Hoolahans Role/Adams Post Match Interview

[Rogue Baboon 0]

''We are not playing Wes on the wing, we are playing him in the hole. When we are defending he has to get back out on the left'' - or words to that effect

So who exactly is on the left? We seemed to be awfully imbalanced tonight, Wes and Redmond seemed to be 5 yards apart at times against a compact defence. Surely we should be stretching the play, pulling defenders out to both flanks and getting balls in the box?

Also, if Wes is in the hole, we lose the ball, the opposition has the left flank to break. I remember Roeder doing a similar thing with only 1 winger.

Surely we wither need to play with 2 wingers, drop Wes, or play with Wes in the middle. Trying to fit him in for the sake of it will lead to more games like this where the middle is packed out and we end up passing sideways and backwards?

[Phillip J Fry 0]

I would assume that Adams is confident enough in Olsson''s energy and pace for him to cover the entire left-wing by himself.

[mrs miggins 0]

why should we be playing with 2 wingers? It pushes Olsson further up the pitch who''s got a mean cross on him; we need to use him more. We should''ve won 3-0 today, we were undone by us letting them shoot from far out to get the ball back. We need to be smarter as a team and wes doing a shift defensively is smart. We can''t play him in the hole and two strikers if wes isn''t putting in a defensive shift

[Downloads 35]

He''s trying to play a fluid type of football in a 442.

So when defending its a flat 442, in attack its almost a 4222.

442, wingers, getting balls in the box, needing 2 strikers - Its all so old fashioned.

We have a perfect setup for 4231 and a striker with enough guile and average pace can play in the line of 3. We were doing it perfectly early on, I have no idea why we changed it (well I do its this notion you have to play 2 strikers)

[a1canary 0]

It''s a tricky one. Whatever you do there''s a compromise. Wes is best in the hole, that is unarguable, but when we play him it does mean using full backs and Redmond for our wingplay and of course using Wes''s own creativity to feed the forwards through the middle. Sometimes this works very well, sometimes it doesn''t which is why Adams likes to use Murphy as the plan B, pushing Redmond out and really stretching the opposition down the flanks as the game enters the final stages. For some reason, he opted for plan C last night. Maybe he was trying something different and giving Howson a chance but it was too late also. I think he thought Wes was playing well and didn''t deserve to be subbed and thought the players on the pitch were the best option to unlock their defence and so stuck with them until the very end. But all of that is with hindsight and i don''t blame him for any of those decisions. They are the decisions he is there to make and he''ll win some and lose some.

[PurpleCanary 5,554]

Beauseant makes an interesting point in Another Place that when we play Hoolahan with two strikers it means we are pretty much forced to deploy the central midfielders(so far Johnson and Tettey) very deep to provide cover. That might roughly suit their game but reduces our attacking threat. And if Odjidja-Ofoe is the kind of box-to-box midfielder he is supposed to be then it is hard to see how he could fit in as one of that central two without limiting his overall game. Another argument for Adams having to decide either to use Hoolahan behind a lone striker or not at all.

[ZLF 271]

Our best attackers are wes in the hole (buit not left) and redderz out wide.     You simply build the team around those two - so its either a 4231 or 4411 to get the best from these league best in position players.  

 

If adams really wants to persist with two strikers as well it has to be a 4132 or 4312.

Ruddy

Martin Turner Hooiveld Olsson

                      Tettey

 Redmond      Wes        Lafferty

                    Grabban  Jerome

Or

Ruddy

Martin Turner Hooiveld Olsson

 Redmond     Tettey     Howson

      Wes        

Grabban  Jerome

All of which are clunky and why we have the current 4222 formation.

 

My preference would is to be bold and return to adding width via 4231 with

 

                    Ruddy

Martin Turner Hooiveld Olsson

             Tettey   Howson

Redmond     Wessi      Lafferty/Grabban

                 Jerome

 

 

[mrs miggins 0]

I wouldn''t mind this v rotherham:

----------------ruddy-----------------

whitts---martin---turner---olsson

redmond--tettey--howson---wes

------------hooper---jerome--------

[a1canary 0]

But the other ''problem'' we have with that miggins is that Johnson and Tettey are not very effective without one another. We''ve seen that a lot in the past. I think if we had to take one of them out it would be Tettey just because Johnson is that much more combative for me. But on balance for me, if we''re going to play Wes and Howson it has to be in a five man midfield otherwise there are just going to be too many holes and the defence too exposed.  I''d put Wes in the hole and Murphy left with Jerome the man up.

[lake district canary 4,531]

I wasn''t there last night, but was at Blackpool and the same problems occurred there as have been mentioned about yesterday.  The left hand side is exposed with Olsson restricted and isolated when Wes goes wandering.   It gave Blackpool more space on our left and while they didn''t really punish us, our overall midfield play was poor in the first half.    If Wes is on fire, its ok, but if not, it restricts other players and team play suffers.    I too would prefer to see him in a 4231 as at the start of the season, or even a 451 with him given a free role, 4411, if you like.  Anything else just doesn''t seem to work well enough for the team.

