkins gets worse by the game for me. Not offering owt that Fox can't.
I can't agree about Mellis, I thought he was very good today. The game did swing away from us after he was taken off.
Cywka was anonymous. Players in middle struggling so it speaks volumes where Daws and Ethuz are at...
To some extent I agree with original poster - every time we take Mellis off we lose our ability to keep possession. He links well with O'Grady too.
I saw him put the lob over for the O`Brien header that went wide, great lob from O`Grady to put Tommy in in the first place.
Have any of you been to the game today?????? If you can cast your tiny minds back to the end of the first half when mellis nearly scored he was also injured. .. Until he got subbed he was still injured from that challenge, but that was only noticeable if YOU wereALL watching the fekin game...
Very true. He was complaining about not being able to recover his breath having made a run and could not cover when the ball was lost.
If he was injured, fair enough, but it's not the first time he's been subbed and we've come under pressure, I only hope Flitcroft is aware of it. He's only a young lad and should be able to do 90 minutes.
Yes when he was subbed, from my seat in West Stand Upper, he looked quite distressed and holding his chest
he was subbed because he was knackered. he was blowug like **** and couldn't get up and down the wing any more
Yeh looked safe until he went off I can never see why unless injured subbing players when you are winning comfortably keep it going
He came off injured. He was holding his ribs and the medical staff strapped ice and bandages to him immediately.
Mellis poor? Yesterday? Really? I thought he was very good, actually looked interested as well...I reckon he had a knock as he set off walking towards the bench before his number appeared on the board.