why have we always been so useless away from home?

[Tetteys Jig 830]

Simple question, anyone any interesting theories?

[R_S 0]

been pretty useless at home as well tbf

[morty 0]

Because we have been a lower Prem / upper Champs team at very best for quite a while now, in a nutshell, we''re not very good. And the shame is that if we manage to stay up, i think we are on the verge of really stepping up in quality. Fingers crossed, eh.

[Chunky Norwich 0]

Simply because we set out looking for a 0-0 draw every game. The one anomaly appeared to be Swansea and it shouldn''t be forgotten we really had to cling on to our 3-0 lead for dear life in the second half and squeezed out with a 4-3 win.

[morty 0]

Also, is there anything massively wrong with the plan of trying to win your home games and draw away.Playing to your strengths?(Please don''t bother coming in with your bottom lip out saying we can''t even do that this season, I am talking in theoretical terms)

[RvWs 4 year contract 0]

[quote user="morty"]Because we have been a lower Prem / upper Champs team at very best for quite a while now, in a nutshell, we''re not very good. And the shame is that if we manage to stay up, i think we are on the verge of really stepping up in quality. Fingers crossed, eh.[/quote]

You''ve got it spot on for me mate.

We''re on the brink of stepping up in class.

Can''t Wigan just **** off?

[Chunky Norwich 0]

Bottom lip?Winning at home and drawing away is a lovely concept and I would be doing cartwheels if we were doing that. I just feel that setting out for a 0-0 hamstrings us on two counts; a) it means there is no onus on us to score and b) it relies on us keeping the opposition from getting any kind of goal across 90+ minutes of football in The Best League in the World. This includes deflected goals, dodgy penalties, dodgy offside goals, moments of sheer brilliance, long-range pearlers, goalkeeper clangers etc.

[morty 0]

[quote user="Chunky Norwich"]Bottom lip?Winning at home and drawing away is a lovely concept and I would be doing cartwheels if we were doing that. I just feel that setting out for a 0-0 hamstrings us on two counts; a) it means there is no onus on us to score and b) it relies on us keeping the opposition from getting any kind of goal across 90+ minutes of football in The Best League in the World. This includes deflected goals, dodgy penalties, dodgy offside goals, moments of sheer brilliance, long-range pearlers, goalkeeper clangers etc.[/quote]Yeah I know our frailties, thats why I stated I was talking generally (The bit about the bottom lip was to put off the casual whiner)Thing is, before the end of season jitters took hold, we were a lot tighter defensively than last season, there was real progress there. But Rome wasn''t built in a day.Fact is we have to accept our relative position in the best league in the world.

[Citizen Journalist Foghorn 0]

Going to Stoke with a side that looks like it was picked for a game at the Nou Camp probably explains a lot.  Our coward manager who has no belief in his squad.

[delta bravo 0]

In my opinion, the reason we are very poor away from home at the moment is because we have very little pace in the team.  Villa weren''t very good on Saturday but they had every intention of counter attacking at every opportunity and did it with real pace.  Whenever Guzan caught the ball he looked to get the ball into either Weimann or Agbonlahor one way or another, either by rolling it to a midfielder to feed them or directly kicking it to them.  When we play away, Bunn is constantly trying to slow the game down, because we are trying not to lose and because we have no pace in the team.  Agbonlahor is no more than an average premier league player in my opinion, yet he is streets ahead of the attacking players we have. 

Also, we play the game in very straight lines, mainly across the pitch.  By that i mean passing, but also the runs our midfielders make.  Johnson and Howson play alongside each other and neither gives their opposing players anything to think about defensively.  Both, in their Leeds days, and Howson, when he first arrived used to be more than capable of breaking midfield lines and getting behind their centre midfield opponents. We need to give teams something to think about, playing Norwich City at the moment must be very easy to plan for.  You know exactly what you''re getting, regardless of the minimal changes in personnel from week to week.

We should set up with 1 defensive midfielder and play 2 in advance of him centrally, 1 should be E Bennett, who never played on the wing at Brighton.  He needs to be used through the middle in effectively a free role, he has real pace, but playing out wide, when have you ever seen him out run a full back who is expecting him to run at him, it''s too easy to defend against, he needs to be played in an area where his runs are difficult to defend against.  Running from deep past a centre back is easier than getting the ball out wide with the full back already set up and having to try to get past him.  Bennett played centrally once for NCFC, away against Swansea last season (3-2 win) in the second half and was a real handful.  Got to be worth a try!

[Gingerpele 0]

I reckon its because we don''t have Gareth Bale in our side.

Should have snapped him up years ago. I blame Roeder.

[Norwich or die tryin! 0]

I''v been supporting Norwich since 2000 and we''ve only had one decent manager in that time (Paul Lambert). That''s probably got something to do with it.

[morty 0]

[quote user="delta bravo"]

In my opinion, the reason we are very poor away from home at the moment is because we have very little pace in the team.  Villa weren''t very good on Saturday but they had every intention of counter attacking at every opportunity and did it with real pace.  Whenever Guzan caught the ball he looked to get the ball into either Weimann or Agbonlahor one way or another, either by rolling it to a midfielder to feed them or directly kicking it to them.  When we play away, Bunn is constantly trying to slow the game down, because we are trying not to lose and because we have no pace in the team.  Agbonlahor is no more than an average premier league player in my opinion, yet he is streets ahead of the attacking players we have. 

Also, we play the game in very straight lines, mainly across the pitch.  By that i mean passing, but also the runs our midfielders make.  Johnson and Howson play alongside each other and neither gives their opposing players anything to think about defensively.  Both, in their Leeds days, and Howson, when he first arrived used to be more than capable of breaking midfield lines and getting behind their centre midfield opponents. We need to give teams something to think about, playing Norwich City at the moment must be very easy to plan for.  You know exactly what you''re getting, regardless of the minimal changes in personnel from week to week.

We should set up with 1 defensive midfielder and play 2 in advance of him centrally, 1 should be E Bennett, who never played on the wing at Brighton.  He needs to be used through the middle in effectively a free role, he has real pace, but playing out wide, when have you ever seen him out run a full back who is expecting him to run at him, it''s too easy to defend against, he needs to be played in an area where his runs are difficult to defend against.  Running from deep past a centre back is easier than getting the ball out wide with the full back already set up and having to try to get past him.  Bennett played centrally once for NCFC, away against Swansea last season (3-2 win) in the second half and was a real handful.  Got to be worth a try!

[/quote]I think thats a good point about pace[Y]