Crosses

[Harv]

Do we actually practice the ****ing things? Its a pretty crucial aspect of the game.....but we seem to have this incredible ability to put in **** cross after **** cross. Its utterly laughable how awful we are.

Every single player that once had good delivery seems to turn to utter dog **** in our side. Adam was incredible for Blackpool. Downing put in quality balls at Villa, Enrique at Toon...now they just put in these pathetic floaters all the time.

What the **** is going on at training. Whip, bend and pace on crosses are what defenders have trouble with. Hitting a floater to the near post for Carroll to try beat two CB's is going to get us nowhere.

Im ****ing sick of our ineptness at the simple things like this, its been happening for years too.

Im not surprised Carroll looks so **** to be honest. He's a player that requires service and he's getting absolutely nothing but floating balls that defenders will mop up all day long.

[danperkins]

I think it's a combination of poor delivery and ****e finishing, and us not having someone likes of a Vidic/Hangeland/Vermalen/Terry/Richards/Kompany etc who excels in the air, Hyypia was incredible for that. Carroll's heading,desire to get infront of defenders and his ability to jump seems to have deserted him.

To be fair to Adam he has 7 assists, and Enrique has 2 assists and is up and down like a yo-yo, so i'd be cutting them some slack IMO.

Downing & Henderson were bought for their ability to put good balls in the box, as they had done for previous clubs, that's non-existent thus far. The corner situation is so annoying though, hitting the first man!!! Gerrard
who is one of the finest strikers of a ball in the world is a fiend for woeful corners, and Adam's wonder corners ... well yet to see them.

[Chris]

Dont think its that big a problem really, I think a lot of people just see Downing or whoever getting a crossed assist for a club then assume every single cross is brilliant when they come here.

We missed two sitters in stoppage time yesterday off amazing crosses.

[bobbyfallon]

thing is we seem to try to pass the ball through the defence like barca do. problem is we dont have those players.

if carroll has to start then the ball needs to come in early with some pace on it, carroll could do with being there the odd time too

[danperkins]

Carroll doesn't do himself any favours by dropping so deep, i can't imagine Kenny tells him to do that. He was unlucky yesterday with his efforts, but should have put one of them away. The fact that he is in the area to get these chances is a positive i suppose, he needs to stay there as Suarez drifts all over the place.

[kopash]

Players keep cutting in as well before crossing giving defence time to get set to win the header rather than back peddling if it was hit from the bar line on the run. Johnson did it time and again yesterday.

Enrique's crossing is woeful. He needs to improve that big time. Defensively he's brilliant but the finnanesque floated crosses are a waste of time and in many ways the cowards way to cross.

[Harv]

Finnan was the master of the floater So utterly predictable and incredibly hard to score from even if you manage.

It infuriates me watching these top level players do the same thing over and over again. Do they seriously think the way to score or cause problems in the box is to put a floater in there? Ok maybe if you have someone at the far post that can come in over the top (still a tough header to get power on) Just whip the ****er in there with some bend and pace and really put the defenders under pressure FFS. Its not that hard, its pretty bloody simple actually. Look at Beckham....why are his crosses so deadly, even now. Pace and curl. He rarely puts the high angled floaters our inept twits do.

[peekay]

Finnan was the master of the floater So utterly predictable and incredibly hard to score from even if you manage.

It infuriates me watching these top level players do the same thing over and over again. Do they seriously think the way to score or cause problems in the box is to put a floater in there? Ok maybe if you have someone at the far post that can come in over the top (still a tough header to get power on) Just whip the ****er in there with some bend and pace and really put the defenders under pressure FFS. Its not that hard, its pretty bloody simple actually. Look at Beckham....why are his crosses so deadly, even now. Pace and curl. He rarely puts the high angled floaters our inept twits do.

Wrong.. Jermaine Pennant was the master, the king, the ultimate Shahinshah of floaters..

[Bari]

Wrong.. Jermaine Pennant was the master, the king, the ultimate Shahinshah of floaters..

So, What are you saying Downing is the Toofan of Crossers

[Exiled_red]

Does anyone know what are the statistics for the fraction of successful crosses (i.e. the number of crosses that are met by a player from the same team). I have no idea but I would guess that it's probably something around the 20-30% mark on average for all teams. Meaning that on average for every cross that is successful there are probably 3 or 4 that aren't. I wonder how much this affects peoples opinion on how the quality of their teams crosses compares to that of other sides, as every football fan will see more unsuccessful crosses that successful ones, which much make it easy for everyone to conclude that their crossing is poor.

[Harv]

Im sure our success rate is on par with most other teams.....we still get our head to the ball with these floaters.

They just don't get attacked like a whipped in ball with pace on it. The floater isn't dangerous in the slightest.

[McDermotX]

[saveferris]

With Downing on the right and Bellamy/Suarez/Maxi on the left we cut in too much. The full backs rarely overlap either

[el matador]

weve hit the woodwork sixteen or seventeen times so I dont know whether thats just bad luck or poor finishing. with the sheer amount of hits I would be more inclined towards a lack of composure when finishing than it being unlucky.

for all defoes faults the lad is a good finisher. darren bent seems like another andy cole, and there just arent the players out there. weve got good young forwards coming through and morgan is certainly a very good finisher but its just too soon for him yet.

its wierd because you would have thought that johnson enrique and downing there would be plenty of.quality.from the wide areas but if you get to a point where you dont think the strikers are good enough and wont make the best of your crosses you just stop putting balls into the box.

[The_weatherman]

Watching the highlights from the Blackburn game, one thing that struck me was that there were no through balls or intricate passing or such, very rarely do we get a one v. the keeper. Most of our chances came from crosses, resultingin lots of half chances. Maybe this will change with Gerrard though.