A few weeks ago, I posted a thread suggesting ways of improving our appalling record from corners and free kicks. Many of you disagreed. Today was even worse. In both halves, we had numerous corners and free kicks into the box with nine men alreay there attacking (or more accurately) waiting for the delivery. West Brom had as many but were ready and waiting to pounce and counter-attack our solitary defender when, inevitably the set piece failed. It's practically impossible because of the number of bodies to get a clean contact with the ball and direct it between the sticks with any meaningful force. The reason why HH seemed much more effective in winning headers and placing them in the direction of his team mates is that he always runs on to a cross and therefore manages to get off the ground. Zamora waits for the ball to come down out of the sky and jumps straight up from a starting position. The technical term I think is 'attacking the ball'. What we do is get the bodies in the box and then wait for it to come to us. No. No. No. If we are going to avoid playing the ball on the deck when we're away from home and simply lump it up for our big man, can we at least get the tactics right?
Taarabt's delivery has improved of late but its still poor considering the talent the boy has. Our set-piece play has been woeful all season. With Hughes giving himself a big pat on the back for changing a couple of treadmills in the gym, maybe he'd be better placed to sort out our set-piece play instead??
Our problem is, is that Zamora is pretty ****. He is a waste of money. What we need is goals, and this fella is not the one to keep us up. He is pony.
We had a great chance for a Taiwo inswinger where any kind of touch would be dangerous, instead we have Taarabt take it and it was useless. We dont use our brains at all with them, why doesnt Buz take corners when he plays? It makes no sense at all.
I said this before we signed him but almost everyone on here creaming in their pants about Zamora and Johnson if he was any ****ing use Fulham wouldn't have sold him
In defense of all concerned,MH obviously has his hands full just trying to keep us up.He has a mish mash of a squad,no real bench available to change things and although I totally agree about the set pieces,I believe what ever division we end up in next season MH will have most of our obvious problems sorted by next August.At the moment he must feel like he,s swimming against the tide.
Zamora missed a great chance from a right-wing cross in the first half, heading inches wide. It's those sort of chances that should be buried, if not we will be...
Good post, Yorkie. The dead ball delivery is poor and, as you stay, standing statically in a crowd in the penalty area is unlikely to reap many positive results.
The set pieces have been much improved in recent weeks. It was unlucky that Taarabt's yesterday on the by-line came to nothing because it created panic, Barton's goal at Swansea came from an excellent set piece delivery and the free-kick against Arsenal that Zamora inexplicably headed over was a peach. Little things like set pieces have improved immeasurably under Hughes though it's taken time.
Can't Taiwo take all the set pieces? He connects well enough when the ball's moving! Played a superb through ball from halfway down the pitch(which Zamora screwed up)
He ain't a goal-scorer but he does everything else really well. He's far better than Heskey and he won a load of England Caps. His link up play is brilliant and if he had Cisse on his shoulder yesterday I think we would have won.
You're a wum, a moron or haven't seen his other performances. He'll never be deadly in front of goal but his hold-up play and ability to bring others into the game is very good and if Cisse wasn't such a lunatic we'd have seen them working together and would probably not be where we are. He's never been at his best as a lone striker but has run himself into the ground doing that role for the good of the team.
