Football The 2011/2012 Season Thread

[Aoami]

Santos or Gibbs at LB?

 

[Wazzerphuk]

Gibbs is better defensively but made of glass. Santos is hilarious and mental and offers a better attacking threat.

 

[Aoami]

I think its a position where Wenger should buy. Keep Santos as a second choice LB and a utility man down the left, and fuck gibbs off to some second rate club like Liverpool. Actually, if you offer him to Liverpool Dalglish will probably buy him for £20m because he is british and you could buy Enrique for that.

 

[Keitanz]

Enrique is class tho, doubt he will leave us for a few seasons at least.

 

[Calaen]

Well the disallowed goal cancels out the blatantly offside goal they scored against us earlier in the season, so meh.

Szczesny - Sagna - Koscielny - Vermaelen - Gibbs: Arguably our first choice back four haven't been beaten in the league when they've played as a unit. Shows how much impact all those defensive injuries had.

Yup, I'm pleased for Koscienly, he really is settling down, and look like a real big game player.

 

[Scouse]

Sack Wenger, obviously

 

[Calaen]

Well I stand by comments made at the start of the season when people were crying about him.

Judge them at the end of the season, they may not have played to the level of flair they have in the past, but I always had faith that they would finish in the top 4. If Only Newcastle could put on a worldy run now and steal 4th place from Spurs and Chelsea!!! That would be ideal!

 

[Cerb]

Since moving over here to the states (and hearing a lot about saber-metrics - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabermetrics - from a few of my baseball junkie friends) I've been wondering if and when some of this stuff will start to be used by managers and players. http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/16986710 . Micheal Cox already does a little bit of this with Zonal Marking but I feel like there is more extensive research and implementation that could and probably will eventually be done.

 

[Everz]

ah thank you liverpool! thank you kindly a much needed win

You munchers are going to stay up at the expense of us. Irony.. we got promoted off you .

 

[Scouse]

Rafa used Zonal and was ridiculed for it (although I personally thought it was very very effective). The new owners are all about data and evidence apparently.

 

[Scouse]

You munchers are going to stay up at the expense of us. Irony.. we got promoted off you .

Jeesus. You're 3 points off safety. Stop fucking whinging. You're as bad as a Villa fan.

 

[Cerb]

That'll be because they are run by the same people that run the Red Sox. The red sox were the 2nd team to hire a Sabermetrics expert and they went all in by hiring the guy who basically invented sabermetrics (not Jonah Hill as Moneyball would have you believe).

 

[Everz]

Jeesus. You're 3 points off safety. Stop fucking whinging. You're as bad as a Villa fan.

4 points, our GD is -33 .

As bad as a Villa fan? We ain't won since Mick the hump and in that time conceded 19 and scored 2. It's hardly looking rosy now it is?

 

[Scouse]

Didn't look rosy for Wenger not that long ago. Negative mindset breeds negative results.

Fans on players (and managers) back = much much harder job.

 

[Wazzerphuk]

Didn't know QPR fans booed Barton and cheered when he was subbed off last night

 

[Lethul]

Since moving over here to the states (and hearing a lot about saber-metrics - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabermetrics - from a few of my baseball junkie friends) I've been wondering if and when some of this stuff will start to be used by managers and players. http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/16986710 . Micheal Cox already does a little bit of this with Zonal Marking but I feel like there is more extensive research and implementation that could and probably will eventually be done.

I think the new managers have tried to convert it to football (red sox as you said). Downing/Henderson/Enrique (i think) were for example all in the top of chances created last season. I think it will take some time to convert it Baseball is afterall much easier to base on statistics since it is basically only static plays imo.

 

[Cerb]

It is easier I agree but I'm sure there are ways it could be implemented. In baseball they figure out things like "75% of runs come from right field between x and y" and they move a fielder 8 yards left and the number drops. Maybe I'm wrong and teams already do this but a team could take a look at an article like this http://www.zonalmarking.net/2012/03/16/premier-league-sides-attack-lopsided-wing-play/ and think "Ok against Wolves I'm going to tell my right mid to drop back 20 yards more than he usually would and sacrifice the left side".

 

[Wazzerphuk]

Vermaelen, our DC who's been out injured half the season has more league goals (5) than Nasri (4), Carroll (3) and Torres (2).

