I hope Jol was listening to Danny Murphy on MOTD2 tonight as he discussed (and demonstrated) the flaw in playing wingers on the "wrong" side. Surlyc (I think it was) has mentioned this many times about Frei and we saw it yet again when Jol played right winger Mesca on the left in the recent friendly game. I'm specifically mentioning Mesca because after the game the consensus was "not yet ready" and to pose the question, what if he had been in his natural position?
Just as significant for me were Hartson's comments about the kind of service a centre forward wants. Now that we've got a proper off-the-shoulder centre forward like Bent, it's even more important that we start getting some good, early crosses into him. Interestingly, I don't recall Danny Murphy ever giving any sign that he disagreed with Roy, yet we always seemed to invert our wingers in those days. For what it's worth, I'm enjoying Danny Murphy as an MOTD pundit - a definite step up from Lawro and Shearer (which wouldn't be hard).
Captain you are right we have played similar under Roy but normally it was Davies right and Duff left when both fit. Probably the point Danny is making is that when a winger is not fluent on both feet to cross the ball will have to turn by which time as we have seen the defense will have regrouped and any advantage lost.
Are you sure, FFC Madness? My recollection is of mostly seeing Duff on the right and Davies cutting in from the left. I don't recall Duff playing much on the left for us until Hughes took over, and I'm sure that Davies' semi-final goal against Hamburg saw him moving inside from the left. Roy used to like his wingers narrow as that way we took less time to regroup into two tight lines of four when we lost the ball. It made us harder to beat, but meant we lacked the width to break down teams who came to the Cottage with little attacking ambition. Of course, I'm an occasional visitor to the cottage, rather than a regular attender, so it's entirely possible that the games I saw were an unrepresentative selection on this matter.
Danny's point is one I've made a lot of times, particularly regarding Frei- if a player has pace and one foot it is a complete waste to play him on the opposite site. Robert Pires plays that role, Aaron Lennon doesn't. The winger cutting in only suits two footed players and usually they don't shift there until they've played a couple seasons and smartened up. We end up just crowding out the middle, it's not so bad if Riether is there to overlap but on the left we have Riise. If he makes one gut busting run he is knackered for the next 5 mins.
I've never understood why managers do that when it's unnecessary. Mourinho did it with Joe Cole, he did adapt to this role but it took hima while. I would have thought that playing a player in his natural position would be the best way forward. But then I am a mere mortal who knows nowt!
