Now, i wasnt one for jumping on the bandwagon, but...

[Joe King]

He didn't come for either goal against Chelsea.

Watch the first goal again. Reina is in the proverbial 'no mans land'

[dww]

I have been worried for a while that we don't have a really dominant defender in the air when Sami doesn't play and that we have a shorter/less aerially adept team now than we have had at some points in the past. I'm not so sure that the zonal marking system is to blame but I do worry whether our current squad is ideally suited to playing it.

If anything it is a problem that many people's desired return of Agger would exacerbate.

[Craig_H]

Let's sign Hangeland

[Warren]

Let's sign Hangeland

He does look a very decent player

[Craig_H]

Indeed he does, possibly the next generation Sami. I wonder how much he'd cost. Fulham dont seem to get huge amounts for their players.

[dww]

I would imagine it would depend on his contract. Fulham haven't sold many players up the chain really (van der Sar excepted) so it is hard to know how strong they are in negotiating. I'd think he would be fairly cheap comparative with other PL players as Fulham pay relatively small wages and he is likely to want to mak ethe move.

[Craig_H]

Did they get a lot for Saha when they sold him?

It's a weird one because they dont often sell their best players - at least, not to big clubs.

So is the conclusion that even their best players arent that good, that big clubs tend to want them?

VDS and Saha are the only ones i can remember ever going to a big club.

[dww]

Wiki (yeah, I know) says the Saha fee was £12.8m which is a pretty decent. IIRC United were desperate for a non-CL barred forward at the time though.

I think that would be a fair assumption about the quality of their players. Mostly there managers have been about maximising players abilities rather than buying top young talents.

[Craig_H]

£12.8m was a lot at that time, but then strikers are always more expensive.

I'd say we could probably get Hangeland (if he makes a point of wanting to come) for something like £6m.

[einar]

I was always under the impression that the defenders marking a zone should attack the ball much in the same way as the attacking players do. That in turn means the attacking player should never get a free header. Andy Grey said that the problem with the zonal marking system was that the defenders are static. I think that is wrong. The mistakes made in that game where not attacking the ball but standing still and therefore it was very easy for the attacker to jump over the defender.

Ps. Putting that stat up alone is very misleading and an obvious attack on Rafa.

[Craig_H]

I was always under the impression that the defenders marking a zone should attack the ball much in the same way as the attacking players do. That in turn means the attacking player should never get a free header. Andy Grey said that the problem with the zonal marking system was that the defenders are static. I think that is wrong. The mistakes made in that game where not attacking the ball but standing still and therefore it was very easy for the attacker to jump over the defender.

Ps. Putting that stat up alone is very misleading and an obvious attack on Rafa.

Yep, they announced some golf news earlier too, another obvious attack on rafa.

[dww]

I was always under the impression that the defenders marking a zone should attack the ball much in the same way as the attacking players do. That in turn means the attacking player should never get a free header. Andy Grey said that the problem with the zonal marking system was that the defenders are static. I think that is wrong. The mistakes made in that game where not attacking the ball but standing still and therefore it was very easy for the attacker to jump over the defender.

Ps. Putting that stat up alone is very misleading and an obvious attack on Rafa.

I agree that a lot of the criticism seems to come from people who don't know and often seem not to want to learn about what the zonal marking scheme involves.

[einar]

Yep, they announced some golf news earlier too, another obvious attack on rafa.

I did not see what they said on SSN but as I understand it this stat was put up alone as argument against zonal marking. If it was so then I absolutely stand by that statement. I have seen interviews with reporters from all over the UK who have stated it as fact that part of the media is not going to rest until they have gotten Rafa out of a job. Using that stat alone is so obviously not in any way an argument against zonal marking. For a journalist to use it in that way is so stupid and unprofessional that it cant be anything else then an attack on Rafa.

ps. do you agree with me on that the players are supposed to attack the ball in the zonal marking system?

[Vermilion]

thing is....with zonal...what are the instructions for when you have more than one attacker in a defenders zone ???....

I suppose it's more about making sure that whatever happens, if/when THE BALL ends up in your zone...make sure you win it!

[JohnDoe]

Zonal marking is more effective than man marking when both are done flawlessly.

Zonal marking is more fragile when individual errors occur.