‘The Bees are buzzing at the top end, but it would be so typical of us if we ended their superb run’
IT’S the final home game of the season for Stoke City this afternoon - and safety is almost in the bag.
So can they sign off at the bet365 Stadium in style to end Brentford’s remarkable winning run?
Debating all the issues this week are ADRIAN BUTTERS, from Stone; ANT BUNN, from Endon; and KEVIN BOOTH, from Waterhouses.
WHAT’S YOUR TEAM? Adrian Butters: Davies, Smith, Chester, Batth, Martins Indi, Thompson, Cousins, Clucas, Mcclean, Powell, Gregory.
Vokes looked tired at the end of the Bristol game and we are likely to have even less possession than normal, so I’ve gone for Gregory’s ability to hold the ball up as well as being able to run the channels in behind.
Campbell is on the bench as, despite his superior finishing, he is too wasteful in possession to play the lone role at the moment.
Brentford are probably the best in the division at keeping possession and playing a passing game, so I’ve added Thompson into the midfield to allow Clucas, Mcclean and Powell to support Gregory. Ant Bunn: I think he’ll keep it exactly the same as at Bristol City, but one change might be Tyrese Campbell for Lee Gregory.
I expect Brentford to have the majority of the ball and it might be a good idea to play Tyrese as high as possible and look for him long and early in the channels where his pace would be vital.
First half at Ashton Gate we really missed Tyrese. Their back four was all over the place and the chance that fell to Gregory I would expect Tyrese on his left foot to dink over the keeper and score. Kevin Booth: Much will depend on fitness concerns surrounding two of our better performers of late, stand-in captain Sam Clucas and playmaker Nick Powell.
Both, I believe, are integral to what Michael O’neill is trying to achieve at Stoke.
One would be a big miss, two would leave us with gaping holes in areas of the pitch already lacking the industry and tenacity of long-term casualty Joe Allen.
Will Lee Gregory keep his place in the Stoke City side this afternoon when they take on in-form Brentford?
Powell has been the catalyst for much of Stoke’s best football under O’neill and, at times, you feel his creativity and footballing intelligence have even outsmarted some of his own team-mates.
Clucas has weighed in with 11 goals and, since being handed the captain’s armband, seems to have recaptured his pre-lockdown form. We’ll need both if we are to compete today.
The only other dilemma centres on whether to recall a rested Tyrese Campbell in place of Lee Gregory.
Gregory did his case no harm at all with a typical all-action display at Bristol City, but for me Campbell’s
natural instinct in front of goal makes him the better option in a game where Stoke’s chances are likely to be at a premium and we’ll spend much time on the back foot.
My team: Davies, Smith, Batth, Chester, Martins Indi, Cousins, Clucas, Powell, Campbell, Mcclean, Vokes.
WHAT’S YOUR PREDICTION? Adrian Butters: Stoke to win 1-0. Brentford have won eight on the bounce and, good as they are, that run has to end somewhere.
It will probably have to be a “Pulis-like” defend the edge of the box affair with a Danny Baath goal
from a set-piece and I admit it will be a turn up, but it would be so Stoke.
Ant Bunn: I think we won’t lose, despite Brentford being as good a team as there is in this division.
They are a model club in terms of recruitment and style of play. They develop players, sell them and seem to replace them with better players.
I hope they lose today, but go up. Be great to see them in the Premier League.
I’m going for 2-2. They will cut us open at times, but I think our set-pieces will worry them with Messrs Batth and Vokes especially crucial in recent weeks in the air.
Brentford are on fire at the moment and our defensive frailties still exist (see Leeds away). Pains me to say so, but I’m going for 2-0 to the visitors.
ANY OTHER BUSINESS? Adrian Butters: I think, certainly hope, we are safe now and it is in no small part down to Michael O’neill.
His post-match interview at Leeds suggested that he was concerned about the way the squad had been assembled and the structure by which the club operated, not quite the attempts to work his ticket that Gary Rowett mastered, but I just had a worry that he thought he’d bitten off more than he could chew.
We are now at a point where he’s proved himself and on the assumption he’s kept us up, we need to trust him with full control of the reins, in much the same way the Coates family backed Pulis in 2006/7 when signing Higginbotham, Diao, Hendrie et al.
I often read that this squad doesn’t care, isn’t trying etc. Frankly I think they’re just not very good and they have little choice as to how they play, sometimes they come up against worse sides and beat them, better ones they lose to.
I think our results depend more on the quality of the opposition than our side’s own influence on the game.
That needs to change by us giving 100 per cent backing to a bloke who took Northern Ireland to their highest ever ranking.
Ant Bunn: If it wasn’t for Michael O’neill we would be getting the road maps out to Accrington next year.
Another week of Nathan Jones would have seen us probably lose at Barnsley on the Saturday - a game that has now turned into a huge six-point swing.
O’neill deserves all the plaudits going. Whilst he himself alludes to problems within the squad, he has got on with the job a hand in a quiet, dignified manner that we have been crying out for.
When we win, he doesn’t run on the pitch and start breaking his own ribs by punching his chest repeatedly, nor does he get too down straight after a defeat.