blonde poker forum

Arsenal are the English dontcha know!

I think we were the CL's highest scorers this year before Tuesday.

We got a bunch v Shaktar which helped, well sort of...



How did your lads do?

Ralph its not a pop at Arsenal its a pop at all the idiots who have come out with this nonsense for the last 2 years. Barca are playing a different game to everyone else.

I always want English teams to do well but a part of me wanted Barca to go through as they're such a joy to watch, they are so much better than everyone else it's unreal. Why the fuck Adrian Chiles and the rest of the mugs on ITV kept saying Spurs would give Barca a good game I do not no, Spurs would get annihilated. Barca v Real in the final if they avoid each other for me, shame the tickets are so ridic priced or might've went.

Souness was a great player and a terrible manager.  As a pundit though, he's quite often on the ball (so to speak).

His assertion that the current Barca team are the "best club side ever" is one that can certainly be argued.  There definitely aren't many better are there?

I think you can take the club bit out if that sentence.

I can't remember an international team better than this Barca team.

Basically they have all the key components of the WC/EC winning national team + the best the player in the world.

So glad Gatters started this Thread, the OPTA stats fascinate me, but I'm a little hesitant to get into debate with "proper" football supporters, as I'll get mauled.

Stats can be misleading, but they don't half expose stuff. I guess all the Premiership Teams scrutinise them to the nth degree, I wonder how far down the League this goes? Do Walsall, Plymouth, Forfar, East Fife do the same?

Back to Barca-Arsenal on Tuesday. Some incred stats, or I thought so, anyway.

208 passes completed by Iniesta & Xavi, compared to 214 by the entire Arsenal team.

108 passes completed by Xavi alone, the highest by all the players. Arsenal's highest was by Wilshere - 25. (He'll maybe make the Barc Second 11.....).

576 MORE completed passes by Barca than Arsenal. Barca had 790 out of 891, Arsenal 214 out of 307.

Arsenal had TWO touches in the Barca pen area. Barca had 47 in Arsenal's pen area.

I'd rather Arsenal won a trophy than any other Team, I admire everything about them, & Mr W. But those are some stats, or it seems to me they are.

Not a good match to watch for an Arsenal supporter, but it'd be churlish not to admire Barca these days, they are very much the team of the generation. A thing of beauty, like watching Brigadier Gerard in his prime, Ronnie O'Sullivan on form, or Deadly Derek mopping up.

Great moments in sport need to be cherished. Tuesday was one.

In answer to tikay's question, most if not all of the English 92 subscribe to ProZone, which gives them widespread stats on each team. I know goalkeepers use it for example for analysis of where players place their penalties

really? it certainly used to be the case that most of the 92 didn't have it as they couldn't afford it. has the cost come down?

quite liked this

YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cRZMjHzWXQc

really? it certainly used to be the case that most of the 92 didn't have it as they couldn't afford it. has the cost come down?

Match analysis tools are used in nearly every professional club in the country. In the smaller clubs breaking down the previous game may simply be a case of the manager or coach taking home the match video and taking notes of the time of the important incidents in the game so that he can replay them to his team.

In the larger clubs, match analysis has become very sophisticated - in fact every player’s movement is tracked, measured and recorded for future use. Championship Manager’s ProZone is a very close replica of the tool used at top clubs, albeit in 2D format.

ProZone basically gives you the opportunity to see every touch, every run and every movement of all the players on the pitch, either as an individual, linked with other players, or as the whole team.

It also allows you to contrast your team with your opponents on each of the analysis opportunities. With regard to your team’s physical performance, it will measure and time each run and give you a series of tables detailing a whole catalogue of physical data which can be used in many ways, such as planning your team’s fitness programme, deciding which players need a rest, and so on.

