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BBC Sport Norwich article by Sutton

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25 minutes ago, Aggy said:

Or is it that he’s said a few things that are probably true so we’re just going to say he’s a bad pundit instead of acknowledging that he might be on to something, for instance when suggesting it might be a half decent idea to give your defence a bit more cover and scope to sit tight when you’ve only got half a fit defender.

 

9 minutes ago, hogesar said:

If you think hes said anything insightful then you'd really enjoy Drive on talksport from 4pm daily.

I’ll take that as a “yes” then...

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Hes not said anything untrue. Thought that had already been covered...

If you think hes a good pundit then power to you but most disagree..

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11 minutes ago, hogesar said:

Hes not said anything untrue. Thought that had already been covered...

If you think hes a good pundit then power to you but most disagree..

I think you'd be an excellent pundit......but most will disagree......

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9 minutes ago, Mello Yello said:

I think you'd be an excellent pundit......but most will disagree......

I dont think you think that....and I think most will agree...

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31 minutes ago, Mello Yello said:

I don't think..... 

Neither does Sutton really but hes got a decent contract with BT so dont rule yourself out..

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17 minutes ago, hogesar said:

Neither does Sutton really but hes got a decent contract with BT so dont rule yourself out..

I aspire to be you......certainly not Chris Sutton......

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1 hour ago, hogesar said:

Hes not said anything untrue. Thought that had already been covered...

If you think hes a good pundit then power to you but most disagree..

Who has said he’s a good pundit? You said he doesn’t do various things and I provided quotes of him doing those things. 

My main post was about the content of the article which the earlier posts were discussing. We’ve now moved on to ignoring the content and instead saying he’s not a great pundit (despite the fact you appear to think what he has said is all true and you having not given any suggestion as to the sort of extra insightfulness you were expecting from an article about our defensive record).

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2 hours ago, hogesar said:

I'll be honest if you ignore his City connection Sutton is just BBCs version of Adrian Durham. He offers very, very little and his article suggesting there wasnt much difference between our team against man city than villa completely ignores a massive glaring hole in that we had Godfrey about to have a hernia OP, Lewis playing through painkillers, Max back early as Byram had an injury and not a single holding midfielder. 

Its kids stuff and he cant even acknowledge those bits. I dont disagree about the stats because they're facts but any one of us can do that, his job is to provide context alongside professional expert opinion and pretty much everything he says or comes up with is lacking in those departments.

Every team has players with pain killing injections or who are not fully fit - Godfrey himself admitted that most of them play with an injury most of the time. The back five weren't actually the main problem against Villa - it was the complete lack of protection which cost us, with no suitable defensive midfielders, no one picking up from the front (including Stiepermann, Pukki and Cantwell) and, to be honest, no strategy to even attempt to defend as a team; this was evidenced when Buendia lost the ball twice in exposed areas and no challenge resulted at all, but had been fairly obvious from about 5 minutes in when Cantwell stopped closing down their right back, and gave Lewis no cover for the rest of the game.

Sutton's article is littered with stats and context - how can you say he offers "very, very little"? Unfortunately his article is bang on - we will probably go down unless we address the problem, which is all he is saying, based on all the evidence available.

By the way I live near Watford - every single fan down here is blaming their predicament on Troy Deeney's injury absence and is convinced they won't go down. Injuries are just part of everyone's season - we've had all ours at once, but would we really have got anything at Burnley or Palace with a full strength team with the way we played? We were steamrollered by hard, athletic, organised premier league players.

I'm fairly confident we will address it though - I don't expect us to play the same system against Bournemouth despite everyone saying we should stick to what we know.

This is going to be a tough season because there are no weak teams this year like Huddersfield, Cardiff and Fulham. 

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21 hours ago, hogesar said:

 

 

18 hours ago, pete said:

I am so glad Chris decided to bring this to our attention now we can resolve the problem it will be alright.  Put the injuries to the back of your mind they appear to be an irrelevance.  

I do see what you are saying but that is what the players have to do though Pete, if they feel sorry for themselves and dwell on what could have been they'll get thrashed every week. They have to believe that the XI which walks out onto that pitch is good enough, like they did against Citeh.

The injury crisis seems to have knocked the players confidence, Krul the straw which broke the camels backs. 

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11 hours ago, sgncfc said:

Every team has players with pain killing injections or who are not fully fit - Godfrey himself admitted that most of them play with an injury most of the time. The back five weren't actually the main problem against Villa - it was the complete lack of protection which cost us, with no suitable defensive midfielders, no one picking up from the front (including Stiepermann, Pukki and Cantwell) and, to be honest, no strategy to even attempt to defend as a team; this was evidenced when Buendia lost the ball twice in exposed areas and no challenge resulted at all, but had been fairly obvious from about 5 minutes in when Cantwell stopped closing down their right back, and gave Lewis no cover for the rest of the game.

