Gera’s caught the wrong side of Geovanni (anticipating a Fulham attack), so probably not his fault. Makes a decent effort to catch him.
Hangeland closed off by the forward, but his finishing position is almost the same as his starting position. Looks like he could possibly have got out and blocked the shot? Big ask I know, but someone had to get out to him.
If we’d been ’set’ to defend this wouldn’t have happened. The defence is flat with no cover (see post earlier about losing the ball in own half), whereas usually you’d have some depth there, with one (or two) man pressing the player and another covering him.
And, without wishing to harp on, a defensive midfielder would surely have been able to stop this. Look again at the area Geovanni runs through, unimpeded…
Question: how many players do we expect to have registered six league goals before 2008 is over?
My guess: no Fulham player will have achieved this.
Which doesn’t prove anything, of course. But…
Clint Dempsey scored six goals before 2007 was over, then moved back into midfield. I don’t think people appreciate this contribution, leaning on the old “old of position midfielder” crutch. I felt that Clint played well as a forward, isolated, handed jack all to work with. As one half of a strike partnership which feeds on balls on the deck I think he could thrive this season. But nobody agrees, it seems.
Yesterday, thinking about Saturday’s defeat, I dug out a couple of books on football tactics. I wanted to get a slightly better handle on why we were so wed to this 4-4-2. I didn’t really get that, but the first thing the 4-4-2 section said was “care must be taken to never lose the ball in your own half”, the point being that you can set yourself up to defend properly if you have time to do so, but if you lose the ball in your own half your players will be out of position to defend properly.
This is what happened isn’t it? The first Hull goal came after (I think) Zamora trod on the ball. And if he didn’t lose the ball, he was in a position where he looked like he might have had it. The ball squirted loose, Geovanni got past Gera, Andreasen couldn’t get a tackle in (he was on the bench) and Hangeland couldn’t get out in time. For the second goal we couldn’t defend because an individual error of that magnitude in that area is going to cost you more often than not.
The subject of a defensive midfielder is not an original one at this point. But I’m still stuck as to why we didn’t use one when it became apparent that we could not control the middle of the park. My book lists ideal characteristics for all players in a 4-4-2 formation, and under central midfielders it talks about being very good at making interceptions. This is important. Every time we win the ball we’re on the attack. Every time we don’t win the ball we’re under pressure. By not having someone in there to win the ball we’re making life extremely hard for ourselves. Andreasen was missed. He can be careless in possession, but the same could be said for most of our team on Saturday. We needed someone to win the ball and restart attacks. We didn’t get him.
I’m a big Clint Dempsey fan, but even in ten minutes I thought his approach to the game made a slight difference. Again, not an original thought, but Davies, Gera, Bullard and Murphy are all about the same height and build. Dempsey and Andreasen are fighters and, technical limitations notwithstanding, both were needed on Saturday.
