Player Ratings vs Spurs

[nycanary 1]

Green 9
Edworthy 7
Charlton 7
Fleming 7
Drury 8
Safri 7
Holt 7
Francis 7
Bentley 7
Huckerby 8
Doherty 7

Very solid performance by the team today. Deserved the point and could have gotten three. Main points to take away:

a. Thought the formation worked well. It needs a few more games to gel but I think we''re on to a winner here. The sacrifice of width is more than made up with the extra passer in midfield (Safri) and giving Bentley the spot in the hole will create chances. Holt/Francis can get used to playing a bit out of center and Bentley and Hux can develop a threatening understanding.
b. Huckerby was heavily featured and played very well. He got an 8 out of 10 instead of 9 because he didn''t put one of his chances away and once or twice, neglected to look up at a point where a teammate was in a scoring position. Still an excellent performance from him but the difference between 3 and 1 point is insignificant and we have to learn to take our chances. His runs were of top quality and rank him as one of the hardest players to defend against in the premiership. Didn''t do his scant England hopes any harm today.
c. Hux needs a striker alongside him. I hope NW makes it happen in the next transfer window. Doc huffs and puffs and gives his all but he''s not going to be providing Hux a lot of support. At this point, I would be getting closer to testing Leon alongside Hux for a longer period of time than 10 minutes. To be honest, i''m not that optimistic about that working well either and so a new striker is still definitely on the list. I could see Johannson and Harewood in that partner role. I actually prefer the Charlton striker -- I always got the impression he played a bit like Eidur Gudjohnson and that could fit nicely.
d. Best for last. Robert Green. International quality performance. The save from Atouba in particular was breathtaking. Sven -- You can''t leave Greeno out of your squads from now on.

Bring on Villa.

[rich 0]

hey ny canary

pretty much agree with your comments, such a great battling performance. only thing i''d comment on is the formation, I thought it worked well, but because tottenham played without real widemen, against villa we may need wide man. barry and solano tend to get down them flanks a lot.  As for holt, francis and safri I just thought something was still missing there, we fought well, but at times, especially first half the distribution from midfield was awful. 

Also i''m not a hundred per cent convinced on bentley in that hole, he has good skill, but his vision at times isn''t the best, I''d like us to get a real playmaker who can use the ball wise and exploit huckerby''s runs.  the need for youri becomes more and more apparent.

the need for a striker is also so apparent. we have to get a few players in january, it''s the difference between just staying up and staying up with a little to spare.

[ZLF 335]

I thought we were very poor in the first half and wouldnt have given any city player more than a 6. We were over run and abysmal on the ball, with a nervy looking Safri making too many mis-placed passes. I felt that the team looked uncomfortable with the new formation and I was looking for a switch at half time to improve our chances of success.

However whatever Worthy said at half time worked. City were a different team and it looked like the training ground practice with this formation suddenly clicked. Safri remembers he was supposed to pass to green shirts not white and Hux movement was far better, giving us options. Holt and Francis upped their work rate with improved positional sense and from then on it was City that were dominating the midfield and not Spurs. With no service we saw nothing of Defoe, Kanoute or Keane - a superb midfield performance. For the second half most players scored at least a 7, with Hux and Greeno outstanding.

However I felt both full backs had a poor game. Eddie made the same mistakes that Helveg got slaughtered on here for, his distribution was poor and he attacking contribution was non existent. Without his attacking option Helveg gets the nod due to his far superior passing ability. Drury (superb tackle on Kanoute apart) looked very nervous and had one of his worse games in a city shirt with his positional sense very poor.

In midfield I struggled to see if Bentley was actually on the pitch. Can we afford to play him just to develop him for Arsenal - his vision and passing caused us not spurs problems. Any other player with a performance like that would be dropped - Safri comfortably out performed him.

Finally Doherty. Despite his valiant efforts the game simply passed him by. He carried no goal threat, posed no aerial problems and failed to hold up the ball. When it was clear that Hux pace was causing spurs so many problems Worthy should have replaced Doc with Leon much earlier to have really stretched the Spurs defence across the whole back line - perhaps we could have been celebrating our first thre pointers rather than an excellent away draw.

Again a solid performance, an invaluable point on the boards and nothing to fear over the next 10 games.

OTBC

[NavMan 0]

Zippers Left Foot,

I have to say that I thoroughly agree with your assessment of the game and thought come half time that we would get absolutely hammered in the second half.  Our first half performance was absolutely abysmal and we cannot afford this because playing like that on some occasions  we will be three down by the time the half time whistle will arrive and it will be too late to get anything from the game.  Our passing like you said was diabolical on too many occasions with us giving the ball away needlessely therefore creating pressure on ourselves for no apparent reason.  Lady luck was certainly on our side in the first half but there again we are still learning and this was again one of the big games to have to play so early in our campaign.

Second half much better but Hucks must start to take his chances as invariably they fall to him and just one tucked away yesterday would have given the team a valuable extra couple of points.

OTBC

[shortfatb 0]

No mention of Matt Svensson as an alternative to Doc or Leon. If he could find some form I believe that he would be a good alternative combining the strengths of both as he did latterly last season. Admittedly he has had a series of ''mares so far. If not I would prefer to start with Leon, as Doc appears to be just an out for the long nervy punt which nobody wants to see us do at this level. The trio of pace from Hucks, Leon and Bentlet would scare a few back fours particularly when Francis does his Robo running stuff in support.  

[Canaries4ever 0]

Green 9

Edworthy 7

Charlton 7

Fleming 7

Drury 7

Safri 7

Holt 7

Francis 7

Bentley 7

Huckerby 8

Doherty 7

 

 

 

[Gentleman Jim 0]

Why nobody give Greeno 10 ?

He played brilliantly, kept a clean sheet and won MOM ! What did he have to do to get another point, score a goal ?

[ZLF 335]

Gorleston Jim - Greeno was good but I felt he should have come for ball that Drury headed to Defoe that was cleared off the line by Safri.

Also his save in the first half from Drurys tackle on Kanoute was only slightly fortuitous in that he was lying on the ground before Drury touched the ball and it bobbled into greenos arms. 9/10 is a fair reflection.

OTBC

[Gentleman Jim 0]

[quote]Gorleston Jim - Greeno was good but I felt he should have come for ball that Drury headed to Defoe that was cleared off the line by Safri. Also his save in the first half from Drurys tackle on Kanout...[/quote]

Cheers Zippers, I stand corrected !