Getsme
Full Member
- Joined
- Jan 4, 2013
- Messages
- 11,236
Having thought about this it’s become very evident that when plan A doesn’t work we resort to long ball tactics, tactics I’d associate with a struggling Premiership or lower division side, not for a Club that prides itself on free flowing attacking football, especially when the manager has a reputation for playing a modern style game. Or does he?
According to stats from the World Cup the Netherlands played over 100 more long balls than any other team in the World Cup last summer- they averaged 80 long balls per game. The next most by any quater-final team was 65 per game by Costa Rica, that’s quite a difference in anybody books. We are now 24 games into the season and we are currently 2nd in the league of long balls, we are up there with all the teams promoted to the Premiership this season. We now even have Sam Allardyce of all people calling us a long ball team, and he has a case.
Yesterday’s game was yet another example of this, we played 29 more long balls than West Ham, but it worked, no one can deny we were struggling to score when we tried to play with a patient possession based football. It wasn't until we started to play the long ball game that we started to create chances, even Allardyce admitted they found it hard to cope with our long ball tactics.
My question is, are we deliberately by-passing the midfield and playing to our strengths? Is the team’s instructions to play it long to our attacking players? It would certainly explain the team selections and why Herrera is constantly on the bench? It’s also a tactic our defenders like to play as it gives them less and less on the ball reasonability
I’m starting to think it’s a tactic we will have to get used to until he finds the right players to play his preferred formation (whatever that may be)
According to stats from the World Cup the Netherlands played over 100 more long balls than any other team in the World Cup last summer- they averaged 80 long balls per game. The next most by any quater-final team was 65 per game by Costa Rica, that’s quite a difference in anybody books. We are now 24 games into the season and we are currently 2nd in the league of long balls, we are up there with all the teams promoted to the Premiership this season. We now even have Sam Allardyce of all people calling us a long ball team, and he has a case.
Yesterday’s game was yet another example of this, we played 29 more long balls than West Ham, but it worked, no one can deny we were struggling to score when we tried to play with a patient possession based football. It wasn't until we started to play the long ball game that we started to create chances, even Allardyce admitted they found it hard to cope with our long ball tactics.
My question is, are we deliberately by-passing the midfield and playing to our strengths? Is the team’s instructions to play it long to our attacking players? It would certainly explain the team selections and why Herrera is constantly on the bench? It’s also a tactic our defenders like to play as it gives them less and less on the ball reasonability
I’m starting to think it’s a tactic we will have to get used to until he finds the right players to play his preferred formation (whatever that may be)