Two today!

No Fulham news.  Steve B, who has contacts, has speculated “in fun” that we may see a new centre-back in time for Arsenal.   Barra, the usual mole on TiFF, says that Andy Johnson’s fit for Saturday, if Roy wants to risk him.   That’s about it.

Big day for CCN though.  We’re two today!  I started this blog two years ago to the day.   At that point I started spamming TFI with match reports, and eventually people started to visit.  And so on and so on.  We got a few people a day back then but get a lot more now.  Many exciting things have happened while I’ve been writing this site, each seemingly more surprising than the last.

Anyway, cheers for reading, commenting, advising.  Great stuff.

Erm

Oh well, gone.  I was experimenting with the look of the site, and the old (until very recently, current) look is no longer available.  So I can’t switch it back.   Hope this is alright for now.

Crockatt & Powell – photos!

Here.  Lots of piccies of the new shop and a few of the old one.

Best bookshop in London.  Crockatt is a Fulham S/T holder.  You should go there!

Shape

For whatever it’s worth, here’s a comparison between the win at Reading last year and the defeat at Hull this year.   These come from the increasingly impressive Telegraph football site, incidentally, and show where the players spent most of their time on the field.  Somehow.  Not sure how.  Anyway.

In both games it’s fairly clear that Danny Murphy is playing behind three more advanced midfielders.  So while we harp on (and we have been) about needing a holding player, Murphy has certainly been doing that to a degree.  Against Reading Clint Dempsey (under the #26 shirt) played deeper too, but that’s probably anomalous.

Against West Brom Davies, Bullard and Gera were quite advanced, quite narrow, but equally attacking.  From the site’s passing stats we see that Bullard and Paintsil exchanged passes a lot during the game, which says something about the width and energy that Paintsil brought to the team.   At Reading last year Simon Davies played much more centrally and very close to Bullard.   In both games the two forwards played close together, although it didn’t seem that way on Saturday.

I’m not sure what the message in all this is.  Probably that we made a couple of mistakes and got punished, but otherwise set up and played alright.  At Reading we scored at the right time (early) but turned the screw.  At Hull we also scored early, but didn’t build on it.  At Reading Shane Long headed wide in the first half when well placed; at Hull Geovanni scored.   Football’s all about moments, sometimes they go your way, sometimes they don’t.

Modern technology

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…

Clint Dempsey is undeappreciated

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.

Mumbles on Monday

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.

Jamie’s report

Ah well. For fans of most football clubs around the country, the hope is the same –new signings, a new-ish manager, and everyone starting level on nought points – perhaps this year things will be different. Before anything has actually happened to suggest otherwise, it’s easy to suspend one’s disbelief and dream of a season in which most things go right rather than wrong, Fulham are clinical rather than wasteful in front of goal, solid rather than generous at the back. It usually takes a few games before reality begins to set in – this year, the optimism didn’t even last that long.

For the first twenty minutes against Hull, the blissful dream was intact. With the sun shining brightly and a full away end in fine voice, the Fulham players, angelic all in white, passed the ball around serenely and created chances seemingly at will. Bullard’s cross was headed in expertly by Seol Ki-Hyeon, of all people – was this really happening? We were 1-0 up and it looked a matter of time before more goals came. Davies grazed the bar with a skilful volley, Gera miscontrolled when he perhaps should have scored, but it didn’t matter, surely. The previously eager home crowd were silent and Hull’s nervous players could barely string a pass together; we had quickly and efficiently asserted our Premier League dominance over these novices and would canter to a comfortable victory.

It had to be too good to be true. After 25 minutes, out of nothing, Hull’s Giovanni picked up the ball, took a run at our defence and before anyone managed to stop him, curled a fabulous twenty-yard shot into the bottom corner. You could sense that the Hull fans had already sat back and resigned themselves to a Derby-like season of depressing struggle, but suddenly they were awoken – Giovanni’s strike restored their fervour and the pendulum had started to swing. By the second half, with the sky now clouded over and a blustery wind set in, it was Hull who were on top. Our creative but defensively weak midfield were simply bullied out of the game – Bullard, under constant pressure, was misplacing passes all over the place and Murphy was simply anonymous.

