Does he have a point or is talkin rollicks?

[frank the tank]

Absolutely. What a load of nonsense that article is. So we conceeded 10 more goals last season from set pieces than the previous year.... when we were also using zonal marking, but had a completely settled back 4. And they went on about zonal marking that season too despite us shipping less goals from set pieces than any other team in the league. Its bloody pathetic, just because it isn't a system traditionally employed in this country doesn't mean its wrong, or that when we concede it isn't down to individual errors rather than the system itself.

I think the only way the media in this country will accept that zonal is at least as valid, if not actually a superior defensive system to man-marking, would be if we went all season without even 1 goal being scored against us.

not just the media in england though bud - dunphy and giles on rte always try to jump on the bandwagon as well.... i seem to remember one particular incident when giles basically said that man-marking is better because when a goal is conceded, then at least you know who to blame because each defender has a man - this is coming from possibly the worst ireland manager in history - and i include stan the man in that..... what a ****in retard...... is it not better to have a system that actually works as opposed to being able to play the blame-game......

getting back to lawrenson though, i actually think that he is one of the worst pundits - he really is... also, do you ever notice that the likes of lawro seem to think that their opinion counts more because they played in legendary teams - what a load of ****e to be honest because often a great player makes an utter ****in **** manager or coach and therefore, not the most tactically realiable source of information - take digger for instance - ****in brilliant player, possibly the most naturally gifted player ever for lfc but what a cack manager he turned out to be - perhaps he was only good because his manager at the time, the king, simplified every-****in-thing for him and therefore all he had to do was basically do what he was told.... my point is, a lot of these former players talk utter ****e but still get the gig simply because they were good players in their day....

also, does anyone remember when keegan brought lawro to newcastle as his defensive coach back in the 90's..... i think they conceeded either 5 or 7 the next week and he was bombed out of st. james...... funny how he seems to be the perfect person to tell rafael benitez, the ****in best manager in the world bar none, with a ****in brilliant denfensive record, how to do his job....

**** off lawro you stupid prick..... is the bbc's money that important to you that you are willing to make an utter ****in asshole of urself for it....... ******

[Skillz]

Rafa admitted there was a problem which to me suggests he was already thinking of the cure. I back Rafa to sort it quicker than Lawro could (x10) and I bet we still use a zonal defense next year.

[frank the tank]

Rafa admitted there was a problem which to me suggests he was already thinking of the cure. I back Rafa to sort it quicker than Lawro could (x10) and I bet we still use a zonal defense next year.

i think that rafa did say that it would be analysed over the summer but let's be honest, agger was a ****in huge loss for the season.... i think we did okay considering that we were without possibly our best defender.... when you take alonso also being out for long periods, then our ball retention and defensive stability were always going to suffer.....

it is actually a credit to rafa that things didnt suffer more.... take vidic, terry, toure out of their respective teams for a whole season and see how those teams cope.....

[MindGuerrillas]

I don't know the stats but perhaps another reason for conceding more set piece goals is that, with Sami playing most of the games, we were defending deeper than we normally would. Sami is a fantastic defender and had a wonderful season but we definitely defend considerably deeper when he plays as apposed to Agger.

This deeper defensive line may mean that we are giving away more free-kicks closer to the box than before. We may not be giving away any more fouls now than in previous seasons but maybe they are, on average, closer to goal and therefore much more dangerous. A free kick on the touchline 20-25 yards out is much harder for us to defend than one 35-40 yards out.

Like I said, I don't have any stats to back this up but it may play a part in extra set-piece problems we've had this season.

[BFG]

I don't know the stats but perhaps another reason for conceding more set piece goals is that, with Sami playing most of the games, we were defending deeper than we normally would. Sami is a fantastic defender and had a wonderful season but we definitely defend considerably deeper when he plays as apposed to Agger.

This deeper defensive line may mean that we are giving away more free-kicks closer to the box than before. We may not be giving away any more fouls now than in previous seasons but maybe they are, on average, closer to goal and therefore much more dangerous. A free kick on the touchline 20-25 yards out is much hard for us to defend than one 35-40 yards out.

Like I said, I don't have any stats to back this up but it may play a part in extra set-piece problems we've had this season.