 

[Shagrat]

Good night for Newcastle last night, we need to put some results together now to pressure Chelsea and put more points between us and lollerpool

 

[Wazzerphuk]

King Kenny
Played 63
Won 29 − 46%
Drawn 15 − 24%
Lost 19 − 30%
Points 102
Points Per Game 0.539

Vs

Roy
Played 31
Won 13 − 42%
Drawn 8 − 26%
Lost 10 − 32%
Points 47
Points Per Game 0.505

£100m buys you a 4% win improvement and 0.34 points per game. Bargain.

 

[Keitanz]

I know it's not a very good excuse etc.. but do you see many players instantly settling in to a new club??

I can't think of that many.. some do instantly but others take a while ... shit tactics from Dalglish + the settling in period has screwed us this season.

It's almost like the players can't be bothered as the teams above us are just too good... but in the cups we are taking it one match at a time which is perfect..

 

[Scouse]

Stats look horrid.

However, the way we're playing is in orders of magnitude more entertaining...


...jury is out, for a season or two.

 

[Raven]

I know it's not a very good excuse etc.. but do you see many players instantly settling in to a new club??

I can't think of that many.. some do instantly but others take a while ... shit tactics from Dalglish + the settling in period has screwed us this season.

It's almost like the players can't be bothered as the teams above us are just too good... but in the cups we are taking it one match at a time which is perfect..

Over a season. Plenty.

It's not like you had a massive Xmas influx and it's not as if this is a one season blip.

 

[Wazzerphuk]

It's also not like the players you bought weren't used to the league and needed time to adjust. They're all regular Prem players.

 

[Keitanz]

Well all the players had to move (and their families as well) to pretty much the other side of the country in all 3 cases..

Henderson and Downing have both been played out of position a lot of times this season as well..

Carroll just isn't starting enough successive games with Downing/Gerrard/Suarez in my opinion.. as soon as Carroll starts performing then Downing will start performing and vice versa !

Lucas Leiva has also been injured for the entire season pretty much and he has been our best player for the past two seasons Henderson is really really lucky that Lucas got injured but for some reason he's still not starting in his place O_O.

Also! I forgot Charlie Adam! he has been amazing at times, one of the best passers in the league no doubt about that, but our strikers up top have simply not been good enough = Adam has been very inconsistently OK.

We are resorting to playing players like Spearing in the middle, who in my opinion is a great player and is perfect for a mid table Premiership team but we need Leiva and Gerrard starting in the middle together then we will really boss teams..



If Adam recreated his Blackpool form, Downing recreated his Villa form, Suarez recreated his Ajax/Uruguay form, Carroll recreated his Newcastle form and Henderson recreated his Sunderland form and we had Lucas/Gerrard/Agger/Skrtel fully fit for the entire season there is no doubt we would easily finish top four.

Lucas really was the glue gluing the Midfield and Defence together, much like Alonso did before he left, we really need someone like that if we are playing a player like Gerrard who bombs forward so much.

But that probably won't happen with Dalglish as manager, hurts me to say that but he just isn't very good tactically, we need someone like Mourinho (hey, I have always pictured him in an LFC kit ) to come in and really kick some of these lazy players up the arse, especially Carroll who seems more interested in going to the pub/clubs etc... tbh I'd love us to get AVB in

Dalglish should be kept on as manager for at least another 8-12 months though due to the cup run, if we hadn't won the League Cup and we got knocked out of the FA Cup a few rounds ago imo Dalglish would have been gone by the Summer...

Injuries eh

 

[Calaen]

Thats a lot of ifs Keit

 

[soze]

With our first choice back 5 fit we have not lost a league game. So if they were fit we would be unbeaten and our 8 losses would be at least draws. Which would put us on 63 points. Both Manchester teams would then lose points so the league table would be:
Manchester City - 67 points
Manchester United - 66 points
Arsenal - 63 points

But then if Wilshere had kicked a ball this season and Chamakh and Arshavin had lived up to their potential then 4 of the draws would become wins so the league table would be:
Arsenal - 71 points
Manchester City - 67 points
Manchester United - 66 points

So there you have it Arsenal should be top of the league!

 

[gohan]

you would be top IF you hadn't been trying so hard to get relegated early on

 

[Aoami]

If southampton hadn't moved from the dell, we'd have 100% definitely won the world cup by now.

 

[Scouse]

Lol

Aye. Players who should have come straight in and performed have been shite. Simple as.