Read this article; http://www.whoscored.com/Articles/oeP8SxdWh0aTlIOSTG-3Aw It concludes that we are the best in the league at keeping possession. That our strikers are lethal. .....and yet we are awful in the final 3rd when it comes to delivering the final ball (we are not even attempting the last pass anywhere near often enough it seems). I put it to you we just need tweaking, 1 or 2 players who try to make things happen in the final 3rd....maybe Pozuelo needs to get more starts also.
Some of us have been saying this all season Terror. The final delivery or final pass has been letting us down all season. Not sure if it's composure or general inability to cross. Even players who are capable of crossing like JDG and Hernandez aren't nearly consistent enough. When they do and it works we create real chances. I pay less attention to the stat about passes in our own half - that's the way we play. What we need to do is improve the final ball quality. A little tweaking as you say and we could be the real deal. For me, one of the key stats is that our strikers are second in the League at converting chances (60%). We just don't create enough of them. Put that right and we'll be flying.
Definately poxy at crossing. Every time we get a corner I groan when I see Ash coming up for it, knowing that nothing is going to come from it 99.9% of the time due to the lousy quality of the crossing.
Just what i and others have been saying all along. I keep on saying we have a very good squad of players but we don't use them to our full potential and if we do we will shoot up the league, If we dont then we have to rely on the lap of the gods and hope results keep going our way. excellent article and very accurate... Team Focus: Pretty Passing but Little Creativity at Swansea by Alistair Tweedale at Wednesday, Jan 8 2014 12:10 Share on twitter Share on facebook Share on digg Share on reddit Share on stumbleupon 0 Team Focus: Pretty Passing but Little Creativity at Swansea Pep's Barcelona approached the game in an ideological way. The old adage oft uttered at Sunday league level that 'they can't hurt you if they don't have the ball' seemed to have a surprisingly apt relevance to the greatest football team of the modern era. The aim was to grind down opponents by retaining possession, tiring them out, before creating openings and winning it back as quickly as possible once it was lost. The Catalans were unbelievably effective at playing like this. With Xavi, Iniesta and Busquets in central midfield, though, they could afford to adopt such a policy; in their successful 2010/11 Liga campaign they averaged 72.6% possession, while they enjoyed 73.4% of the ball as they won the Champions League in the same season. Plenty of others had already taken note of their success. Swansea, to a lesser extent, have tried to play like this. They have bags of technical ability in their ranks, and impressed hugely in climbing up the football league from near extinction in the fourth tier in 2001. It was fitting that it was a Spaniard in Roberto MartÃnez who introduced the keep-ball philosophy they still adhere to, and possibly yet more so that the manager who was apparently Barcelona's first choice ahead of Guardiola back in 2008, Michael Laudrup, took the reigns when Brendan Rodgers left for Liverpool before the start of last season. The work of MartÃnez and Rodgers has been continued. It is extremely rare for a newly promoted side to dominate possession like Swansea did in 2011/12. They averaged a 58% share of the ball as they managed an eleventh-placed finish in their debut season in the Premier League, then 55.3% as they further established their place and also won the Capital One Cup. This season, that figure has increased to a league-high 59.6% but the results haven't accordingly improved. It seems odd to say there might be such a thing as too much possession, but could it be that Swansea have had just that this season? Plenty of the ball in unthreatening areas is not a worry to opponents if chances don't ensue. For all their possession, the Swans have had the 8th most shots (13.8 per game) in the Premier League and have actually attempted a large proportion from distance too, with nearly half coming from outside the area (49%). They have played just under a quarter of their passes (24.6%) in the attacking third of the pitch, a lower proportion than any other team in the Premier League. It is fair to conclude that too much of their play, while adding to their possession, is rather unnecessary. Team Focus: Pretty Passing but Little Creativity at Swansea Too much of their play is horizontal and too little goes forwards - a higher proportion of their passes are played sideways than any other team in the Premier League this season (54.0%) - and while they are brilliant at keeping the ball a lack of incision may cost them. Laudrup's men are currently 6 matches without a win in the Premier League and have slipped into a rather perilous position just 4 points above the drop zone. They won't be getting relegated this season as there are at least 3 teams that are worse than them, but this run will need to be ended sooner rather than later, and maybe a signing or two could be worthwhile this January. For all their fantastic technical ability in central areas with the likes of José Cañas, Jonathan De Guzmán and Jonjo Shelvey usually making up a midfield three, there is still an argument that Swansea lack creativity in those areas. Of those players, Shelvey is making the most key passes per game from open play, but even he is only making 1.1, followed by De Guzmán (1.0), while Cañas has made just 2 in 16 Premier League appearances thus far. Of course, that is not what the Spaniard is tasked with, but alongside such a player there needs to be far more in the way of creativity. De Guzmán is a brilliantly gifted player; an energetic set-piece specialist who keeps the ball fantastically well whilst also providing something of a goal threat from deep, and it would be a big ask to demand that Swansea make an improvement on him. It would, too, be a huge task to buy someone that is an improvement on Shelvey, but a team with the talent they have arguably need a more conventional, imaginative trequartista than they currently possess. Wilfried Bony and Michu are two of the best finishers in the Premier League and need better service up front. The Swans have had only 23 clear-cut goalscoring opportunities this season; a tally that only struggling Norwich (22) and Crystal Palace (20) fare worse in of all top flight teams. However, Swansea rank 4th for their conversion rate from clear-cut chances (43.5%) and 2nd when only strikers are considered (60%). Plain and simply, though it sounds painfully obvious, the fact of the matter is that Swansea's deadly strikeforce are good enough to score ample goals, and if they were provided with more good quality service, Swansea would not be in the predicament, by their standards, that they currently find themselves in. It could be time that Michael Laudrup and Swansea sacrifice a little principle for some well-needed pragmatism if they are to turn their season around.