Sutton's article is littered with stats and context - how can you say he offers "very, very little"? Unfortunately his article is bang on - we will probably go down unless we address the problem, which is all he is saying, based on all the evidence available.

By the way I live near Watford - every single fan down here is blaming their predicament on Troy Deeney's injury absence and is convinced they won't go down. Injuries are just part of everyone's season - we've had all ours at once, but would we really have got anything at Burnley or Palace with a full strength team with the way we played? We were steamrollered by hard, athletic, organised premier league players.

I'm fairly confident we will address it though - I don't expect us to play the same system against Bournemouth despite everyone saying we should stick to what we know.

This is going to be a tough season because there are no weak teams this year like Huddersfield, Cardiff and Fulham. 

I disagree.

Our situation is not comparable to Watford's, where they are blaming all their woes on injury to one player - or ManC come to that, where the loss of one CD was apparently the cause of defeat against us.

Emi & Todd may not have been great defensively, but that does not explain the complete shambles that ensued every time Villa attacked. The defence looked completely bewildered, as if nobody had a clue what to do, & I believe that's because we had no Tettey or Trybull to protect them or organise them (& i believe Tettey remains the best player we have for this role) & no Krul to bark instructions to Godfrey & Amadou (LDC reports that he is very vocal in this respect).

I repeat we were missing 3 specialist CDs, had no DM available, & a 3rd choice goalie, one who hasn't the ability to play our system (although I don't think he's a bad goalie). All of this made the game simply a bridge too far.

 

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55 minutes ago, ron obvious said:

I disagree.

Our situation is not comparable to Watford's, where they are blaming all their woes on injury to one player - or ManC come to that, where the loss of one CD was apparently the cause of defeat against us.

Emi & Todd may not have been great defensively, but that does not explain the complete shambles that ensued every time Villa attacked. The defence looked completely bewildered, as if nobody had a clue what to do, & I believe that's because we had no Tettey or Trybull to protect them or organise them (& i believe Tettey remains the best player we have for this role) & no Krul to bark instructions to Godfrey & Amadou (LDC reports that he is very vocal in this respect).

I repeat we were missing 3 specialist CDs, had no DM available, & a 3rd choice goalie, one who hasn't the ability to play our system (although I don't think he's a bad goalie). All of this made the game simply a bridge too far.

 

"it was the complete lack of protection which cost us, with no suitable defensive midfielders, no one picking up from the front (including Stiepermann, Pukki and Cantwell) and, to be honest, no strategy to even attempt to defend as a team"

so, when you say you disagree, you actually mean that you agree, because that's pretty much what I said.....

I agree that our injuries are having a greater impact on us that Watford's are on them - my point was that their fans are blaming their plight on one crucial injury - but that doesn't make Sutton's comments any less relevant - the rest of the team were a shambles against Villa, as you say.

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14 minutes ago, sgncfc said:

"it was the complete lack of protection which cost us, with no suitable defensive midfielders, no one picking up from the front (including Stiepermann, Pukki and Cantwell) and, to be honest, no strategy to even attempt to defend as a team"

so, when you say you disagree, you actually mean that you agree, because that's pretty much what I said.....

I agree that our injuries are having a greater impact on us that Watford's are on them - my point was that their fans are blaming their plight on one crucial injury - but that doesn't make Sutton's comments any less relevant - the rest of the team were a shambles against Villa, as you say.

But when we had more players available we were good against Newcastle, Chelsea and even City to an extent. My point is that was kind of ignored for the poor performance against Villa and the insight i'm referring to would be acknowledging that our style of play alongside having no defensively minded players available in midfield, as well as our first choice GK were crucial to the spine of our team as well as our style. 

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1 hour ago, sgncfc said:

"it was the complete lack of protection which cost us, with no suitable defensive midfielders, no one picking up from the front (including Stiepermann, Pukki and Cantwell) and, to be honest, no strategy to even attempt to defend as a team"

so, when you say you disagree, you actually mean that you agree, because that's pretty much what I said.....

I agree that our injuries are having a greater impact on us that Watford's are on them - my point was that their fans are blaming their plight on one crucial injury - but that doesn't make Sutton's comments any less relevant - the rest of the team were a shambles against Villa, as you say.

You're putting a completely different slant on what I said & your original post ( & Sutton's comments).

The inference by yourself & Sutton is that the injuries had no significant impact on the result. My contention is that they did.

Once we get at least Krul & Tettey back I believe that our defensive performance will improve. Once Zimmerman returns we will improve further (this is all assuming said players perform to their previous standard of course).

I agree we have never - under Farke - been a defensively minded team & will probably always concede more goals than we'd like. I still believe that once we get those players back it will be enough for us to survive, even with playing with the same philosophy.

