Norwich City vs Brentford match thread

[Horse Renoir 1]

The sensible thing to do today if we''re going to play a 442 with a good target man, two very poor CM''s and a very tall winger would have been to try to Stoke them, bypass the midfield to Jerome/Lafferty and have Hooper/Redmond working off the knockdowns.

We haven''t got the players to play a passing game, we''ve spunked a whole lot of money to build a sort of Stoke-lite, hard working battlers but we''re very slow, weak and lack physical presence. For the 100th time I ask, what the hell were the Hughton and the club''s scouts thinking when they assembled this side!? It''s so imbalanced and nonsensically thrown together.

Everyone can see we''re lacking some mobile, technical players extremely badly and we could use a bit of physicality as well. We need to do some business this window or we can kiss promotion goodbye regardless of who''s managing us

[Phillip J Fry 0]

[quote user="Monty13"]Bit harsh on Johnson Phil, I agree with your earlier post, for most of the game he was trying to do two players jobs.

Personally I think Johnson is underrated but he needs a decent partner, he''s a battler with the occasional act of brilliance, not the guy you want dictating the tempo in there, but then neither''s Tettey. Howson and O''neill are going to be sorely missed if the latter still isn''t available next up.[/quote]

Possibly. I think Johnson is a fine midfielder when given a good partner but struggles if he has to be the one to lead from that central due to his inability to pass consistently. As I''ve metioned before, Johnson has this strange ability to play a lovely dinked ball over the top with one pass and then completly screw up a simple sideways pass the next. Whilst Tettey won''t dictate the tempo, he can be relied on to complete simple passes to other teammates. One of the reasons that Johnson/Tettey works well as a partnership is that Tetteys more disciplined, careful, game contrasts very nicely with Johnsons more aggressive game. 

[Phillip J Fry 0]

[quote user="Darth Catbeard"].

We haven''t got the players to play a passing game, we''ve spunked a whole lot of money to build a sort of Stoke-lite, hard [/quote]

We have, but all the central midfielders you would pick for that side were unavailable. We had one fit midfielder, and he''s the one least suited to a passing game.

[Monty13 2,247]

"We have, but all the central midfielders you would pick for that side were unavailable. We had one fit midfielder, and he''s the one least suited to a passing game."

Cough, Hoolahan.

If you haven''t got the players to play 442 you change formation to accommodate.

[Phillip J Fry 0]

[quote user="Monty13"]"We have, but all the central midfielders you would pick for that side were unavailable. We had one fit midfielder, and he''s the one least suited to a passing game."

Cough, Hoolahan.

If you haven''t got the players to play 442 you change formation to accommodate.[/quote]

So what formation do you play then? You still have just one fit central midfielder. Maybe you could go 4-3-3 and maybe, just maybe, get away with using Hoolahan and E.Bennett as the more advanced midfielders but then your asking Johnson to play as the only holding player and Johnson has never looked comfortable playing as the holding player in a midfield duo, let alone by himself.

[Willmeister 35]

We did play the Stoke way. I don''t think i have ever seen a Norwich team play quite so route 1 at home. Whittaker and Johnson and the defence just booted the ball at the first opportunity. If there''s one thing we have learned today is that Whittaker is not a holding midfielder. But the Turner and Cuellar were both abysmal, although the penalty was incredibly soft, and the ref was a showbiz ref, who made it all about him. Martin was only marginally better than Cuellar and Turner. What Brentford did excellently was close us down in midfield, we never had any time but to hoof it. What we didn''t do was close them down at all. Their midfield had so much room, you could have driven a tank between our midfield and back 4 and they constantly exploited those gaps. That enabled them to play their quick football, with relative ease. Once they started marking Redmond properly we weren''t really a threat. Jerome had probably his poorest game for us and was in their defence''s pocket all day.I hate to say it, but unless we improve dramatically we aren''t good enough to go up, we got outplayed and tactically outclassed by Brentford today. I hope AN takes this as a real lesson, and i hope we never see tactics like that again.

[Horse Renoir 1]

Tettey isn''t suited to a passing game, O''Neil is tidy but he isn''t much use in linking up play going forwards, Howson can be useful with this approach at times, but he drifts in and out of games too much which leaves us too lightweight and as for Vadis....I have no idea.

Redmond is an awesome individual and a great outlet, but would anyone say he''s great at passing/moving/splitting the defence/pinpoint balls into space etc and we don''t really have any other wingers. Hoolahan and EB are shadows of their former selves.

What Brentford played was a passing game, which is what we try but fail to emulate and I don''t think even when fit we have the midfield for it. We''ve never moved the ball as quickly and creatively at any time this season even at our best.

To look at it simplistically, they''re isolating the strikers and not providing enough protection for the defence. Swap our midfield for Brentford or Bournemouth''s and we''d be flying, this area is the problem, we have to sort it in January or if for whatever reason we can''t play uglier and more direct

[Phillip J Fry 0]

[quote user="Darth Catbeard"]Tettey isn''t suited to a passing game[/quote]

Which is why he boasts the highest pass completion ratio in the squad. 

