Now I hope no-one mistakes this as pointing the finger on one player - far from it; we all know Ruddy has had very little support from his defence at times. However, I've been saying for a while that his performances this season have not been great and one of things I noticed is how many goals per shot on target we seem to concede. Here's the stat: "[Ruddy] has only made 1.51 saves per goal, which, when you compare that to Sunderlandâs Vito Mannone, who averages 3.38 saves per goal, you can see that he definitely has to up his game to make those crucial saves that could win points for Norwich" I appreciate that it doesn't quite work like this, but you could argue that means had we had Mannone (who I do think is a decent keeper) we would have conceded fewer than half the number of goals. That's bonkers. Obviously it's not strictly true because Mannone has almost certainly had less protection from his defence and therefore more shots, but it does highlight that Ruddy has fallen short of last season's, and the 2011-12 season's, very high standards. http://www.squawka.com/news/2014/04...o-need-to-step-up/2014040993573/norwich4#main
He's also "committed the most errors that have led to a goal in the Premier League" (stat courtesy of WhoScored) http://www.whoscored.com/Articles/w...s-Norwichs-Decision-to-Sack-Hughton-Justified EDIT: incidentally, that link is their (WhoScored's) take on the sacking of Hughton. Nothing too groundbreaking within their analysis though.
How many of those "mistakes" put us behind in matches though? I bet a lot of them came when we were already behind.
Good point - this is almost certainly true. I bet those stats are based heavily on the City thrashings and suchlike. I can't specifically think of any games where Ruddy cost us points, but I think there are maybe a couple where he could have done better and gained us a point or two. Happy for these to be challenged, but at a guess: home to Fulham away to Cardiff home to Villa I think if we had, say Ruddy on the form of Marshall or Ruddy last year the key is it would more be a psychological benefit. They go hand in hand - knowing our 'keeper will save just about anything that's not right in the top corners or a tap in gives the other players the freedom to move forward.
I agree that he hasn't been as assured this season but to say they were mistakes may be a little harsh. I know what you are getting at though, when in top form you'd fancy him to do a bit better in at least some of the above situations. Hopefully this dip in form will put off any potential suitors in the summer (should we stay up).
I found that the defensive players in front of him just let people get too close before try to put a challenge in. Almost inviting shots on target.
All down to confidence IMO, CH has knocked the confidence out of the squad, hopefully NA can give them a boost.
Possibly but he was also out with an injury for a long time and it can sometimes take a while to get back to full sharpness after such a lengthy lay-off. This has probably been exacerbated by poor team performances too.
Agreed, he didn't seem the same player from the start of the season really(Hull game), also England prospects might have created a bit of nerviness in his performance.
I agree Rudy has not had his best season, but of late I feel he has improved. Other then that I'd say this is mostly rubbish. Shots saved is a tiny part of goalkeeping, although one most people look to as it is easy to put as a statistic. Shot stopping is the easiest part of goalkeeping, and even in the lower leagues you can have plenty of good shot stoppers. Far more important in many ways is their command of the area and talking to defence. Sadly for those of you who love stats, there are none for that. Two situations that make goalkeeping harder are a team sitting too deep or a team that gets hit on the counter attack. Sadly both seem to happen too often to us. Arguably the GK should instruct the defence to push up, but not if that is what the manager ordered (speculation of course). It means you are more unsighted on shots, more chance of deflections and teams are shooting from closer. Most importantly a keeper is just part of a team and a back line of 5 who are all responsible for defending, to say it is down to any individual is far too simplistic and wrong. With regards to Marshall, yes he has had a good season and his shot stopping is good, but he is not that good a keeper.
Ruddy clearly struggled with having been out so long at the start of the season. The notable improvement we had over bunn is his ability to control his box and take balls out of the air before they become shots. He has also improved significantly through the season and I'd say some of his recent games have been excellent. Not his best season but he's looking up for the run in.