We made one real chance – again falling to Gera, a right-footer playing on the left, and again his left foot failed him. But if anyone was going to score it was Hull – Giovanni missed an open goal and Schwarzer acquitted himself well on a number of occasions. Zamora and the previously impressive Seol were now lonely figures; the away crowd was crying out for Hodgson to make a change in order give our back four some protection and put the exasperated Murphy out of his misery. But a substitution wasn’t forthcoming, and eventually the pressure told when the usually reliable Konchesky tripped over the ball in his own area and Folan, via Fagan, made no mistake in accepting the gift. The KC stadium exploded as Fulham fans’ heads sank.

I basically agree with Rich’s analysis of our midfield issues below. I had no problem with the starting line up – such an attacking set-up was a calculated risk which, considering the opposition, was a reasonable one to take. And it worked in the first half. What rankles is Roy’s apparent unwillingness to be slightly flexible and change things when it’s clearly not working, as was clear for all to see in the second half. Of course it’s easy to talk with hindsight, but these were things people around me were shouting from about 55 minutes onwards. Roy surely would have seen it too, so what prevented a change – stubbornness? Arrogance? It was difficult to fathom. And now it looks as if we might be heading into September with nought points on the board.

It’s when the pre-season optimism is dashed that the ever-resourceful football fan reverts to looking for other things to enjoy apart from the result, and one positive at Hull was the emergence of a new comedy-hero – Johnny Paintsil at right back. This was a super committed performance of enthusiastic bombs down the flank mixed with athletic, if haphazard, efforts at the back. I’m sure he’ll make a few bloopers in his time and it’s possibly doubtful whether he’s even a Premiership quality defender at all – but whatever happens, he’ll be giving his all and it’s going to be fun to watch. What’s more, he was alone in making the effort to come right over and acknowledge the away support both before and after the game. Top man.

Not wishing to think about our own shortcomings

I’ve written a small tribute to George Boateng for The Times.  Where is our Boateng?  I want one.

Enforcerless: Hull City 2-1 Fulham

Pre-season optimism ruined in a day. This Fulham team has weaknesses and they were exposed at the first time of asking. That the team to do the exposing was Hull City is something we must try to ignore if we are to retain any sanity for the long slog ahead.

The game started well: Seol tricked down the left and crossed for Gera, but the Hungary player’s left footed volley was unconvincing. The ball was behind his run but it was a chance. Hull went up the other end and nearly scored themselves, Mark Schwarzer, blameless today, made a fantastic save at full strength to deny a Giovanni header. The ball dropped just the right side of the line, and John Paintsil cleared the resulting trouble.

Then we did score. Bullard stood the ball into the box from the right and Seol’s glancing header slipped into the far corner. 1-0! You’re in the big time now, Hull!

So we set about compiling our thrashing. Several near chances came and went, that man Gera missing another decent opportunity, again on his left foot. The pressure was all ours; the goals were presumably coming.

But here it went wrong. Using the Murphy and Bullard combination is a calculated risk; by keeping the ball they don’t have to tackle, the theory seems to go. That’s the idea, and it’s an important one, because nobody in our cultured midfield *can* tackle. And the downside to this is that teams will always get room around our box. Exhibit A: Geovanni, cuts inside Gera, nobody there to close him down, Hangeland can’t get out in time, screaming left footed shot beats Schwarzer.

We didn’t recover our composure. The midfield and the forwards couldn’t relate to one another, variously too far apart or not on the same wavelength. It got very scrappy. Bobby Zamora, on his debut, worked hard, but nothing went for him. There were no nice combinations around the box, no real chances; very disappointing. Part of the problem was George Boateng, whose disruptive presence for Hull mimicked exactly what he did to us last year for Middlesbrough. Gera showed flashes, so did Davies, but Bullard and Murphy in the middle could not control the game at all.

Gera had another chance in the second half, again on his left foot, again fluffed. This bears watching: if he’s a right footed player being used on the left then we may see more of this. The assumption has always been that he is capable of using both feet and doing damage either way, but three decent left footed chances came and went today, which cost us.

It came to Paul Konchesky to deliver the knockout blow. Deep in his own area, his usual stepover then clearance move failed him, he was dispossessed and Hull scored. It was a terrible error from one of our more reliable players.

Roy summoned Clint Dempsey, Erik Nevland and Leon Andreasen, but with the benefit of hindsight these moves came far too late. Andreasen in particular was required far sooner. It’s easy to be wise after the event, but the Murphy and Bullard pairing needed reinforcing from about the 30th minute onwards.

