Nice to see them in dark shorts again, but that’s quite similar to Malamine Koné’s Airness design for us two years ago. This from the wonderful Football Shirt Culture site, needless to say.
July 10, 2008
Something more substantial
While we spend these news-free days pondering the future makeup of our first team squad, here’s something about last year:
It’s a quick and dirty defensive measurement. The first columns look at the number of shots each team allowed per game. The second looks at the proportion of these that were on target.
Look at it like this: if a team plays against nobody they’ll get hundreds of shots. If a player shoots from the edge of the box with no defender near him, he’ll get it on target. So these two numbers are quite good proxies of how good a team is at defending: if a team closes down opposing players, denies them space and time, the quality and quantity of shots allowed will decrease. Easy, right?
First, shots per game. You’ll see that Fulham H(odgson) were better than Fulham S(anchez) by over two shots allowed per game, which is pretty good and would certainly add up over the course of a season. There’s no difference really in terms of the shots on target, but this column is still worthy of inspection as the best defensive teams do well here too.
Football is a game of hundreds of little incidents, few of which make a difference to the game’s final outcome. But if you improve as many of the little incidents as you can then it might just tilt something in your favour. Today’s game is so finely balanced that you need all the edges you can get. These charts show little edges, and give an idea about how teams like Liverpool make sure that they’re always competitive. They always say that successful teams are built on solid foundations, and that means defence. I fully expect Roy’s team to improve on these numbers next season.
East London imports
From the West Ham Official site:
West Ham United can confirm that the club has received an approach from Fulham for the transfer of Bobby Zamora and John Pantsil.
The club is looking forward to an exciting new season with a fully-fit squad including the return of Kieron Dyer and Craig Bellamy along with Dean Ashton secured on a long-term contract. Added to the form of Carlton Cole and the emergence of Freddie Sears, the decision has been made to let Fulham speak to the two players. West Ham United CEO Scott Duxbury said: “We recognise that Bobby Zamora and John Pantsil have had limited first-team opportunities last season at West Ham United. They want to play regular first-team football and we have given permission for them to speak to Fulham with a view to concluding a move.”
I’m fairly happy with this. Zamora is a good player. Look at this:
That’s a goal every other start throughout his career (conveniently ignoring 60 sub appearances, but still). Bearing in mind the things I’ve been saying over the last few days, I think Zamora’s a reasonable addition. He’s not Djibril Cisse, but he’s a proper forward who should benefit from regular playing time and having good players around him. With Kamara out we needed someone like this, a player with (as best I know) a broad base of skills and what might optimistically be described as an eye for goal. He’s probably a forward who’s better suited to the ball being on the deck, too, which is good. We shall see, but it’s a fair move, if it happens.
I know nothing of John Pantsil. Anyone else?