 

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I don’t think Sutton is saying the injuries had no significant impact on the results. In fact, he goes as far as to suggest that because of the injuries we should have changed things in order to try and avoid such results (implying that there may not have been any need to change things had players been fit).

We seem to have taken the view that as we have lots of injuries we aren’t going to defend well, so let’s just be open and try to blitz a few goals ourselves first. The Man City game though showed that (even with injuries) if you set up in a certain way you will get results. And we still played some of our best football in that game. 

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You lot make me laugh. Say how you want us to keep the same philosophy attacking football that got us where we are now. And now you want us to defend. ncfc fans are THE WORST

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1 hour ago, Aggy said:

I don’t think Sutton is saying the injuries had no significant impact on the results. In fact, he goes as far as to suggest that because of the injuries we should have changed things in order to try and avoid such results (implying that there may not have been any need to change things had players been fit).

We seem to have taken the view that as we have lots of injuries we aren’t going to defend well, so let’s just be open and try to blitz a few goals ourselves first. The Man City game though showed that (even with injuries) if you set up in a certain way you will get results. And we still played some of our best football in that game. 

But we simply didn't have the players to change things! That's the point!

I don't think we've decided we aren't going to defend well. We're just defending the best we can with the players available. Once we lost Tettey, then Krul, the cupboard was completely bare.

Such a shame Zimbo got crocked. I reckon we would've picked up another point or two at least. Apart from anything else it would've freed up Amadou to play in his best position.

 

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We had Tettey for the Man City game and he was magnificent. We suffered a double whammy in that in addition to losing Alex, the player(s) we brought haven't played to their potential. No DM and no good passers in midfield either.

Once we get Zimbo back then perhaps we can change thing's a bit and release Amadou into his preferred position alongside either Tettey or Tommy. Until then we'll have to muddle on as we are. Unless of course Famewo suddenly steps in and does well.

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45 minutes ago, ron obvious said:

But we simply didn't have the players to change things! That's the point!

I don't think we've decided we aren't going to defend well. We're just defending the best we can with the players available. Once we lost Tettey, then Krul, the cupboard was completely bare.

Such a shame Zimbo got crocked. I reckon we would've picked up another point or two at least. Apart from anything else it would've freed up Amadou to play in his best position.

 

I don’t think it’s entirely to do with the players. Against Man City Amadou looked quality - he’s been average at best as a centre back in every other game. Is that because he just had a one off, or is it because of the system?

I’ve said this elsewhere so won’t labour the point again here, but if you leave your defence exposed, you need players who can win their individual battles. I’m not sure even our first choice defenders are good enough to do that regularly in the prem - Godfrey and Aarons have been at fault for as many goals as Hanley and Amadou. Even Liverpool, before Van Dijk their way of playing left them vulnerable. They’ve had to bring in arguably the best defender in the world before they look decent defensively. But if you play compact, with a small gap between defence and midfield and your full backs fairly narrow, then it reduces the chances for your defenders to make individual errors. 

Now most people think that means Big Sam two banks of four, hoof ball. But as we showed against Man City, it doesn’t - our playing out from the back in that game was as good as it gets. 

Agree Tettey was immense against Man City, and we’ve had injuries to others such as Trybull. But again, get your two holding players to sit tighter and stay closer to the back four and then it might mitigate for missing Tettey.

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52 minutes ago, Aggy said:

I don’t think it’s entirely to do with the players. Against Man City Amadou looked quality - he’s been average at best as a centre back in every other game. Is that because he just had a one off, or is it because of the system?

I’ve said this elsewhere so won’t labour the point again here, but if you leave your defence exposed, you need players who can win their individual battles. I’m not sure even our first choice defenders are good enough to do that regularly in the prem - Godfrey and Aarons have been at fault for as many goals as Hanley and Amadou. Even Liverpool, before Van Dijk their way of playing left them vulnerable. They’ve had to bring in arguably the best defender in the world before they look decent defensively. But if you play compact, with a small gap between defence and midfield and your full backs fairly narrow, then it reduces the chances for your defenders to make individual errors. 

Now most people think that means Big Sam two banks of four, hoof ball. But as we showed against Man City, it doesn’t - our playing out from the back in that game was as good as it gets. 

Agree Tettey was immense against Man City, and we’ve had injuries to others such as Trybull. But again, get your two holding players to sit tighter and stay closer to the back four and then it might mitigate for missing Tettey.

We beat them partly because of the way ManC play, partly because they didn't really see us as a threat, partly because a lot of our players performed brilliantly, but also because we had Tettey to dominate the midfield & Krul to organise the defence. We had neither of those against Villa.

