Is an excellent shop stopper, evidenced by his world class save to keep us in front, and eventually beat WHU, decent at coming for crosses and commanding his area, distribution is patchy at times, but mostly when trying to find Cam tight on the line on one wing, or McCrorie/Sykes on the other. He’s still relatively young for a keeper and is still improving. He’s amongst the best statistically in the championship
IMO Max is about the right standard for us....any better and he would be poached by bigger and more successful clubs than us.....He has a mistake in him as does Vyner and a few others......saved us on more than one occasion....definitely in credit with me.....all in all I think he's a decent keeper
Agreed, right across our team individuals make mistakes it’s why they aren’t at a higher level, those that are more consistent are soon snapped up by bigger clubs/ clubs higher up in the food chain. Max is no worse in his position than most of our team in theirs. His mistakes are highlighted more because he’s a keeper and keepers errors often leads to goals. For me he’s well in credit he’s made more than enough good saves to make up for his bloopers. Our defensive record is amongst the best in the league, that doesn’t happen with a poor keeper.
Max is ok, he'll do it for me, the player who is consistently playing out of his boots, is under the radar and is as far as I'm concerned an absolute top guy is Cameron Pring.
This game v Watford. Improvement after recently looking uncomfortable. Distribution by feet gets worse ... Fieldingesque?
Disagree re distribution against Watford , other than when trying to find either Pring or McCrorie tight on the touchline. He’s obviously playing to orders with those balls, which frankly most of our outfield players would struggle with. I’m sure Manning realises they are not going to be successful often and factors that in.
Ashton It's an old ploy hitting a wide player 50 yards from goal. Might as well get a big man up top centrally if that's Manning's get out ball. At least the ball would stay on the playing area.
Why do it then if the keeper isn't good enough to put it on a six pence? I don't get the why's of attempting to drop a ball on a players head out wide, who is outnumbered by the opposition so if he does win it the opposition get second balls. It is % of a % football!
I realise it’s an old ploy, but the success rate is never going to be that high. We don’t have anyone centrally we can use, no point going central with Tommy, I realise that’s why we do it, but doesn’t change the fact it often isn’t going to work. That’s what I meant when I said manning would be aware and factor it in.
We don’t do it all the time, usually when he can he’ll play a short ball to feet, if the opposition close all those routes off it’s better than kicking high centrally as we don’t have a tall ball winning centre forward, Tommy has no chance against most tall central defenders.
Because if the ball is lost to a throw we at least have the opportunity to ensure we are defensively set up.
The accuracy of a pass/shot reduces over distance but that doesn’t mean you should always pass short. I’ve noticed that often players ‘bunch’ in one area anticipating the goal kick. If the ball lands within the bunching then it’s about 60/40 as to who gets it under control. The defending side will have a slight advantage because they are naturally facing in the direction the ball is coming from (hence the 60) The GK has to weigh up the risk vs advantage, but all he’s really doing from a personal perspective by playing it short is offloading the risk on to the defender he passes to.
The ball is lost. Frequently. So we have a team playing possession football and a keeper losing the ball 45% of the time he has it. The two are not the same. As O'leary cant land the ball on a six pence why not punt the ball off the park further up field and press in behind it? City do not do this. There is a massive advantage to the opponent because City don't go lop sided to even up or outnumber the opponents.