So Dai can copy and paste, nice one, almost read it twice Most have been saying our crossing was shocking, but then to be fair in the games recently our crossing seems to be improving, 2 headed goal by bony, and a few good chances that didn't quite fall to him, so I reckon the boss realises this and is hopefully pushing it in training. Maybe I am just hoping, but like I said, I personally feel like I have seen a difference in the quality being put in the box. What the article doesn't really point out is that although we don't create a lot of chances, it also restricts the opponents, yes they may create more chances per passing, but when we have the ball, it means they aint passing and that means less shots for them.
Its not all about crossing it goes far deeper than that as the article says the strikers have had a lot of service anyway, Its all this wasteful un productive pretty passing that is not producing the results that we should be getting....I dont care if we dont get any players in the window as i know we have a squad capable of beating anyone. Its the way we execute our play is the problem and have always been that this season in the premiership. change some aspects of that and play more direct and we will win more games than we will lose...New players wont solve things if we keep playing the way we do and all it will achieve is an increase on our wage bill...
Good article. Bang on there Terror. We now know without doubt that Bony is fantastic with good service. Another valid point there. We really aren't far off getting it right and being a solid top ten side. Really hoping we can strengthen in the right areas to make this happen.
Theres two sides any argument , it would be interesting to identify which games these stats came from ,a game against the big boys will make us more likely to be procession based and against lesser opposition a more attacking approach and with that more chance of trying something which may not come off .As you say Swanselona our procession does restrict the opposition chances .I'm happy with the way we've slowly evolved from passing for passing sake and are willing to try and mix it up .
I agree with the point the article made about the final ball, but there was one bit of the article that annoyed me: "but a team with the talent they have arguably need a more conventional, imaginative trequartista than they currently possess. Wilfried Bony and Michu are two of the best finishers in the Premier League and need better service up front." Do they not realise Michu usually plays in that trequartista position behind Bony when fit?
Muchu has played up front enough times to be classed as a striker by people. What would you call KI when he played for us because he played everywhere..
What is his favoured position, and where did he play most of last season. Most of his goals were scored from that role, the problem was he tended to be lone striker against the big clubs, which is where he would score and gain more notice, whilst playing up front. Doesn't make him a striker though, only to the uneducated.
The media and bloggers at one point had us favourites to go down (last 2 seasons i believe), look how that turned out
Imagine if it really was the 'Final' ball !!! What would we talk about after it was gone ?? Ball nostalgia ?
Aren't you Brendan's biggest fan? Laudrup was the one who tried to coax us to be more direct.... Remember, all those posts of yours "we don't pass it like we used too", "we can't keep the ball anymore" and "where have the triangles gone?" etc. Under Brendan we were anything but direct. What has happened this season is that we have regressed to be more like the Brendan side....and this is mainly due to loss of individual's form (Routledge, and Dyer at the start of the season), injuries to key players in the final 3rd (Michu, Hernandez and Dyer) and the integration of new attacking players to the blend (Bony, Pozuelo and Shelvey). There has been a general loss of confidence in the final 3rd but it would seem that we are finally "clicking" and confidence is returning. Soon we'll have Michu, Hernandez and Dyer fit and maybe a new signing (another winger). We'll get better and better now IMO and barring the heart being ripped out of the squad this summer(if Laudrup leaves and triggers an exodus) we'll be a much slicker outfit next season.
To be honest, I don't see an exodus if Laudrup leaves in the summer - which he probably will. I know he has attracted a lot of our recent signings, but when he goes it will probably be to the sort of club that our players wouldn't be worthy of. I mean say he gets the Barcelona job, which of our players would have a chance of following him? They're all well contracted and are pretty much settled, it would make as much sense to stay as it would to move on just because the manager has. Of course I could be very wrong, but I do feel quite confident that while one or two may move on it won't be en mass
None of our players would get into their squad, so hopefully the squad will remain intact, barring JDG of course, who would probably leave
Agreed, I can't see us buying JDG unless Laudrup does stay maybe. I think Lamah's loan spell will be up in the summer as well won't it? Anyone else who goes will be for a good fee anyway, so we'll be fine.
