From the telegraph, via the press association, who count these things impartially. The talk of Seol not tackling is nonsense. He does his bit.
He might or might not be a good player, but he is not the player people think he is.
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The hatred Seol seems to generate goes beyond anything I can recall at Fulham.
My opinion on TIFF that he had some virtues (to go with his faults) met with stiff rebukes whilst your facts have been ignored.
Very strange and inexplicable to me. When he managed assists against Torino and a goal against Hull it was made clear that that was ALL he did and merited no credit.
Nevland’s two goals (and I’d genuinely like to see more of him) are however proof of his superior talents seemingly.
I’m a simple soul. I like our players to do well and try to be fair. You get the impression though that some supporters would be genuinely pissed if Seol got a hat trick at West Brom.
Comment by Tony Gilroy — September 29, 2008 @ 2:40 pm |
It is odd. As we’ve both tried to say, sure he’s not a good player, but for a lower-half team he has his uses.
Here I’m not trying to say that he’s a midfield hard-man, but Cheggers made a strong point to say that he NEVER (and he capitalised that) tracks back and tackles. Well that’s easily verified these days, and surprise, surprise, he does his bit in that regard, and tackles far more than many of his team-mates.
I suspect Roy can see as much too. Like you, Nevland intrigues me, but we really haven’t seen too much of him. Colin (at Championship at Best) recently proved that almost all forwards score more regularly as subs than when they start, which is a nod towards using a forward late on in games, but also a suggestion that Nevland isn’t necessarily the second coming of David Fairclough.
The Torino thing was insane too: sure it was a friendly, but again, we pointed out dozens of times, he was the only one in the team to create two goals. Nobody else managed that.
He was awful against Leicester, and didn’t have the best of times last season, but his form this year has been pretty good in his two league starts, and Jamie said he wasn’t all bad at Burnley (although TiFF was alive with abuse… from people who hadn’t seen the game).
I wonder what’s going on. Something for next year’s book, if nothing else…
Comment by weltmeisterclaude — September 29, 2008 @ 2:49 pm |
I haven’t spent much time on the Official or the Independent sites, but can this be true? Is there really more vituperation and hatred for Seol this season than there was for Baird last season? Really? If so, my decision to spend less and less time on these sites has been justified.
About the chart, I was interested to see that the guy who tackles least often is the guy who made only two tackles all season evidently got a yellow card for each of them. Stunning.
Comment by HatterDon — September 29, 2008 @ 4:51 pm |
er, ah; poor cutting and pasting. Read the first sentence in that last paragraph WITHOUT “who tackles least often is the guy”
Comment by HatterDon — September 29, 2008 @ 4:52 pm |
Two tackles for Andy Johnson and yellow cards for each of them. Brilliant.
Comment by Josh — September 29, 2008 @ 4:56 pm |
much more, Don. It’s quite depressing.
Baird’s grief was much more about his failings as a player, people (largely) exaggerating a few admittedly bad performances and ignoring the games where he played quite well. With Seol… it’s just so strange, I’d so like to stop thinking about why this is, just can’t get my head around it. I feel sorry for the bloke, because he’s done alright.
I mean, it’s not like he’d be the first below average player who doesn’t have an extrovert style to put on a white shirt is it? I suppose Collins John had that wonder season, but even after that when things didn’t go his way so much, people still muttered and moaned, but there was nothing too severe. This…
Comment by weltmeisterclaude — September 29, 2008 @ 5:26 pm |
They complain that we don’t have enough players making tackles, but they complain even more when someone who is good at tackling gets into the lineup. It is a mystery!
Comment by Colin — September 29, 2008 @ 6:20 pm |
I do have a problem with statistics over-riding what you see on the pitch. I can see that they help to articulate what you see on the pitch but I’m pretty sure no one on here would argue that Seol is a better tackler than say Brede Hangeland. The black and white figures show that players we think don’t do something actually do, but they don’t show the quality or importance of when those tackles were made. You know that of course, I’m just trying to add a little bit of weight to the “emotive” evidence used on TiFF.
Danny Murphy though – well done!
Comment by Chopper — September 29, 2008 @ 8:25 pm |
I agree there, Chopper. I pulled these off to show that Seol is not what people say he is. Sure he’s not Roy Keane, but he’s not nothing either.
Comment by weltmeisterclaude — September 29, 2008 @ 8:29 pm |
Thanks for the update on the Seol-bashing. I’ve done a bit of it myself, so disappointed was I with his performance last season.
A while back, GBFC [one of the local Fulham folks who hang out at FUSA] told us about a Fulham player of several seasons back who always caused the crowd to moan. He was one of those guys who missed “easy goals” [never found one of those when I was playing!]. Anyhow, everyone who stood around GBFC agreed that he was the biggest negative in the squad. Nobody could understand why the gaffer kept playing him. Once the season was over, GBFC and his friends watched a close-season highlight film. He said that the guy that everyone thought was hopeless had had a hand in aboug 75% of the critical goals Fulham had scored that season. He and his mates did some serious backtracking.
Stats like the ones you’ve posted mean we can find out we’re wrong well before July. Thanks.
Comment by HatterDon — September 29, 2008 @ 9:14 pm |
Good stuff. I still have to clarify that I’m not arguing that Seol’s a good player, a good tackler, or anything like that. Only that the sort of abuse he takes is very much over the top, and not based on reality. He does try, I’m sure of that, and he’s done alright for us this year.
Comment by weltmeisterclaude — September 29, 2008 @ 10:01 pm |