Common Denominators....Versus Norwich City at the Unibol, Sat. 16th Feb, 3 O' clock

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Re: Common Denominators....Versus Norwich City at the Unibol, Sat. 16th Feb, 3 O' clock

Post by Dave Sutton's barnet » Tue Feb 19, 2019 1:50 pm

Prufrock wrote:
Tue Feb 19, 2019 11:47 am
The problem is the top end of the pitch. All the spirit in the world disappears if all your work goes unrewarded because you can't score goals. It's exhausting to keep playing ok, staying in games and then coming away with nothing because of one mistake.
Very true. We don’t score many goals. We didn’t even when we went up: 68 in 46 games is fewer than 1.5 gpg, which is hardly Banging Them In From All Angles. Indeed, of the last 20 teams automatically promoted from the third tier over the past decade, the average goals-scored is 81.3 and only two teams have scored fewer than we did (Burton 57 in 2016, Donny 62 in 2013). In the second tier over the same timeframe, again only three teams have scored fewer and gone straight up.

Then we sold Madine, under a certain amount of pressure, and ALF, under very little at all. Which is fine if you replace the goals, but we quite simply haven't. And now we're on course for our worst-ever goals-scored ratio (it's currently 0.63; previous worst were 0.833 in 1970–71, 0.848 last year and 0.891 in 2015/16).
BWFC_Insane wrote:
Tue Feb 19, 2019 12:02 pm
I think its partly that. But defensively we're worse than last season. And even when we struggled for goals last season we were often hard to break down. I go to games now thinking "when the opposition score we're doomed" not "if"
We could argue all day about qualitative assessments (my gut feeling is you're right) but quantitatively we've conceded 51, same as this point last season. We've scored 21, eight fewer than this point last season.

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Re: Common Denominators....Versus Norwich City at the Unibol, Sat. 16th Feb, 3 O' clock

Post by nicholaldo » Tue Feb 19, 2019 3:52 pm

Dave Sutton's barnet wrote:
Tue Feb 19, 2019 11:28 am
I can't help thinking we've missed Karl Henry this year.

He's still available to come back and save us, though he publicly accused us of not paying his bonus on the agreed date so it would appear that bridges have been burned.

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Re: Common Denominators....Versus Norwich City at the Unibol, Sat. 16th Feb, 3 O' clock

Post by bristol_Wanderer3 » Tue Feb 19, 2019 4:38 pm

Dave Sutton's barnet wrote:
Tue Feb 19, 2019 1:50 pm
Prufrock wrote:
Tue Feb 19, 2019 11:47 am
The problem is the top end of the pitch. All the spirit in the world disappears if all your work goes unrewarded because you can't score goals. It's exhausting to keep playing ok, staying in games and then coming away with nothing because of one mistake.
Very true. We don’t score many goals. We didn’t even when we went up: 68 in 46 games is fewer than 1.5 gpg, which is hardly Banging Them In From All Angles. Indeed, of the last 20 teams automatically promoted from the third tier over the past decade, the average goals-scored is 81.3 and only two teams have scored fewer than we did (Burton 57 in 2016, Donny 62 in 2013). In the second tier over the same timeframe, again only three teams have scored fewer and gone straight up.

Then we sold Madine, under a certain amount of pressure, and ALF, under very little at all. Which is fine if you replace the goals, but we quite simply haven't. And now we're on course for our worst-ever goals-scored ratio (it's currently 0.63; previous worst were 0.833 in 1970–71, 0.848 last year and 0.891 in 2015/16).
BWFC_Insane wrote:
Tue Feb 19, 2019 12:02 pm
I think its partly that. But defensively we're worse than last season. And even when we struggled for goals last season we were often hard to break down. I go to games now thinking "when the opposition score we're doomed" not "if"
We could argue all day about qualitative assessments (my gut feeling is you're right) but quantitatively we've conceded 51, same as this point last season. We've scored 21, eight fewer than this point last season.
In the season when we went up Wheavers scored 16 out of those 68. But for set pieces we would've struggled to score more than a goal per game on average. We scored a significant number of goals purely because we had tall players and a decent set piece taker.

Henry was very important last season in terms of leadership. We don't have that this season although there are some leaders in the team such as Lowe, I think the general chaos has dragged them down...

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Re: Common Denominators....Versus Norwich City at the Unibol, Sat. 16th Feb, 3 O' clock

Post by Dave Sutton's barnet » Tue Feb 19, 2019 4:47 pm

bristol_Wanderer3 wrote:
Tue Feb 19, 2019 4:38 pm
In the season when we went up Wheavers scored 16 out of those 68. But for set pieces we would've struggled to score more than a goal per game on average. We scored a significant number of goals purely because we had tall players and a decent set piece taker.
Fair point. Add Morais to the whyohwhy pile.

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Re: Common Denominators....Versus Norwich City at the Unibol, Sat. 16th Feb, 3 O' clock

Post by irie Cee Bee » Tue Feb 19, 2019 6:26 pm

Our only chance of survival is to change the Manager during the International Break. hopefully someone will buy us before then. I'm convinced he does not have a clue how to get the best out of our players, as limited as they are. Give Phil Norwich for three months and he would completely change them into a defensive side with no idea how to score goals to win football games. He does not know how to use a La Fondre, Armstrong etc.. Our attacking players and wingers have all lost confidence it would seem, or don't know what they should be doing. The ball keeps going back!

