I was shouting before their free kick - PUT SOMEBODY ON THE LINE as I guess were quite a few others. This isn't a specific criticism of Sir Chris - as so few managers do it, but one thing I don't like about football is the arrogance that managers have that they know best all of the time. They generally do of course, but this is one area where they don't and it is about time they listened to people who do - like me and probably most on here I suspect. Why can I say that? - simple statistics- that's why. Under Curbs we played 8 years in the Pemiership and conceeded a goal to one free kick - a sublime joy of an effort from a Thierry Henry at the top of his game - my god- 8 years! You don't have to be Stephen Hawking todo the maths and work out the pattern FFS.
I know Sir Chris was asked about this last season and he said he left that choice to his keeper. I think he needs to pick up the phone and have a chat with Curbs and reconsider this policy. Come on - it isn't rocket science.......thank god!
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surely if you put a man on the line then the opposition are no longer offside, can stand where they want and you'll have a blind sighted goalkeeper.
every level of football from prem to sunday league has a wall and the rest are level with the wall. this leaves it down to the goalkeeper to line-up and stand in the correct position. if he's beaten then its either his fault or a simblime strike.
cant see it changing anytime soon.
im not knocking the idea, its just that football teams/managers all over the world mainly adopt a wall only policy so there must be a reason for that.
if we done it last night and their players were standing near hamer then id imagine 15,000 people would have been screaming for our players to get out!
Last night he didn't save it. If that was down to his wall then thats something he can correct going forwards. If it was down to quality of free kick then there's not much he can do about it.
The reason we lost last night was not down to not having a player on the line. It was down to not scoring when we were clearly on top. That's what we need to adjust.
if we put a man on the line and everyone was inside the box, crowding out hamer, the player took it, it took a couple of deflections and then went in, there would be a hell of a lot more people on here complaining about staying level with the wall and let only a world class free kick beat us.
When you have the bloke there, you get the oppo coming in, the player on the post then moves back out, they do likewise and then they keep going back and forth.
Secondly, we would also have had Deano in goal so again apples and pears.
Thirdly, as others have said, few teams do this today, prefering to leave the keeper to deal with it.
Lastly, all managers have their own ideas which we agree or not with. Curbs for example used to defend with 11 men in the box. Used to drive me mad that he wouldn't leave Dennis for example up top! I don't think it's arrogance though. CP has a idea how he wants to defend set pieces just as Curbs did and he will learn, adapt, and get better accordingly imo.
Elliott would have saved it
When I was a goal keeper I put a man on each post and I didn't concede a free kick in my four years of playing as keeper. I fairness most of them went miles over that bar but still I think its much more sensible to put a man on the line than risk it like yesterday.