[Phillip J Fry 0]

Can I just say, I love the way Norwich fans overreact to everything.

Beat Bournemouth away and we''re the best team in the league and are going to storm up that table.

Lose to Brentford at home and the club might as well go bust.

I find it very amusing.

[Horse Renoir 1]

I mean, a passing attacking game, yes he''s very good at keeping the play ticking over and finding the more talented players over short distances, but he''s a purely a holding midfielder and nothing else, like Johnson and O''Neil. Any time they do try to get a hold of the ball and move forwards they will almost always either run into the opposition or stop, hesitate then slowly pass it sideways.

That''s why I don''t like to look at passing stats, I bet Martin to Turner is a 100% pass rate link up, it''s a useless play though

[Monty13 2,247]

"So what formation do you play then? You still have just one fit central midfielder. Maybe you could go 4-3-3 and maybe, just maybe, get away with using Hoolahan and E.Bennett as the more advanced midfielders but then your asking Johnson to play as the only holding player and Johnson has never looked comfortable playing as the holding player in a midfield duo, let alone by himself."

Not disagreeing phil, just started a thread on it. I would have wanted Hoolahan and a 451 but it still probably would have meant Whittaker alongside Johnson. I just feel Hoolahan from the start would have took some of the pressure off those two rather than a 442.

[Horse Renoir 1]

Also I''ve had an issue with our midfield since the first game this year, it''s not an over reaction, even when we win I always feel we could have been so much better if we had a balanced, more technical midfield, there''s just no need to spout it after we''ve won, I''d rather just enjoy the win. But we didn''t we lost a huge, massive game today at home against a side that was assembled with next to nothing and we lost because we completely lost the midfield battle as we often do, that is the issue, not the manager or leaving out Bassong or Phelan leaving etc I don''t rate any of them bar Redmond and even if we had won today, comfortably I''d still (to myself at least) want some big changes made to that part of our squad

[Herman 9,820]

[quote user="Phillip J Fry"]Can I just say, I love the way Norwich fans overreact to everything.

Beat Bournemouth away and we''re the best team in the league and are going to storm up that table.

Lose to Brentford at home and the club might as well go bust.

I find it very amusing.

[/quote]I think it''s football fans in general, but still, we are top class at overreacting.

[Phillip J Fry 0]

[quote user="Darth Catbeard"]I mean, a passing attacking game, yes he''s very good at keeping the play ticking over and finding the more talented players over short distances, but he''s a purely a holding midfielder and nothing else, like Johnson and O''Neil. Any time they do try to get a hold of the ball and move forwards they will almost always either run into the opposition or stop, hesitate then slowly pass it sideways.

That''s why I don''t like to look at passing stats, I bet Martin to Turner is a 100% pass rate link up, it''s a useless play though[/quote]

Well, those kind of players are crucial to developing a passing game. Look at Busquets at Barcelona. A pure holding midfielder with a very high pass completion rate and absolutely vital to the team. 

Anyway, Tettey is not ''just'' a holding midfielder. He''s more than capable of powering forward into attack when needed. He''s done it several times before. He''s a little lacking when he pushes up and is forced to try and play one-twos to move around the defence, but that''s when players like Howson and Hoolahan should take over.

Tettey gets the ball, passes it off smartly, and then sits deep observing the attacking phase before making a decsion of whether to attempt a late run in order to cause the defence problems.

O''Neil is a far more limited midfielder but would still be crucial to any attempt at playing a passing game.

In fact, Brentford kind of prove my point. Two holding midfielders that offered little going forward but boasted a high pass completion rates. 

[kantata soul 0]

Going for a football style based on technical quality like we''ve just

seen from Brentford is something that''s alien to the men in suits on the

board like McNally. He''s got very little idea about football and has naively tried to find the next up and at ''em type like Lambert. We''ve not played decent passing football for almost 20 years now. The managers are picked based on their form, not on their ability to produce a team playing a technical passing style.Playing like Stoke is all very well, but teams like them tend to need a lot of money to maintain any success they have. The smaller sides that have done well in recent years have mostly planned around playing good passing football and getting all levels from youth to first team playing the same way eg Swansea and Wigan. We''re now seeing other teams, eg Bournemouth and Brentford, rise on similar principles by gaining a competetive advantage in terms of quality.McNally and the board would never have been able to build up a club like Bournemouth or Brentford because they wouldn''t know how. Macho management, financial targeting and trying to find an exceptional manager can only get you so far. If Alex Neil doesn''t work out then we''re back to square one instead of having a solid base ready for the next man to work with.

[Highland Canary 76]

Total shambles but the consequence of not appointing Lennon or equivalent last Summer. So frustrating.