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Budgie

Not one of Hughton's 60 substitutions this year have either scored or assisted

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We all know our players lack that cutting edge in front of goal and this stat probably means nothing much when most of the players that start can neither score nor assist either. However it does show Hughton and his staff and players have been totally ineffective this season at attempting to change games by bringing players off the bench.

http://au.eurosport.com/football/premier-league/2012-2013/matchpack-west-ham-united-v-norwich-city_sto4130917/story.shtml

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I suppose it''s all relative, Budgie. It is, as you say, a fairly damning statistic, but the fact also is that very few Norwich players have scored goals this season, full stop . And our top scorer has not scored in over 8 games now.I do not know where to look for this kind of information ,but it would be interesting to see how many goals  during Hughton''s tenure have actually been scored from open play . Last season we seemed to get quite a few from corners, Snodgrass free kicks etc, but even that seems to have dried up this season. Has anyone actually got these stats ?

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We have gone from last season being the second best team in the league at set pieces to the second worst team

Last season we scored 22 from open play (15th), none from counter attack (20th) and 17 from set pieces (2nd).

This season we scored 14 from open play (14th), 1 from counter attack (14th) and 3 from set pieces (19th).

http://www.whoscored.com/Regions/252/Tournaments/2/Seasons/3389/Stages/6531/TeamStatistics/England-Premier-League-2012-2013

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Put the blame where you want from this but who takes our free kicks and corners, and who has persisted with playing the weakest link in the side all season despite him being horrendously out of form?

It is no surprise that the team look so much more potent in attack with Snodgrass out the team. Yet as soon as he is back from injury I expect Hughton to put him straight back in the starting 11.

This season he has so far 2 goals and 1 assist. Last season he had 6 of each.

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As good as our defence has been most of the time, our scoring record has been unacceptable and needs to improve sharpish. We are the only team to have kept faith with what we''ve got (no change of manager or new strikers) and it''s a massive gamble. No questioning the pedigree of our players and manager, but if it fails to improve, either Hughton or our entire front line must be held accountable.

Let''s hope we get on the goals trail soon, starting tonight.

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The defense is working well from what I can see. Clean sheets and attacking full backs who are prepared to cross high into the box (which is more than our wingers do.

The problem for me lies in the midfield and not the strikers. Our wingers do not look to cross early nor high. We have strikers who can jump and head the ball (RVW v Evertone?) yet we never cross high except at set pieces when our CBs are in the box. The service from the wings this season has been, frankly, appalling and the players at fault are sad to say Snodgrass and Redmond. These player can dribble and get in good positions but the decision making and delivery is abysmal, the constant checking back and crossing in swingers is working against our strikers. Inswinging crosses are easy to defend as are low slung balls, I''m not saying we cut them out entirely but we need more variety of balls from our wingers. Snodgrass should know better and someone needs a word with Redmond. Redmond may excite the crowd with his dazzling runs and skills but the final ball (or in most cases poor shot) are lacking and costing our strikers valuable chances to score. Redmond could potentially be the key to our survival if he can start to solve this problem.

I''m going to leave Johnson out as I believe he does his job well (although he needs to cut out the long range shots). In the middle with Fer and Tettey (Howson or whoever) there is a completely stunted attack. Our central midfield almost stops running when they get past the centre circle. They have clearly been instructed (both home and away) not to press high into the box. The attack/counter attack is then left to the wingers and strikers to execute. As previously discussed our wingers are pretty much ineffective and we are not using other means of chance creation. The only time the CMs push high is when the opposition is pinned inside the area and we are passing around the outside looking for a way in, mostly fruitlessly. This ultimately leads to either a long shot or the ball going out again to the wingers who we are clearly relying on too much. The CMs should be driving forward and looking to play into Hopper to hold up,/flick on to the 2nd striker. We are seeing a clear lack of creativity from our midfield which has at time this season looked completely static and scarily void of ideas.

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When substitutes arrive after 80 minutes, there are two very good reasons why they are unlikely to score:

1) They will take several minutes to get used to the pitch and the pace of play, and to reach full pace. They will obviously be very careful, and not attempt anything fancy until they feel ready. "I don''t want to let the side down by trying something special until I am ready.

2) Unless it is clearly a substitution caused by injury, there may be a presumption of being defensive - "Just help to keep them out for a few minutes!", even if the manager hasn''t actually said much. We may have been chasing the game previously, but with just a few minutes to go we don''t want to make the result even worse.

So, what could happen is that the newly introduced player will make simple passes to colleagues who are to speed, and avoid the responsibility or a serious mistake.

It would e interesting to see the statistics of other clubs and late substitutions. There is a history of "super-subs", who score and perhaps win a match, but how late are they brought in. Many managers are aware of a kind of stalemate, and bring on the sub after 60 minutes, say, or the Cardiff manager after 40 minutes, even. Our substitutions are seldom before 75 minutes, unless there is an injury.

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[quote user="Budgie"]The defense is working well from what I can see. Clean sheets and attacking full backs who are prepared to cross high into the box (which is more than our wingers do.

The problem for me lies in the midfield and not the strikers. Our wingers do not look to cross early nor high. We have strikers who can jump and head the ball (RVW v Evertone?) yet we never cross high except at set pieces when our CBs are in the box. The service from the wings this season has been, frankly, appalling and the players at fault are sad to say Snodgrass and Redmond. These player can dribble and get in good positions but the decision making and delivery is abysmal, the constant checking back and crossing in swingers is working against our strikers. Inswinging crosses are easy to defend as are low slung balls, I''m not saying we cut them out entirely but we need more variety of balls from our wingers. Snodgrass should know better and someone needs a word with Redmond. Redmond may excite the crowd with his dazzling runs and skills but the final ball (or in most cases poor shot) are lacking and costing our strikers valuable chances to score. Redmond could potentially be the key to our survival if he can start to solve this problem.

I''m going to leave Johnson out as I believe he does his job well (although he needs to cut out the long range shots). In the middle with Fer and Tettey (Howson or whoever) there is a completely stunted attack. Our central midfield almost stops running when they get past the centre circle. They have clearly been instructed (both home and away) not to press high into the box. The attack/counter attack is then left to the wingers and strikers to execute. As previously discussed our wingers are pretty much ineffective and we are not using other means of chance creation. The only time the CMs push high is when the opposition is pinned inside the area and we are passing around the outside looking for a way in, mostly fruitlessly. This ultimately leads to either a long shot or the ball going out again to the wingers who we are clearly relying on too much. The CMs should be driving forward and looking to play into Hopper to hold up,/flick on to the 2nd striker. We are seeing a clear lack of creativity from our midfield which has at time this season looked completely static and scarily void of ideas.[/quote]

Very much agree with all that. I''m hoping Fer being more advanced now will help that a little, we''ve massively missed Tettey as has been shown by his performances on his return.

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