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Ratings v Norwich

braineclipse said:
But he did make a change, he put on Adebayor...
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So Harry could see 442 wasn't working. He certainly knew by the post match interview and presumably had an inkling during the game. You'd certainly hope so. Check the match thread, and people could see it too from pretty early in the first half

So why bring on Ade and retaining the formation that was not working? Bold? No. The same. And fail.
 
SpurMeUp said:
So Harry could see 442 wasn't working. He certainly knew by the post match interview and presumably had an inkling during the game. You'd certainly hope so. Check the match thread, and people could see it too from pretty early in the first half

So why bring on Ade and retaining the formation that was not working? Bold? No. The same. And fail.
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Simple, he didn't want to take off Defoe. Defoe scored. He would look like an idiot to the media if he lost a game in which he subbed off his goal scorer.
Compare that to Mourinho, if something isn't working he'll make substitutions in the first half if needed.
 
I think he wanted Defoe on as he was hoping for some pot shot to dig us out of a hole. And Saha had to come off for someone as he was dreadful, never mind about formations he had to be taken off.
 
Right so bring on VDV for Saha, or even Sandro would have been more appropriate. Then ask Defoe to run himself into the ground and put Ade on for the last 25 mins.
 
Defoe cant be a target man though. Especially since Friedel was taking long kick outs and our defense wasnt capable for buliding play from the back. I presume he didnt want to risk Sandro who like Lennon has been struggling with injuries.
 
VDV for Livermore was a silly sub to make, there was still 15 minutes left and it killed any momentum we had. It puts pay to this idea that the more attacking players you have on the field means you'll be more attacking and more likely to score, as simply put you cannot score if you can't get the ball.
 
Rossi22 said:
VDV for Livermore was a silly sub to make, there was still 15 minutes left and it killed any momentum we had. It puts pay to this idea that the more attacking players you have on the field means you'll be more attacking and more likely to score, as simply put you cannot score if you can't get the ball.
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The first sub was insane to me. Whats the point of subbing a forward with another forward while we were losing the midfield? Sandro should have been a better option.
 
I think at times we had a lot of the ball but had few players in the box. You had Bale, Lennon, Modric and VDV outside trying to make something happen but not consistantly in the box. Utd for example, if they are chasing a goal, will completely overload the box with players and do more work from the wings to get crosses in to them. We didnt seem to have a plan bar a few decent efforts by BAE on the left.
 
442 is not working 433 is not working. Norwich played the long ball , our problem was the defence mainly King was an is a liability, we were bossing the game until they scored and then you could see the confidence draining away.

We played better today than we did against Sunderland at least we looked like scoring and did.

Had Gallas played instead of King we probably puled have won, had Kaboul not gone off , maybe the same as well.

They mostly played the long ball and by passed the midfield anyway.

Harry is getting hang up on formations.

I thought the subs were justified, he brought on who he thinks is our prime striker, he then brought on an attacking player for a defensive one , when we had to score and had nothing to lose.
 
They by passed our midfield with diagonal balls that exploited the fact that we like our full backs to go foward. That really stopped BAE and Walker getting foward enough and pulled our central defenders out of place. Decent tactic by Lambert when used with pressing our defenders in to playing long balls too.
 
I'll repeat what I said in the OMT.

For the first 5 minutes we looked strong, and I thought we'd score for fun. Then King was put under pressure and panicked, and the whole team panicked. Our confidence disappeared after that and Norwich grew in confidence.

As much as I hate to say it, the performance and loss was down to King having a shocker.
 
Had Gallas played instead of King
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Gallas has been amazing for us since coming back from injury. He is great, really really great. But they had 2 big strikers, they are one of the top scorers if not the top scorers of headed goals. Their goals come from crosses, set pieces and things like that. Their team is based around wing play and crossing the ball. Kaboul got injured, Nelson came on for him. King didn't have a good day, he was troubled by Grant Holt... Now I love Gallas, but no matter what you say about Gallas, it's hard to call him tall. We saw at Stoke that he's not tall. (Some would say Harry might have noticed that before playing him at Stoke...) So while Gallas would have been useful on the ground, calmer while being pressed than some defenders, the thing you want playing against Norwich is being able to defend in the air.