Not quite back to the drawing board – one of Roy’s strengths is to keep an even keel rain or shine, especially this early in the year – but that was a very disappointing start to the season.

Brrrrrr….

Well, we’re nearly there. Tomorrow brings a new season of who knows what.

Nice day today. At 630 this evening I was lying on the train platform at Surbiton waiting for my train, listening to Jeff Buckley’s “live at Sine” then Rilo Kiley’s “Under the Blacklight” and watching the sun sort of go down and sort of lose its mojo for the day, all with the general feeling of not wanting to move, not wanting to go anywhere, not being in a rush. I was at peace for the first time in weeks.

I got to Wimbledon, walked around HMV, picked up a load of DVDs, put them back, and walked home. And now it’s nearly tomorrow.

Here’s the new Juliana Hatfield video. She’s doing videos again! It’s a comeback! Not the best track off the new album, but you take what you can get, don’t you? Which is as good a theme for tomorrow as I can think of. See you at the F3K…

Bags

Matthew and Adam have those modern ‘material’ bags now!  Also the Fulham Road shop is open until 9pm on Wednesday evenings, should you be in the area.   Officially the best bookshop in the country!  You can get Fulham Reviews and the Plumb/Coton Haynes book there as well.

Speaking of being in the area, for a number of reasons I’m not going to Hull this weekend (I don’t think*), but the game should on at the Famous Three Kings by West Kensington tube.  So worth a look if you’re at a loose end and want to watch the game.

*We will have a first hand account though, as Jamie’s making the trip

What to expect

It’s been a while since I confused myself with numbers, so try this:  above you see the average goals for and against required to finish in each position for the last six seasons.   Before you protest, goals for and against are a remarkably good proxy for finishing position, and by taking a medium term average like this we get a fair yardstick for what’s required to finish where.

As you can see, last year’s 38-60 goals for and against record was historically dangerous.   We survived – just – but a repeat will be a very bad thing.

So the question is:  how many more goals for and against can we expect this season?

The tempting thing would be to look at Roy’s performance last year, but that’s fraught with danger:  for one thing he spent the early days in what we might call a ‘teaching’ phase; for another we can’t really judge the last few games by any rational criteria.  They happened, we have no idea how, but they were somewhat special.   So it’s probably best to stick with the overall F/A values as some kind of negative regression to the mean guesstimate for what our team was like last season.

Have we added much?  We certainly have.   Mark Schwarzer is a good goalkeeper.  Antti Niemi, Kasey Keller and Tony Warner were alright goalkeepers.  We have a season of Brede Hangeland now, and we might get another centre-back in.  We have two more right backs.  We ought to have someone who can tackle in midfield.  You have to think that the goals against tally will decrease.   By how much?  60 goals against was a lot last year… the average goals against for teams finishing 12-16th was somewhere between 53 and 55, so let’s say 54 and be done with it.   I think our defence should be 6 goals against better.  It seems reasonable.

What about at the other end?   While we didn’t have a specialist centre-forward for much of last season, I’m inclined to think that the people who played up front did quite well.  Clint got six in the August to December shift, which is pretty good, and McBride, Kamara and Healy all chipped in after that.    We have Bobby Zamora and Andrew Johnson now, but I still believe that much of forward play is the chances your team makes, and we will be trotting out the same midfield as last season, for the most part.  Zoltan Gera seems to have had about 8 assists per season in the last three years, so he’s certainly going to help here, and our new forwards are arguably a bit better than our old ones, so I think we’re definitely looking at an increase here.  How much?

Does 6 goals more sound about right here as well?  If you think that sounds low then I might agree with you, but this would take us up to 44, which is the 12th place goals for yardstick, so that seems quite optimistic.

Where are we?   If, somehow, we can shave off 6 concessions and score 6 more, we’re looking at F44 A 54, which would leave us somewhere between 12th and 16th.    Does this seem like a possible achievement?

I think it does.  The team should be more solid at the back now Roy’s had a while in charge.   I’m quite confident we can make our 6 concession target.   Up front?  I’m less sure of this.  Gera, Zamora and Johnson ought to make a big difference, and ought to be able to score a few more goals, but I don’t see us playing a particularly open, high scoring game.  Add to this the old truism that you have to improve to stand still in this league, and I don’t know that it’s a given that we’ll be scoring that much.

