Jamie Palmers Review of Wolves v Stoke City

So here it was, opening day of the season and a relatively short trip down the M6 and A449 to Wolverhampton was in store. I have to admit I wasn't overly excited about the prospect of this game after a dour 0-0 draw there last season and pretty much the same team as we had last year turning out. But let's face it; just the thought of the opening day of the season being upon us is enough to get any of us excited.
We rolled up in Wolverhampton with the rain tipping down to make a depressing place even less attractive but the news that Kenwyne Jones and Fuller were to start up front was the ray of sunshine that we were waiting for to brighten our day.
After entering the ground it was straight to the concourse for the compulsory pie that will be had at every away game of the season. Thankfully the Wolves could oblige with my order of a meat and potato pie and I happily polished it off in 5 mins.
When 3 o'clock came there was a glimmer of optimism in the away stand as the strong following of Stoke fans put their hopes in Kenwyne Jones to pull a familiar Stoke side out of their dull predictability and into an exciting attacking away team?
From kick off the game was bright and it looked like a lively game was in store. Fuller and Jones looked sharp up front and after Jones broke free and hit the bar it was apparent we were here to play and we wanted the Wolves blood. Then with about 20mins gone disaster struck. Jones was involved in a challenge and once he hit the deck, he never looked like getting back up to carry on leading the line. It was visible both in the stands and on the pitch that everyone was deflated and to top it off TP was as predictable as ever and replaced a lively Jones with Sidibe; I don't need to explain what I mean by this.
From that point on the game turned. Stoke went back to defensive, shaky Stoke and Wolves started to open up and play the confident football Stoke looked like they may produce prior to the exit of Jones. As Stoke continued to sit back it was inevitable a goal would come. After a foul on the edge of the box with Stoke at sixes and sevens, Wolves had an ideal opportunity to get their noses in front just before the half time interval. After Henry touched the ball to Jones, who then flicked up the ball and volleyed towards Sorensen's goal there was only ever one outcome as the ball clipped the underside of the bar and into the net. This lead to absolute chaos in the Wolves stands and Stoke were on the back foot. Although it was a great strike, for me questions must be asked about how a player can flick a ball up and volley it before any Stoke player has thrown themselves at him.
So back to kick off we go and if we looked deflated before, we were practically dead on our feet after the goal. We lost all shape and motivation and were getting run ragged and as Wolves put the ball into the box via a deflection, the ball looped up into the air over several Stoke players and Thomas Sorensen and fell at the back post where Steven Fletcher was waiting to thump home a diving header for his debut goal. Absolutely soul destroying would probably sum it up. How did we allow all of our players to get under the ball leaving the back post unguarded? Both the players and the fans were dejected whilst Wolves were bouncing. Half time came and a few boos rang from the away end as some disgruntled Stoke fans showed there disgust at the capitulation that had taken place in front of us.
For both goals we lacked organisation and it would need a rocket from Pulis to turn these sorry efforts that call themselves professional footballers into anything near that!! We lacked urgency and bite which was there when Jones was on so how could it disappear so fast??
The second half started and both teams looked sluggish. Not too far into the second half TP decided that Sidibe was coming off and Tuncay was coming on. The question we all asked was why was this not the original decision when Jones went off? Fuller looked a shadow of himself when Sidibe was on in comparison to when he was paired with Jones or Tuncay and if you ask me he doesn't want to play with Sidibe because he knows what’s coming. If we can play Jones and Fuller together why can’t we play Tuncay and Fuller? Anyway that’s for Pulis to answer because there's no common sense answer. The introduction of Tuncay breathed some life into us again and after a Matty Etherington corner was thumped home by the head of Abdoulaye Faye a bit of optimism had returned. However don't be fooled, this was as much a case of Wolves slacking off as Stoke upping there game and had Wolves continued with their first half tempo Stoke would have been humiliated.
Despite the best efforts of the players we never looked like scoring again and the Wolves victory was always going to be the way the match would end.
To sum this game up the problem we have got is we put too much hope on Kenwyne Jones. Once he went off we fell to pieces and Pulis even admitted after the game that once we lost Jones we had the same problems as last season. So tell me Tony, if you can see it as we do, why are we not doing something about it? Why do we continue with negative long ball tactics and a defensive approach? Why don't we play through our midfield rather than only introducing them into the game as they are running back to goal defending? Why are we not making numerous signings? And why oh why do we not play Fuller and Tuncay together? The squad lacks depth and if you ask me the players know that improvement is needed because we are stale. We need 3 or 4 players to come in to freshen up our midfield and front line because let's face it all of us, players included can pretty much tell what the line up will be week in, week out. If you look at our bench, what options do we have to mix it up in attack when we are losing? None!!
After listening to Pulis after the match he admitted about the problems from last season which was the first alarm bell for me and secondly his explanation of the lack of transfers was that we've been unlucky. Well how about we stop being 'unlucky' and get a bit of urgency about us. Rather than chasing unrealistic targets, go for players who want to join and will put a shift in for us. Maybe a bit of urgency from the management may then filter down to the team because at times we looked like we were in a training session even when we were two nil down. I don't doubt that Pulis does a good job at Stoke however the lack of urgency and organisation in the team infuriates me and I'm sure every other Stoke fan. I said it at Derby and I'll say it again now, if we don't bring in fresh faces and stop playing such predictable football then we are in for a long hard season. Let's see how it goes shall we..........