Seems quite plausible mate, would be interesting to see some stats.

[Skillz]

i think that rafa did say that it would be analysed over the summer but let's be honest, agger was a ****in huge loss for the season.... i think we did okay considering that we were without possibly our best defender.... when you take alonso also being out for long periods, then our ball retention and defensive stability were always going to suffer.....

it is actually a credit to rafa that things didnt suffer more.... take vidic, terry, toure out of their respective teams for a whole season and see how those teams cope.....

Agger was a huge loss. Alonso was a loss. Poor form from Riise, Finnan, Carra etc was destabilising. We recovered well so we have hope.

If you do not agree you have not seen as many Torres youtube compilations as me. DO IT. DONT THINK! DO

[Exiled_red]

The problem could be that we made so many changes to our defence this year so people were never settled in theire roles, in previous the season we had stuck with the same back four 90% of the time.

Another reason we concede from set pieces could be due to the fact we don't have anyone who can put quality corners into the box in training (our attacking set pieces show this) if we're only used to defending poor quality balls into the box then we are more likely to concede against teams who have this quailty

[Norbs]

We're so difficult to break down that teams see set pieces as the most viable route to score against us. Ergo they concentrate their tactics and game plan on scoring from set pieces. I wonder what the stat is for the other 3 in the top 4

[RedReet]

Absolutely. What a load of nonsense that article is. So we conceeded 10 more goals last season from set pieces than the previous year.... when we were also using zonal marking, but had a completely settled back 4.

Again statistics can be misleading. This ten goal deficit doesn’t take into account just how good our record actually was last year. A more interesting statistic would be how it compares to United or Arsenals record last year or more importantly how it compares since Rafa has taken over and deployed zonal marking.

Can’t stand Lawrenson, nothing worse than tuning in to MOTD to see him sitting alongside Alan Shearer or Lee Dixon, without Hansen to inject a bit of sense.

[El Jefecito]

When Sami scored that goal against Arsenal nothing was said about the fact that he had managed to escape his man marker and had a free header to score a goal.

Zonal marking is only brought up when we concede but we have one of the best defensive records in the league again last season.

I thought Skrtel did more then alright when he came in and was it a coincidence that we started playing better and went on a great run when he was in the team which for a starters allowed us to defend further up the pitch then when Sami and Carragher are the central partnership.

Personally i just think Lawro is just jumping on the bandwagon as per usual.

Rafa said he was going to be working on defending set pieces and towards the end of the season we were much much better. Given the past record, it would appear the problem wasn't zonal but just understanding between a new back 4 and general sharpness. That don't make good headlines though.

If you take out a couple of flaps by Reina and a couple more by Snipes, I think you'll find that zonal marking is just fine.

I'm pretty sure I remember Hansen saying that in his day they played zonal @ set pieces. Does anyone else remember that?

[dww]

I really think it was a genuine weakness this year. It wasn't just the goals we conceded but the fact that corners and free kicks caused us to look panicked a lot, if anything we were lucky we did not concede more.

I don't think that it is a problem with Zonal marking per se but I do think the lack of form of our fullbacks (and in Aurelio's case lack of aerial ability and/or awareness) and the fact that we have removed Crouch and Sissoko who were good jumpers from playing regularly means we need to think about who we put in which zone.

By all accounts Degen is a decent height so that might help as might Dossena coming in at leftback. Other than that defensive heading is one of the many things we have to hope Babel improves on unless Barry comes and is surprisingly good at it (no idea myself he seems good enough in attack and was a CB so there is hope).

[Big-Red-Ed]

Maybe last years easy goals conceded had more to do with the constant chopping and changing of our defence due to injuries.
I doubt whether Rafa will change now, he clearly believes in the zonal method.
Every week I see daft goals conceded by teams who man mark and they never get the kind of abuse we get. When zonal doesn't work it is usually down to an individual players error rather than the zonal system.

[El Jefecito]

Maybe last years easy goals conceded had more to do with the constant chopping and changing of our defence due to injuries.
I doubt whether Rafa will change now, he clearly believes in the zonal method.
Every week I see daft goals conceded by teams who man mark and they never get the kind of abuse we get. When zonal doesn't work it is usually down to an individual players error rather than the zonal system.