And the problem with getting 'two holding players to sit tighter and stay closer to the back four' is that we didn't have two holding players, certainly not with the ability to perform that role in the PL.

 

 

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4 hours ago, Ward 3 said:

You lot make me laugh. Say how you want us to keep the same philosophy attacking football that got us where we are now. And now you want us to defend. ncfc fans are THE WORST

We got here playing a defensive / ball winning midfielder and we haven't had one fit. 

We also got here playing with a keeper with good distribution, and have just played almost two games with one who is rubbish with his feet. 

So I agree that we need to keep our philosophy as much as possible, but what we've seen in the last few games is an XI which doesn't suit it.

In an ideal world we'd have Amadou in DM but for now with insufficient CB's have to hope that Tettey can stay fit... He seems to struggle with that now. 

Edited by TeemuVanBasten

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We had a collective off day against Villa and of course the injuries had an effect but I do also agree with Sutton that we should have adapted a little in the circumstances. Indeed I think Farke and the players should have adapted during the game once it became clear that they were consistently pressing Leitner and pinching the ball off him (or later in the game Buendia) thus giving them a free run on our penalty area on about a dozen occasions with no challenge going in. They should have adapted and avoided playing the ball into Mo in such dangerous areas or if they were going to do that Kenny needed to drop deeper and at least get some tactical fouls in to break up the play if we lost the ball.

I also think its the case (and I don't think this is controversial) that we defended so much better against Man City because we didn't have the ball very much and thus were able to keep our shape better. The full backs were not bombing up the pitch and leaving space and we were generally a more disciplined and a tighter unit. I think that's what Sutton is suggesting we need to do in other games until we are coming out of this injury crisis and I don't disagree with him. I think the thought was very much "Villa at home let's do our thing" and we just went out there and tried to attack with abandon and they were ready for us an caught us out. I accept that the personel available gave us limited options other than to put out that starting line up but you could tell the full backs to sit in a bit and have Mclean playing deeper and just generally try and make it a tight game where you have a chance of sneaking a win or drawn rather than just going out all guns blazing and leaving the defence totally exposed. 

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On 16/10/2019 at 23:00, Aggy said:

Who has said he’s a good pundit? You said he doesn’t do various things and I provided quotes of him doing those things. 

My main post was about the content of the article which the earlier posts were discussing. We’ve now moved on to ignoring the content and instead saying he’s not a great pundit (despite the fact you appear to think what he has said is all true and you having not given any suggestion as to the sort of extra insightfulness you were expecting from an article about our defensive record).

I wish I could have had pain-killing injections in my eyeballs after Villa's 5th goal went in.....

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On 16/10/2019 at 17:08, hogesar said:

To be fair, we also had people at the start of last season who said it wasn't strong enough and we'd struggle to do any better than midtable. Any recollection of that NBS?

Last season where we conceded 58 goals (iirc) in a follow up to the season before where we conceded 60 goals.  We then went into the PL without really strengthening the first choice defence.  In addition to this with Farke adamant that he would not change the way we play.  It is completely valid that some people had concerns in this respect for this season.

Anyway a great battling point yesterday and a clean sheet that few saw coming!  I think and hope that Farke will realise that he will need to change things at times this season, even if it goes against his philosophy and whether forced by injuries or not yesterday.  There is no way we will survive this season conceding at the rate that we were. 

The difficult part, as it has always been, is finding the balance between this whilst also remaining an attacking threat. 

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Quite so, NBS - I don’t think anyone is really advocating a ‘park the bus’ mentality, but we need to find a balance particularly away from home.
 I was concerned before the season started that we needed to either make some tweaks to personnel or the way we play - you can’t concede at the rate we have been at this level as it’s harder to out-score sides. I’m sure we can adjust and come good, Saturday was a great start.

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Interesting the comments. I think he's spot on. But I doubt it's anything Norwich fans dont already know and hadnt anticipated whilst we were still in the Championship.

When we were beginning to think about promotion it became obvious to me that we were going to have a problem this season. Continue to play the way we do and get mercilessly exploited at the back by better teams with better players (Liverpool had demonstrated this after only 28 minutes of our return to this league) or play more conservatively, and have Jamal and Max defend a bit more (something we genuinely dont know how good they are at) whilst also restricting the advantage this gives us in attack, causing us to lose our overloads and our width, making us impotent in attack. Throw in the lack of a top quality DM (Amadou might be that guy but in an act of double punishment we lose his potential impact in a screening/ball-winning role by having him fill in at CB)

 

Didnt see the Bournemouth game, but an uninspiring 0-0 might be exactly what we needed, and a platform to build upon

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I think its fair to say that us doing pretty much exactly what Sutton suggested and coming away with our first away point on Saturday kind of vindicates what he was saying and also indicates that Farke himself had come to the same conclusion after the Villa game.

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