In my time at Charlton with Alan Curbishley we used our post-match analysis system for the following :

1 To review the previous game
2 As an individual player analysis tool
3 As a sectional analysis tool, eg. Looking at the back four
4 As a physical analysis tool


Reviewing the previous game

This takes place as soon as possible, normally a version is available the next day after 3pm kick offs and 2 days after a night game. If in a hurry, either Alan or myself would take a video of the game home with us to watch and then confirm our thoughts after watching the game again with the 2D animation. In a normal week with no midweek match we would review the game paying attention to the following points :

a) Watch the whole game in 2D animation with the video in picture as well.
b) Highlight all the goals, analyse why and how they were scored, both for and against.
c) Highlight all Set Plays for and against, check what was successful and what wasn’t.
d) Look at individual errors, examining why they happened and considering how can they be eradicated.
e) Look at the overall shape in each department.
f) Analyse whether both the team and the individual players carried out pre-match instructions, and did they have an effect on the result and performance?
g) Review the passing and technical tables - who did what?
h) Review the physical table - who did the most work? Who did the most sprints?


Individual player analysis tool


ProZone can be used for individual players; this is normally done at the beginning of the week, maybe as a reaction to a weekend performance or in the case of a younger player as an aid to his football education. We used it in the following ways:

a) Younger players will have their performances from the reserve games transferred into ProZone, giving the coaching staff a chance to help them improve by video education.
b) If players have hit a bad patch, it is possible to go back over a number of games and compare to see if they are doing anything different. If they are making the same mistake time after time, it is easy to highlight and try to correct. It is also aids us when giving more detailed instruction to a player, rather than relying on the players’ recollection of an incident.
c) As an individual player you may be given detailed instructions on how the manager wants you to play and what your duties are, such as man-to-man marking. With ProZone it’s easy to see if an individual has done his job.

A sectional analysis tool

When one the team’ departments is not functioning well, it is very useful to be able to break the team down into its component parts and see how each is performing as a unit. You then analyse how each part of the team can start to help each others to rectify the problem. When you begin to analyse each department you would consider some of the following:

a) Defence – Depending on which shape you were playing, back four, five or three, you would look at the width, how deep you played, how well full-backs covering positions, defending as a unit (e.g. always being in touch with your nearest fellow defender) holding the line for offsides, how quickly you cleared the box.
b) Midfield – Again, depending on what shape is being played, whether a winger is playing… width would be examined, as would support play, availability to passes, angles, and forward runs into the box. If a striker comes short, is a midfielder making a run beyond him, do they protect the back players defensively, do they make a tackle, can they get box to box?
c) Front Players – You would look at their movement, availability, the timing and angle of their runs, their ability to hold the ball up and bring the midfield into the game, their ability to play up front on their own or as a pair or in a three, depending which system is being used.
d) Team Shape – Compactness when defending, being difficult to play through. Open out when attacking, make the pitch as big as possible to give room to pass and move.

.....and finally.

Is there such a thing as a "neutral" Football Forum, devoid of all the inane one-eyed stuff? I can't abide the ridiculous arguing from "home" perspective, but I want to see good balanced football debate. Is such a thing possible?

Think, for example, of The Baron, or Boshi, as two good examples. Two good guys, with great clarity of thinking, but when it comes to football, can only see things from Liverpool's perspective, or so it seems to me. Apologies if that seems unfair, I am just trying to make the point.

In my experience, no..although some of the stuff in the comments section of the Guardian's sports website can be v lucid

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/blog


Bit unfair to Baron.  ;)

Must be over 20, well over 20, really intelligent football posters on here who discuss stuff without any of the "Man U are Scum" nonsense that is everywhere

Players do far more nowadays - running around the whole time.

If you see old footage of football matches, you'll be struck by just how little running about players do when they don't have the ball. A few years ago, the BBC showed the whole of the 1966 World Cup final again and it's amazing to see how much of the game was played at walking pace, or periods with the defenders just passing it to each other and back to the keeper while they all had a breather.

You don't get that now - it's mostly helter-skelter the whole time.

Yes, fair comment, thank you.

However, unless I've missed it, the incidence of hammys in, say, RU, RL, NFL etc, sports where agility, frequent physical contact, quick changes of direction are part of the game, hammys are much less, frequent, no?

However, unless I've missed it, the incidence of hammys in, say, RU, RL, NFL etc, sports where agility, frequent physical contact, quick changes of direction are part of the game, hammys are much less, frequent, no?