It's true that if you look at retrospectively, Gallas for King doesn't seem like a bad idea. But at the start of the day, playing against an aerial team, you'd have backed King to help more than Gallas, wouldn't you?
 
Fuego said:
Gallas has been amazing for us since coming back from injury. He is great, really really great. But they had 2 big strikers, they are one of the top scorers if not the top scorers of headed goals. Their goals come from crosses, set pieces and things like that. Their team is based around wing play and crossing the ball. Kaboul got injured, Nelson came on for him. King didn't have a good day, he was troubled by Grant Holt... Now I love Gallas, but no matter what you say about Gallas, it's hard to call him tall. We saw at Stoke that he's not tall. (Some would say Harry might have noticed that before playing him at Stoke...) So while Gallas would have been useful on the ground, calmer while being pressed than some defenders, the thing you want playing against Norwich is being able to defend in the air.

It's true that if you look at retrospectively, Gallas for King doesn't seem like a bad idea. But at the start of the day, playing against an aerial team, you'd have backed King to help more than Gallas, wouldn't you?
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In retrospect we should have gone with Kaboul and Nelsen.
I wonder if we had started that line up and won would everyone still think we were heading for 3rd place.
 
Based upon my view of game from Park Lane plus watching Football First:

Friedel -6- Not much he could do about either goal.
Walker -5- Sub-par performance.
Kaboul -5- Partly at fault for first goal.
King -4- A pale shadow of his former self since the City game, lucky not to concede penalty.
BAE -6- Some good driving runs, unlucky not to score.
Lennon -6- Regaining match sharpness.
Modric -6- Some quality passes, some appalling corners.
Livermore -5- Great through ball to set-up Defoe but failed to shield the defence.
Bale -6- Some decent crosses, unlucky to hit crossbar.
Saha -3- Anonymous.
Defoe -6- Great goal but otherwise didn't contribute much, typical JD really.

Nelsen -6- Battled well when he came on, our best CB on the day.
Adebayor -5- Nice 1-2 with BAE but otherwise didn't provide any goal threat.
VdV -5- Made no impact.
 
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I thought Modric deserved a 5 from what I saw up. had to log off early.

Nelsen was probably a 4 so was Brad. Everyone else were between 1 and 3.

Though King had his worst league game ever, I reserve special criticism for Bale, Lennon, Saha and Defoe who did absolutely nothing whatsoever to be avalable outlets for the other teammates on the ball behind them. They just fudging stood around with Defoes run for the goal the one notable exception (credit for the marvelous finish).

This performance was a real stinker. Forget formations. Forget fatigue. When you don't move the ball and when you don't compete for 2nd balls, then you deserve nothing. We didn't do either and haven't done so for huge periods of our games since New year. Argue all you like, that's the harsh truth.

A promoted team should have scored 3-4 against us in one half and had 43% of the play pinned down into our half.
 
lennon was at fault for norwich's winning goal.
he turned over possession when it was 3 on 3 with them on the back foot.

match fit or not, he has never been consistent with his performances. everytime he looks to be a world beater he gets injured and then begins this long optimistic 3 steps for wards 2 steps back type of progress that keeps fans hanging on. we need a back up for lennon.
 
colin fishwick said:
442 is not working 433 is not working. Norwich played the long ball , our problem was the defence mainly King was an is a liability, we were bossing the game until they scored and then you could see the confidence draining away.

We played better today than we did against Sunderland at least we looked like scoring and did.

Had Gallas played instead of King we probably puled have won, had Kaboul not gone off , maybe the same as well.

They mostly played the long ball and by passed the midfield anyway.

Harry is getting hang up on formations.

I thought the subs were justified, he brought on who he thinks is our prime striker, he then brought on an attacking player for a defensive one , when we had to score and had nothing to lose.
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No, 4-3-3 was working fine. Having listened to Harry on talksport after the game it sounded as though he caved into fan pressure for moaning that we should be playing two upfront all the time.
 
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