I made an exception to my rule and watched a good bit of their game last night. They did not control it. It was at best a 50/50 encounter against a depleted Sparta team. This isn't a certain narrative.
They fail to track runners, and are destroyed by any pace whatsoever. It is not a confidence issue, it is not a psychological issue, it is a very average team issue.
Laxalt, the worlds greatestest left back is an extremely fast runner who CAN go by a player at speed more often than not runs into trouble and either crosses blindly to no-one or loses it and gets caught way out of position. On the other side the guy they dropped in for ping pong, elhamed, does similar and his crossing was lazy, again throwing into noone.
McGregor looked as if he was running out of air after about an hour. Christie should have been red carded after his latest stamp through petulance. Ntcham is a liability when facing decent, not great, players. Brown is reduced to making last ditch tackles because he is so off the pace. Rogic is and always was skilfull but no stamina
Their latest combo of defenders cannot keep track of runners, any interplay between forwards and they are all over the place. They are decent, not good, in the air. They are awful when faced with movement.
I emphasize again, this was mainly Sparta's 2nd and 3rd choice players. Not saying they weren't decent but they're not someone we would worry much about. If they were offered the same amount of money wasted on Barkas, the mentally challengeds could have bought most of that Sparta team from last night.
Sparta B/C had 13 shots on goal 7 on target. mentally challengeds had 8 and 4 on target. Of those, Sparta scored 4 and hit the post. They scored 1 and fluffed any other decent chances. Sorry, but how does that equate to controlling a game?
Their 'extremely dangerous' striker missed an absolute sitter, falling on his arse 4 yards from goal and went off 'injured' because he couldn't be bothered. Definitely looked a Suttonesque injury.
They are a team devoid of ideas. They look like us 2nd half of last year but with worse players. How you managed to see anything other than that I am not sure.
If you are worried that they are capable of beating the SPFL dross that's fine, they are. If you are worried they can get better, of course they can. If you are worried that they are as good as us, rest easy. They are nowhere near our level. We need to keep winning but unless we implode again this year, and we might, we have their measure. That is the first time in years I have genuinely thought that.