[a1canary 0]

Theres''s also a distinct sense of deja vu in this discussion from the Lambert era. Then too it was essentially our tactics to change from the diamond at some point in the second half if the game was scoreless or if we were behind. Then too, if we hadn''t managed to get in front in the first half of the game it was usually because Wes was either off his game or being sat on, or because the opposition had successfully exploited the vulnerability on our flanks when playing a diamond or with 3 in the middle. Or any combination of the above!

I don''t think any of this is bad and i think it''s no coincidence that Adams is doing this having watched Lambert''s Norwich sides so many time at close quarters from the commentary box!! I''d much rather have a side that can switch between playing style than one that can only play one way. It will inevitably lead to plenty of armchair fans saying we should have switched sooner, later, played one way from the start rather than half way through the game.... and so on. But it''s much more fun and also, more importantly, much more likely to get us a result based on NCFC experiences to date!

[smooth 114]

A1 spot on the hoolahan quandary.

After a few games where he went missing he turned up but every game he does leave that side exposed.

It has been his problem and out problem for years we need to get someone in who can surpass hoops as our most creative player

The big thing for me still is that I would expect a player of his quality scoring between 10-15 goals a season, certainly in this league with squad we have

For me he does not score enough, he is best in the hole because we have balance but he needs to lift his game so he can get on the score sheet much, much more

[PurpleCanary 5,554]

[quote user="smooth"]A1 spot on the hoolahan quandary.

After a few games where he went missing he turned up but every game he does leave that side exposed.

It has been his problem and out problem for years we need to get someone in who can surpass hoops as our most creative player

The big thing for me still is that I would expect a player of his quality scoring between 10-15 goals a season, certainly in this league with squad we have

For me he does not score enough, he is best in the hole because we have balance but he needs to lift his game so he can get on the score sheet much, much more[/quote]I think the quandary is much more pronounced this season that previously, for a couple of reasons. Firstly, Hoolahan is getting to the veteran stage and probably will mix bad games with good games. Secondly, unlike last season, we have at the moment, even with Lafferty and Hooper not entirely fit, two strikers whose goals have pretty much demanded they both start. So Adams is still trying to shoehorn Hoolahan and two strikers into some kind of system, despite strong evidence that it doesn''t work.It is a tough choice, either to drop one of the strikers (or to play one right out on the wing) or to drop Hoolahan, but then good management involves making unpopular decisions.

[nutty nigel 7,509]

But this season we are in the Championship and not the PL. Wes on the left or right or both made no difference to us defensively last night. In fact we were weaker in those areas when he went off. I think sometimes we get as hung up over formations and shapes as Chris Hughton did in the PL. Neil Adams seems to be more of a Neil Williams type coach who sees more that the whiteboard or ipad. We were far more fluid attacking with Wes and Redmond attacking more freely and they easily recovered their shape to cope with the slight attacking intent Charlton showed. Perhaps it wouldn''t work when we play Derby away but I''m sure we woulodn''t play that way in those types of games anyway.

 

To me it looks like Adams has found another way to play that suits Wes. For these type of games anyway. The guy just continues to impress.

 

 

[mrs miggins 0]

a1canary wrote the following post at 01/10/2014 1:32 PM:But the other ''problem'' we have with that miggins is that Johnson and Tettey are not very effective without one another. We''ve seen that a lot in the past. I think if we had to take one of them out it would be Tettey just because Johnson is that much more combative for me. But on balance for me, if we''re going to play Wes and Howson it has to be in a five man midfield otherwise there are just going to be too many holes and the defence too exposed. I''d put Wes in the hole and Murphy left with Jerome the man up.

----------------------------------------

In this league I think we have to try to play Tettey and Howson together when at home and not write them off without seeing them play together in this league. Tettey is an absolute beast and gets through so much work, especially defensively, whereas BJ is trying to do this as well as play more creatively, where at home I think personally that Howson would give us more drive as he''s a proper box to box player unlike Tettey and Johnson who are defensive midfielders being told that they can also get forward. I would love to see Howson and Wes together in the same team at Home as we need to unlock defences. He''s too good not to play imo.

[Holtcantshoot 0]

[quote user="Phillip J Fry"]I would assume that Adams is confident enough in Olsson''s energy and pace for him to cover the entire left-wing by himself.[/quote]Yes, and you would have thought awful team performances against Birmingham and Blackpool (both turned around after Hoolahan was benched) would have taught him that lesson. Clearly not and we dropped vital points on Tuesday due to his poor choices.Just pray he works it out for Saturday, though I''m not counting on it.