The best right back in the league?

Don't have to worry about it just yet - he signed a 2-year deal so has another year to go.

 

Well, they can track player position and movement, so a stats actually can tell you those things.

But I understand the point you are making. My counter argument is what good does it do you to know these things? If I told you Player X was fantastic because he ran left a lot, you'd laugh. For good reason.

You have to do the analysis, whether you use your eyes or stats. Ultimately the Player ran in some direction for a purpose. To make a pass, or receive a pass, to tackle a defender, to pull someone offside. All those things are measurable outcomes.

If Player X, doesn't win a tackle but Player Y that is recorded in stats the same way your eye sees it. One guy made a tackle, one guy didn't.

What I sense you are trying to get at is that Player X helped the defense despite not making the tackle. But it is your brain that attaches those events together to create a story. Not your eye. The data itself is meaningless.

You do the same thing with statistics. If Player Y averages more tackles per minute while Player X is in the pitch, wouldn't that indicate the Player X is having a positive impact? How about if the opposition has less possession, or attempts fewer passes or scores fewer goals?

 

I found this interesting image on the web. It shows the actual path that Cuco's goal of the season against Arsenal took. That's quite some bend.

 

Sort of. My point really is that judging two players on stats is dangerous as they may not have done the same thing in the same situation and the outcome may have take the game/ball in a different direction (here I'm on about Cedric/Martina)

For me, using stats beyond a basic level can be very misleading in interpreting the performance of a player and his impact on a football match.

 

I still think Cuco is poor defensively and would like to see us upgrade that position in the Summer if possible.

 

There used to be a player for Lincoln that you would always hear fans (especially older ones) acclaiming his effort. "Would run his socks off for the Imps."

However the end result from that effort was virtually zero. Couldn't get that past the older chaps though. they were having none of it. This was of course the days of "Le Tissier is too lazy."

 

Indeed. An example: back in the early 2000s, Brett Ormerod was the crowd favourite. Even over James Beattie, who was the club's lead striker. Brett was a hard tryer who somewhat overcame his limited skills. Beatts was undoubtedly a step up from him though, and he put a shift in too. When Kevin Phillips came along he was head and shoulders better in quality, but Brett retained his crowd favourite position, pretty much solely because he tried hard and ran around a lot.
Anyone, even the completely unskilled, if they put their mind to it, can make a lot of effort, and that's entirely laudable. But effort without skill, or with less skill, lacks focus and impact, compared to the highly skilled. If I am a manager, I don't want my Matt Le Tissier chasing round the pitch. I want his head full of creativity. Let the less skilled do the running around. However, it doesn't seem to work like that in terms of appreciation. Make less effort on the field, even while putting in the unseen, hard, thoughtful hours of work of honing skills, and it often goes unappreciated. More often than not though, it's those people who are the real game changers.

 

Statistically speaking, that Steven Davis is rubbish. If you ignore the last few games his goals scored is zilch, I will bet he's not as fast as long or Mané, tall as Pelle or wins as many headers as Fonte or VVD.
Get rid of him!

 

I'm sure you had it in mind, but when watching that Le Tissier documentary last year, it really hit me how much time he put in on his skills as a kid. Hours of kicking a ball against a wall, booting a ball up in the air and trapping it, hitting a target from distance.
Yet often players of that ilk are labelled by commentators/pundits as natural. As if it's god given rather than something which is honed and learned.

I've heard Waddle & Hoddle mention similar things. Twatbeard's ability to turn on a sixpence is not something that just came to him.

I have seen a few videos of freestyle footballers which are brilliant and they're not just juggling tricks, but shooting and passing tricks. These players are clearly skilful, so you wonder why they're not playing at any kind of professional level. Perhaps they've had bad injuries, but it's likely that they just don't run around enough for coaches

 

Cuco has been much better second half of the season, but that isn't necessarily because he has become a better player. He hardly played at the start of the season, but the main thing is just he could well have taken a little while to settle in.
Although he has impressed me, I think part of the reason people seem to rate cuco at present is because of the low expectations we had of him when we signed him. Whereas we all expected cedric to be pretty good.

 

Cuco had a period when he seemed to just wander off. We were joking (you know, the gags that spread around a section of the crowd) at one of the games that Ron must have told him to stay under a particular seagull that was drifting round the stadium. Then, over a period of three or four games, he just stopped going AWOL, tightened up his positioning and he looked a different player.

If we can see a problem, you can get your bottom dollar that the coaching team see the same thing but the difference is that they can do something about it.

Regardless of the cause (new team, uncertainty of his place, desire to show his ability or whatever it was) he wasn't doing something right and I suspect he was taken aside and had the errors coached out. All sorts of things can make a sound player (sound enough that we signed him) drift off course. Good coaches will fix them without causing more of a problem. I have great faith in our coaches' ability to improve players and to fix temporary problems. I'm now quite happy to see his name on the team sheet.

Vin

 

I believe this part is because they don't have a few extra things, such as a football game brain, will or desire, understanding of when to use flair and when not to.

Here's a silly example and also relates to the Le Tiss bit in your post. When I was 7-8, I lived opposite a lad of the same age and we played in the same team. In our road. He could easily do about 50 keepy ups at that age and I struggled to 10 if I was lucky and that was chasing touches 7, 8 and 9 down the road. He was miles more skilful than me but I was the one out there in the dark practicing and carried on playing for many years. He stopped at 15 because his skill and pace weren't harnessed.

 

I'm not sure that Cuco is the answer, but if Ron decides over the summer (or maybe has already decided) then he is, then I will go along with that. I certainly rate his crossing better than Clyne's and Cedric's. We've missed that since Richardson.

 

The problem Cuco has is that he's always only one bad pass away from a barracking from the more impatient types of our fanbase.

 

But statistically speaking, Davis ISN'T rubbish. He profiles exactly like you would expect.

It's true that the stats show he doesn't score much or win too many headers. But that's because he doesn't. But he he has a high work rate, makes tackles, rarely makes mistakes, passes often and successfully, and occasionally chips in with a nice assist.

If you are judging Davis solely on speed, headers, height, and goals only that's not a problem with statistics. That's a problem with your analysis. And you would reach exactly the same conclusion that Davis sucks if you used only your eyes and not your brain.

 

I think that because of low expectations, Martina was initially being blamed for every goal, even though they were obviously not his fault. Now people think that he has improved massively, but a lot of is that they simply started seeing him in a different light.

 

If you go onto youtube and look for the "F2 Freestylers" there is a few videos of them playing at what looks to me like semi pro level and basically doing all their tricks in a game. I think those 2 both had the options to be pros but at L1/L2 level and turned it down to be freestylers.

 

Which is the point I was making- stats have their place but until they measure "times players refrained from hoofing it back to opponent and passed it out of trouble" then I suspect that SD will not get the plaudits he deserves.

 

Cuco with training could fill a void in charge esp if playing 3, RK is the man for training a newby. My problem with Cuco is that he does switch off, point in case is he let Kane one on one with with Jose but thought OK Jose has this covered whereas he should have gone behind Jose just in case Kane went past Jose, which he did and only a fantastic block by Forster prevented a goal. If you look through the season you will probably find at least 10 more examples of him switching of and those errors leading to goals or chances

 

Butterfields crossing was excellent the other day, get him in as crossing coach to the others!