Either way, I hope this has suggested that improvements do not have to be huge (six goals at each end over a whole season doesn’t sound like much) and that we are well capable of a higher league position.    But football’s a fecker sometimes and all kinds of bad things can happen without good reason, and it doesn’t take much to derail a perfectly promising season.   As I’ve shown in the past with various monte-carlo simulations, a team that should finish 15th can easily end up anywhere between 7th and 20th through sheer luck alone, so there’s that.

Nevertheless, it’s fairly clear that a) we’re better and b) we should finish higher.  Which is a good thing.

Roy: en fuego

We have the greatest manager in the world, no?

“I have no idea where that story has come from. No-one has approached us about Paul Konchesky because it is pretty obvious to everyone we are not interested in the slightest about selling Paul Konchesky.

“And if I was Paul Konchesky I would be very sad to see my name linked with a £2million transfer when I am a player who is worth a lot more than that.

“God only knows where that has come from. There must be a reason for it. Someone must have an agenda and is using Paul’s name to further it.

“Paul Konchesky is not for sale. He is our star left-back.”

And here’s a preview video.

Diomansy is being mended.  ETA December, for training at least.

Danny Murphy: captain of Fulham

Murphy confirmed as captain.

This was one of the great sporting moments.  A player who had quietly gone about changing the way the team played, who got on with passing, passing and passing, who led by example and provided a cooling influence at a time when things were more than a little mad around him.  That sunny day on the south coast, when all the wrong teams were winning and Fulham had yet to find a way through… in a blur of magic he rose – completely unchallenged – in the Portsmouth box and diverted Bullard’s free kick home.  It meant everything to him, his teammates, and all of us in the stands.  We looked straight at the linesman, and no, there was no flag.  Danny Murphy had really scored, we were really beating Portsmouth, and 15 minutes later we were really safe.  Amazing.
Now he’s captain.  Great choice.

I see it quite simply. I signed a year contract. There is the option of a second year there. I’ve got no intention of playing my football at any other club from now until the end of my footballing days.

Excellent.

Squad numbers!

My favourite time of the year (not really)(but almost): squad numbers!

1 MARK SCHWARZER
2 MORITZ VOLZ – shame, if he’s going to Boro would’ve been nice for Stoor to have 2
3 PAUL KONCHESKY – proper left back number
4 JOHN PANTSIL – quite a coup for John, this.  Good number, 4.  I hope John uses it well
5 BREDE HANGELAND – excellent, as it should be.  He’s a proper number 5
6 ANDRANIK – as hinted at in the past, and suggestive of an important role in the team
7 SEOL KI-HYEON – this should belong to a regular player
8 ANDY JOHNSON – okay
9 BOBBY ZAMORA – makes sense
10 ERIK NEVLAND – ten?  I like Erik, but he’s not a ten.  Well done him though
11 ZOLTAN GERA – about right, although harsh on Diomansy.  Will get this on the back of my Ferencvaros top
12 DAVID STOCKDALE
13 DANNY MURPHY – his preferred number.  A better use of ten though I’d have thought
14 EDDIE JOHNSON
15 DIOMANSY KAMARA – as noted, a bit harsh, unless he didn’t want 11 in the first place
16 ALEXEY SMERTIN – 37, to 8, now 16
17 COLLINS JOHN – dropped from 15.  Weird
18 AARON HUGHES
19 PASCAL ZUBERBUHLER
20 STEVEN DAVIS – from 10 to 20
21 JIMMY BULLARD
22 FREDRIK STOOR – a double 2 I suppose.  May get this on the back of my Sweden top.  Probably check to see if he’s any good first though
23 CLINT DEMPSEY
25 SIMON DAVIES
26 LEON ANDREASEN
27 ADRIAN LEIJER
28 ROBERT MILSOM
29 ANTTI NIEMI
30 WAYNE BROWN
31 DAVID HEALY – oh dear, demotion from the main #9
33 TONI KALLIO
34 CHRIS BAIRD

This and that

This weekend we play Hull. Look at what Hull wore in the 90s. At some point someone approached someone else with these designs, and that someone agreed to let them be mass produced and worn by their football team. Like so much in football, it defies rational explanation.

Here’s the new Auxerre kit, for those of us (is it just me?) who like to keep up to date with matters Airness:

If they were still supplying us our own version would, presumably, slightly recall the dabs.com kit that I always associate with Papa Bouba Diop.

Arsenal are without nine first team players. If they can stay without for three weeks that would be nice, wouldn’t it?

