My comment wasn't aimed at you especially
@johnwillomagic, just agreeing that the way our whole team is set up, especially first half, is immediately limiting the potential performance of the lone striker. It is intended, by design, to keep it tight until halftime.
It extends to the 2 AMs at the top of the box too. When they receive the ball they have 1 striker, a fellow AM and if they are lucky, one of the WBs or DMs up with them in support. It's 2, maybe 3 players to aim for against a Championship level defence and their defensive midfield(ers).
Here's a visualisation of the set up against Norwich in the first half to demonstrate it:
View attachment 17673
There's a few stand out points:
* The gap between the DMs and AMs is pretty huge - it's easy to see why Norwich had the run of central midfield (617 passed completed for Norwich vs 302 for us) and why the forwards looked toothless 3 vs 6.
* You can also see why our wing backs are vital to attacking and why they impress when they go forwards - they have the whole pitch to run into and it pulls the DMs and full backs wide. Despite the possession difference, we had a mammoth 26 crosses to Norwich's 4 but they were wasted with O'Hare, Allen and a static Bakayoko there.
* With Walker or Godden as 9 you'll get a bit less hold up play but more chance of nicking a goal from a half chance. 2 strikers pulls the 6 and 8 Norwich DMs closer to the CBs and they start to lose their midfield dominance.
* A lot of criticism of Allen but he's there for the same reason as Bakayoko, be annoying, work hard and chase lost causes. It's very hard for our AMs to have a really good 90 minutes. I don't think that makes them bad players, they just don't really have the attributes to thrive in that role under these circumstances.
Shipley needs to be arriving late into the box or making runs beyond the striker but we need possession for that.
Allen isn't big or fast enough to pick the ball up and dribble at or run past players, his best will be playing pass and move football with players around him.
O'Hare has probably looked most effective because he can carry the ball himself and win cheap free kicks. He can't head a cross to save his life though.
For this game, I was happy enough with a point afterwards and would have been delighted with that before the game too but based on the match itself I thought that Norwich team were there for the taking after about 20 minutes. They were weak up front and their fullbacks were getting skinned when our WBs got forwards but we didn't have the right players on the pitch to capitalise with what little we did create, or the ambition to try and win the game early (which I get away from home vs top of the league).
Looking forward to seeing how Robins releases the handbrake against the poorer teams over the next 6 games. Gonna be squeaky bum matches if we approach it the same way and look to nick results in the 2nd half of games.