A new face will give us a chance against the mid table teams we have to play in the run in. We must find six wins.

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Re: Common Denominators....Versus Norwich City at the Unibol, Sat. 16th Feb, 3 O' clock

Post by TonyDomingos » Tue Feb 19, 2019 10:19 pm

irie Cee Bee wrote:
Tue Feb 19, 2019 6:26 pm
Our only chance of survival is to change the Manager during the International Break. hopefully someone will buy us before then.

Unfortunately, there is no fairytale ending. No one is going to buy us.
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Re: Common Denominators....Versus Norwich City at the Unibol, Sat. 16th Feb, 3 O' clock

Post by Dujon » Tue Feb 19, 2019 11:58 pm

This is a genuine question addressed to all, but in particular to DSb.

It seems that every time I look at the game statistics as provided by the BBC we, in general, have a very low possession rate. Perhaps I have a pessimistic brain but some stats I've managed to dig up (most of which seem to be repetitions of other sites' data) our average possession is, like DSb mentioned earlier, somewhere in the high 40% range. This does not gel with my brain's opinion/recollection.

Is there anywhere I can find information about ball possession and, perhaps, other related information? By "related" I'm looking for goals for and against.

Cheers

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Re: Common Denominators....Versus Norwich City at the Unibol, Sat. 16th Feb, 3 O' clock

Post by Harry Genshaw » Wed Feb 20, 2019 7:06 am

^ which leads to the interesting question

When did we last (& how often do we) dominate possession in a league game?
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Re: Common Denominators....Versus Norwich City at the Unibol, Sat. 16th Feb, 3 O' clock

Post by Dave Sutton's barnet » Wed Feb 20, 2019 9:11 am

Bit of a fiddly one to answer on a commuter train but I’ll have a go.

Dujon, if you’re saying 40% possession doesn’t sound too low - few teams in few circumstances record sub-40% possession in any given game. Think Newcastle at Man City sort of subjugation.

What often makes us fans feel dominated is fear: every time the opponents have the ball time slows to a painful terrifying crawl, while every time we have it hurtles toward inevitable disappointment. When watching a game I try to imagine how the other team’s fans might feel. It brings a bit of balance - but not at the moment because we genuinely are plap.

Possession was an overstated metric about five to ten years ago - think when Pep’s Barça, and not-Pep’s Spain, were dominant. They won by keeping possession against terrified deep defences until a mistake was made, then pouncing ruthlessly. No point having possession pointlessly. Too many people started to think it would win you games via a thousand cuts, forgetting you need someone to apply dagger to heart.

Then came the reaction. Firstly you had Mourinho’s Inter getting what they needed at the Nou Camp with hardly any ball at all. Then came Klopp’s Dortmund (and Pochettino’s teams) who didn’t hang about racking up possession and passes - get it forward, not long but via high-press turnovers and several quick vertical passes.

Since then possession’s position in the statistical hierarchy has been corrected to what it should be: interesting but not a be-all. Game’s about goals. I’ll check in a bit but I’d be surprised if we had more than say 53% on average even when getting promoted under Parky. If we’re failing now (spoiler: we are) it’s not because we don’t have enough ball, it’s because we couldn’t hit a cow’s arse with a banjo.

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Re: Common Denominators....Versus Norwich City at the Unibol, Sat. 16th Feb, 3 O' clock

Post by Dave Sutton's barnet » Wed Feb 20, 2019 9:19 am

Harry Genshaw wrote:
Wed Feb 20, 2019 7:06 am
^ which leads to the interesting question

When did we last (& how often do we) dominate possession in a league game?
That’d require a trawl through BBC results (they have stats on every match report) which is a bit too faffy on the Tube. If I remember and have time I’ll have a look in a bit mate.

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Re: Common Denominators....Versus Norwich City at the Unibol, Sat. 16th Feb, 3 O' clock

Post by TANGODANCER » Wed Feb 20, 2019 9:27 am

Harry Genshaw wrote:
Wed Feb 20, 2019 7:06 am
^ which leads to the interesting question

When did we last (& how often do we) dominate possession in a league game?
Dominate possession? That's a cracker. If we tried taking our ball home somebody would nick it before we got off the pitch. I don't think we've ever dominated much on the football field. We did used to fight better, for sure, and had the ability to score goals, but dominate possession...??
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Re: Common Denominators....Versus Norwich City at the Unibol, Sat. 16th Feb, 3 O' clock

Post by Jugs » Wed Feb 20, 2019 10:03 pm

Terrible result for us at Pride Park tonight

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Re: Common Denominators....Versus Norwich City at the Unibol, Sat. 16th Feb, 3 O' clock

Post by TANGODANCER » Wed Feb 20, 2019 10:10 pm

Jugs wrote:
Wed Feb 20, 2019 10:03 pm
Terrible result for us at Pride Park tonight
Aye, that was a bit of a shock, but then, shocks are all part of the game. We'll just have to score and win.
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