Hang on - to the right of the keeper from the keeper's point of view? If so the 1st goal was and the 2nd goal wasn't. Though I guess the 2nd entered the goal to the right of the keeper... I think I may be confusing matters.
I never questioned his goals. He's one of the players that keeps going narrow though and isn't picking out the passes often enough when he does it. You look at City and Arsenal and their players do it all the time, playing precise through balls just behind the defenders, playing one-twos just on the edge of the box or taking on a man and opening the game up. Since he's not doing that I'd like to see him give us some more width at times and get some crosses in. This is why I'm questioning his overall contribution. He's in great goalscoring form, no question, and he's proved me wrong as I'd have sold him in the summer if we got a decent offer but I still think he needs to make a positive contribution in more of our attacks.
From the POV of Lloris, shooting from the right of the other keeper. (Chadli shot from the left, though it went in on the right, so it doesn't count.) I'm trying to think of one. Ade was marginally to the right when he scored against QPR, I think, but really it was from very near the center. My point is, every single one of our scorers prefers to shoot from the left side, and it's a big problem, because whoever plays on the right either doesn't score at all (Townsend and Lennon), or can't score from the right (Lamela and Eriksen).
Nacer isn't getting the praise because we haven't got a decent song for him. Lamela and Kane are doing well in the cups because there we play lesser opposition; but I agree it is a matter of time as they are both young.
All Chadli does is score. He's useless, like Gylfi really. Or maybe we should get four more who do nothing but score, and another five who do nothing but defend. It might be preferable to players who all too often do neither.
PNP, are you saying Chadli is the new Ardiles? Or suggesting Ardiles for one of the four scorers? If so, I'd be a little concerned at his being 62. Though I guess that's what they have time machines for.
Sorry RWAEB, I guess the reference to Ossie's tactics as Spurs manager might be a little before your time following the club. He basically picked the team that you described. Totally unbalanced and pretty mental, but fairly entertaining at times.
It's never too late for me to learn...I hope. But I persist in stubbornly believing that most people underrate the importance of goals, very oddly enough, and have underrated them ever since teams started getting three points for a win. Attractive football, good shape and a balanced side are central to making the beautiful game beautiful. But I doubt they'll get your team wins like having a couple of players who can bang 'em in. See Sherwood's team last year.
Sherwood started off with two strikers and slowly abandoned it, despite it appearing to work. I think he tried to sacrifice one of them to protect the defence more by packing the midfield, yet he still stubbornly refused to pick a midfielder with any idea of how to protect the back four. Goalscorers are very important, but I find that they need to provide more than that nowdays or results will suffer. Darren Bent is the prime example, as he always scores goals when he gets a run in any side, but the team will pick up less points. It's effectively like playing with 10 men for big chunks of games and then being randomly awarded a goal every few games. Having players in the side that score regularly is incredibly important, though. Someone like Suarez, who knows how to put the ball into the net, yet works hard, provides chances for others and tracks back, are invaluable. When you don't have a player like that, then you have to divide up various parts of the game between those that can do the individual jobs, in my opinion. Putting in some graft needs to be something that everyone does, though. Lamela can't tackle, but he's finally worked out that he needs to try to do it anyway.
Interesting and informative. I've been much more pleased with Lamela than most, I think. I'm put off by the haircut and some of the other cultural choices as well, but the Aston Villa game epitomized him this year. He came in, slammed into Bentecke, their big player, starting a melee which resulted in them going down to ten men. Then he put one on a platter for Chadli to equalize.
I actually meant that comment as a compliment to Lamela, RWAEB. Not quite sure it came across that way, admittedly. He's a good player and his workrate and closing down have improved drastically, when both were a little lacking when he first arrived. He's never going to be a ball winner, but he can still get in the way and give the opposition something to work around. That can often be the difference between good players and great players. The tiki-taka Barcelona didn't batter everyone for years because they had a lot of skill. They did it because they had a lot of skill and they worked their arses off. Mourinho's teams are always successful because he simply won't put up with any passengers. Mata's an excellent footballer, but he doesn't do that much of the dirty, gritty stuff. Allowing one player to slack off can affect your whole team's mindset. Having a team of fighters makes every game a challenge for your opponent. This is what's been letting us down a lot recently. The players don't put in enough hard work and don't believe that they can rescue negative scorelines.