Except that when push comes to shove, and Holtby strikes the ball from 30 yards to about two yards inside the post, do you want a shot-stopper or someone who commands their area well? I'm afraid that shot-stopping is key there, and this season there have been too many occasions where Ruddy has conceded goals which other keepers would have saved, and that is borne out in the stats, above. Far from meaningless. I'm not saying Ruddy's entirely to blame, or that if Marshall was in goal on Saturday we wouldn't have lost to West Brom. What I'm saying is that Ruddy hasn't been as good. That is borne out in the stats - I bet they were much better in 2011-12. I agree with Bath though that he has improved.
Where did I say you don't want a shot stopper? Of course you do. But it is only one part of goalkeeping and you can't base a keepers quality on just one part of goalkeeping. Most goalkeepers are good at shot stopping, there are bigger variations of quality in other parts of goalkeeping.
I didn't say you did. You said: "Shots saved is a tiny part of goalkeeping, although one most people look to as it is easy to put as a statistic" I was saying that actually it is quite a big part, and when push comes to shove actually pretty important. I agree it's only one part, but in a team conceding lots of goals from range and some I see as soft, it is doubly important. Agree that Ruddy has improved though. I think the nuance of this statistic has been overlooked. This is not "number of shots saved". This is shots saved per goal. This gives you a good idea of conversion rate of other teams against us. Teams playing Norwich are more than twice as likely to score with a shot on target than a team playing Sunderland. That's pretty massive. Yes, there are many, many factors to read into it, but you said "Other then that I'd say this is mostly rubbish". It's not rubbish. Taken alone and without due consideration for exterior circumstances, it's unhelpful, but far from rubbish. And I assume a certain level of intelligence amongst posters here that they will not take these stats in isolation or at face value.
Ruddy has also "stolen" games for us this season. WBA away comes to mind where he was excellent. Also personally I think Ruddy shot stopping is good. Another point Id make is that the statistic of saves per goal doesn't account for the quality of the shots. Should ruddy have been expected to save half the goals he let in? Clearly not. That stat could indicate more that the defence has been limiting chances better than the Sunderland defence. Which I would say is fairly likely.
Fair point, this is equally true. And a good point - it is a key problem with this particular stat. I suppose my point is that if the difference was down to, say 1.2-1.5 times, I think this would definitely be enough to account for it. There is absolutely no way that Mannone is twice the shot stopper of Ruddy, after all. But double? Bearing in mind we have conceded the same number of goals as Sunderland, that would mean if we defended as badly as Sunderland we would have conceded twice as many! Which would be a league record by some margin...
I think you're simplifying the stats too much. To really get a grasp of how they match up you'd have to look at number of shots from outside the area, inside the area, one on one's, coming from another players mistakes (Which has happened a lot for us). We don't usually concede a huge number of shots on goal but a lot have come from mistakes and poor defending in general, that means Ruddy has been left stranded and the attacker has a better chance of scoring. He definitely started poorly. He's also had a few big mistakes (Cardiff springs to mind) but he has not been the biggest problem in our defence. We should really be doing a thread comparing Bassong's stats from last year. I bet you'd see a marked rise in mistakes for a start!
Sorry to sound defensive, but I'm not simplifying them - I'm merely repeating what we've been given. They are as simple as presented to me. I've said a number of times that they need to be weighed and looked at with caution. I agree it needs to be much more nuanced to be in any way definitive, but I maintain the disparity between Ruddy's and Mannone's statistics is enormous. It is very easy to dismiss statistics as too defined, not nuanced, etc. Often that's true. Here, though, the disparity is huge and cannot simply be explained away by casual dismissal of statistics as "lies, damn lies and statistics". It can be softened, of course, particularly with the factors Bath brings up. It should be noted though, the factors you bring up don't soften the statistics - they colour them and break them down into categories. Over the course of the season (and 50+ goals conceded apiece) those factors actually even out across both teams. I'd be surprised if there are enormous disparities between Norwich and Sunderland on each of number of shots from outside the area, inside the area, one on one's and coming from another players mistakes.
I fear unless we do something amazing in the next few games you won`t need to worry about Ruddy`s form as he will probably be keeping the Chelsea bench warm for the young Belgium keeper..