Setanta are warned to make some money. If they don’t the next TV deal could go a bit pear shaped, and the game could conceivably find itself in a bit of a mess. This happened in the Championship and below with ITV Digital, of course, but it’ll be interesting to see how things play out. Will the game pay for letting its players walk away with so much of its revenue? These booms don’t always keep booming, do they?

Great stuff on 200 percent. A season preview, a look back at the Topical Times Football annuals (I had those!) and even a reminder of the original Football Manager on the ZX Spectrum (yep!). (none of these links are working as of now, but were a while ago)

Finally, Chopper’s dug out some info on messrs Zakuani and Omozusi. Zakuani was popular at Stoke until they got themselves promoted and presumably decided to shop for ‘better’ players. But the young man was a regular at Orient from a very young age, so I’d assume him to be coachable. He’s still young. Omozusi will be playing at Norwich, which’ll be ideal for him.

And I have just had a bowl of Sainsbury’s Own Brand Super Noodles at work. It’s the simple things in life…

Captains

Brede Hangeland is now captain of Norway.  And I think Danny Murphy is now captain of Fulham…

Roy: modern coach

I’ve just received “Coaching Soccer: Match Strategy and Tactics” by Luca Prestigiacomo in the post. This in itself is not interesting, but straight away Mr Prestigiacomo has me gripped. I’m only up to page 12, but he has already described what he sees as the modern coach. Here are some chopped extracts, which are not doing him justice, but that might be interesting to some of you:

The modern coach…

the coach has freed the team of individual improvisation and aims for collective play that is well defined, easily recognizable and based on innovative tactical themes

…

With such coaches we do not usually get ranks and grades of importance among the players. No one player is to be considered indispensable, and, at the same time, each single player feels he is as important as any other…. everyone knows they are at the service of the group

…

this type of coach is like the conductor of an orchestra. He has to synchronize his musicians, who, they may excellent at playing their own instrument, would only give rise to an annoying din without someone who can organise them

…

(mental preparation)

The first things he must get over to his players are the principles of total soccer: offensiveness, a feeling for the group, collaboration and reciprocal assistance. The team must be looked upon as a compact block moving on the whole field – the point where everyone is at the same time both a defender and a forward…

Defensive play should begin in our opponent’s half, in the first place to force the rival team to play as far away as possible from our goal, but also to crush them into their own area so we have as many chances to shot as possible.

…

(programming)

In the possession phase our manevers must be fast, fluid, based on incessant movements without the ball which are synchronized among all the players…

Short passes are preferable to medium or long range ones, the ball should be kept as much as possible to the ground and a collective solution (a pass) is always better than an individual one (dribbling)…

The coach must make sure that the movements without the ball are correctly timed and coordinated… the team must repeat all these things again and again until they have become almost automatic.

…
(micro programming)

We could compare a soccer team to a Formula One racing car: it has its own shape and well-defined characteristics, and yet at the same time from race to race it undergoes small but decisive alterations to its set up.

By only taking the odd chunk here and there I’ve over simplified and perhaps made it look like Mr Prestigiacomo is merely stating the obvious. But in its full version his writing is very impressive, and at every turn you can see something Roy has said or done. Team ethic: definitely – this is said to be the unspoken Bullard issue (not because Bullard is not a team player, but because he might not be the best at adhering to fairly rigid instructions); short passing: definitely; repetition: yep, we heard about this too; pressing high up the pitch: Andy Johnson is well known for this; synchronisation: same as for the repetition, but this is what Roy was working on at length last season.

As I say, this is 12 pages of a long book, but it’s really emphasising to me that Roy’s got this sorted, and that he can make things work if his players listen and go with the plan. Which they stopped doing on Saturday, he says. It also emphasises how much work goes into this (I didn’t bother excerpting any of the defensive stuff, which is pretty heavy), and why people who say that Roy didn’t get instant results when he took over are slightly missing a point.

Anyway, fascinating stuff. I recommend the book to anyone. I got mine from forsport.com.

Torino reaction

“It is a poor result which has come as a result of not following the type of play we want to see and players deciding it is all too easy and playing how they wanted to.”

“I was anxious to win today. I didn’t want to gift our opponents anything and that’s what we have done. People use the word ‘disappointed’ too much these days. I’m not disappointed, I’m very angry about it.

“We got in good situations time and time again you have to make the right decision. We had two good finishes first half but could have had more. But in the second half our game was too individual.”

Says Roy.  Good man.