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channonswindmill

Our Corner Taking.

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I was watching a load of footage from the mid-80''s the other night and it struck me how dangerous we, as a team where from corners. Mark Barham in particular seemed to plant the ball perfectly for an on running Steve Bruce to enevitably score, I also remember David Philips being just as adept. Standing watching City from the Barclay as a teenager I remember the excitement as a corner mostly meant a chance on goal. Those days are long gone, a corner at Carrow Road now does''nt register in the same way (or is it just me?). I get continually frustrated that the corner taker; Snodgrass being the main culprit, can not beat the first man, either that or the corner is so deep it turns into a break away attack for the opposing team. I do question how much corner practice takes place in training. Do others feel the same? I am not a Snodgrass hater, but I do wish we could vary the taker more.

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It''s got to be one of the easiest things a professional footballer should be able to do. Kick a ball, with no other players nearby. They only have to get it in a certain area. No one expects them to play a ''killer'' pass/ball. Get it in the areas pre-arranged and let the other players get on the end of it, but it seems impossible for some to execute that simple part of the game 

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I have to agree the quality of our corners and crosses generally has been disappointing, especially compared to last season when it created a lot of goals for us.


Whenever we play Man U I am always impressed by the quality of their crosses especially, they are normally whipped in at pace and at a level that invites a striker to attack the ball while giving no chance for the goalkeeper to claim it.  This is routine and it means that any cross is difficult to defend.  All too often ours sit up in the air and the goalkeeper has a bit of easy catching practice.  Now if Man U had a striker in the van Nistelrooy mode, he would have a field day, but fortunately they don''t.

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Set Pieces are vital. they can get you an extra 3 or 4 goals a season (an extra 3 or 4 1-0 wins perhaps) which can make a difference in promotion/relegation etc.

I work with a youth side on Saturday morning as a coach. we spend time every week working on exactly the same set piece routine over and over again. I would hazard a guess we have spent 10 hours on set pieces alone this season.

We create a chance from every single corner we take... not necessarily a goal but usually someone gets a shot in.

I am sure they spend time at Colney working on corners, etc unsure as to how. but they can certainly make a difference.

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Isn''t there some statistical analysis or something that says most goals are scored off near post corners? I''m not sure.

 

Anyway, near post corners aren''t a bad thing if you beat that first man with the delivery or if someone gets infront of him to win the ball for you. Problem is when you see a succession of corners hit that first man and turn into nothing. It''s a waste.

 

It''s also nice to see a bit of variety so the opposition aren''t expecting the same thing every time.

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The thing that makes me laugh about Snoddy''s corners is his "code". Usually as we all know from our playing days, where you place your arm before the corner dictates the area you''re going to try and hit. point to the ground = near post, arm chest height = in the middle, one arm above = back post, both arms up = drilled across the front.

Snoddy = every single corner throw one arm up in the air and it has zero relevance to where the ball is going to end up be it failing to beat the first man or sailing over the box. He doesn''t even mix it up. Every single corner he flails one arm in the air.

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There''s a very interesting piece about corner taking just gone up on the Beeb. We feature in a couple of the assessments, according to Nevin the breakaway goal from our corner scored by Chavski is a deliberate tactic.Link

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It''s a shame that Pat Nevin isn''t allowed to use actual game footage. I think that would really help demonstrate his points.  He''s one of very few pundits that is able to raise interesting points and explain them articulately, he should be on MoTD over Hansen, Shearer etc. 

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Why this has stuck in my mind is a mystery, after all these years, but I seem to recall John Bond working out that Liverpool were vulnerable to near post flick ons, and worked on that, around 1980.

Please give me 5 minutes to try and remember what I had for breakfast yesterday

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If FIFA 14 represented the real thing we''d be scoring 10 a game...

Anyway back to the real world, our corners haven''t been as good as they were last season. It''s a bit disappointing really considering we added Fer and Elmander who should both be big threats now.

That''s what happens when Garrido doesn''t play and Snoddy is off form though.

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There seems little doubt that our corners are generally below the standard of previous years. Snodgrass seems to be suffering in this, but Pilks and the younger wingers are also struggling to hit good corners consistently.

 

It is really difficult to know what to say, - the taker is not under pressure as he would be in trying to make a cross while running, so why is the dead ball a problem? Some have been hit too near the keeper, some too low to get beyond the first defender, and some over hit. It ought to be a matter to sort out in training and even in practice for keepers, and yet nothing seems to be improving.

 

It''s not only corners. Our free kicks seem to lack the threat and the goal promise they had last year. Something has gone wrong and needs attention by the coaches.

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the reason we lost the chelsea game was down to a poor corner

the blame falls on hughton again, has been here long enough and done nothing about it, i wonder if we practice attacking at all

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Maybe one arm up means Im going to put it in weakly to the first defending player. Would make a lot of sense. Cannot understand this perception that Snodgrass is somehow a dead-ball genius. The majority of his free-kicks and corners fail to clear the first defending player, his direct shots on goal dont really have much bend, accuracy or pace. The statistic comes up regularly from last season that he topped the charts for dead-balls, but I wonder what his percentage was. At Norwich noone else is allowed to take a free-kick, else Snoddy shouts ''F*ck off, f*ck off, you cant hit it, f*ck off'', so he monopolises all set pieces. At clubs with a greater pool of talent, the Rooneys and the Giggs'' and the Van Perises have to fight over who gets the chance to take one. At least a few of Snoddy''s direct free-kicks last season only went in due to poor goalkeeping. Yet this perception over his ''genius free-kicks'' have given him Holy Cow status and might be the reason behind his drop in form and general disappearing up his own backside this season. His set pieces really arent that good

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[quote user="CambridgeCanary"]What do the do at Colney then Iron Stan?[/quote]

im guessing its mostly hughton  practicing shouting "johnny johnny" and "bradley bradley" so hes got it right for match day (its actually all ive heard him say) whilst the team are drilled in the skills and tactics used by world war italian tank commanders......

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