Defending!

[Lord Nelson]

I know that after a fantastic week, you may be surprised that I want to point out a negative? I watched the game yesterday, and I was again surprised how we just cannot defend! I don't think our defenders are that bad, I just believe their positioning is great. I also believe that we struggle to defend from midfield. Sorry for the negatives!

[Marc Overmars]

I think it was the midfield that caused the problems, Liverpool definitely outworked us in that area.

[Olivier's xmas twist]

I know that after a fantastic week, you may be surprised that I want to point out a negative? I watched the game yesterday, and I was again surprised how we just cannot defend! I don't think our defenders are that bad, I just believe their positioning is great. I also believe that we struggle to defend from midfield. Sorry for the negatives!

TBF we had TV 5 who was not fully fit, Gibbs who is not really match fit, so its expected we'd struggle abit also the midfield as usual did not help.

[Syn]

I know that after a fantastic week, you may be surprised that I want to point out a negative? I watched the game yesterday, and I was again surprised how we just cannot defend! I don't think our defenders are that bad, I just believe their positioning is great. I also believe that we struggle to defend from midfield. Sorry for the negatives!

You can't be too surprised by now, surely. ;)

It's weird. I think with Koscielny, Vermaelen, Mertesacker, Sagna and even Santos and Jenkinson proving to be good players, I think we have a decent defence. I don't just mean decent defenders, I mean that we generally defend quite well. Obviously the game at Anfield didn't prove that to be the case even though we only conceded 1 which is about the going rate at Anfield. I think we have shown signs of some defensive maturity. I mean we can actually clear set-pieces at a respectable rate which never looked possible a couple of seasons back.

YET we concede a lot of goals. And our attack is nowhere near as fluid IMO. We have an average midfield (especially creatively) and are desperately missing Wilshere. Yet we have scored more goals at this stage of the season than we had in 03/04.

:shrug:

I think we're just going to have to accept that we're going to be defensively naive as long as Wenger's in charge. And that, somehow, we're never going to struggle for goals when Wenger's in charge. A better balance would see us improve. But in fairness to Arsene and Arsenal, nobody else has looked too great defensively this season either.

[Lord Nelson]

TBF we had TV 5 who was not fully fit, Gibbs who is not really match fit, so its expected we'd struggle abit also the midfield as usual did not help.

Good points! Totally agree with your comment about the midfield lack of defending. Wiltshire will help us next season. Not sure Arteta or Ramsay are the answer long term! Anyway! What a great weekend for footy! Especially with spuds losing!

[She Wore A Yellow Ribbon]

i actually think gibbs was alright and sagna was a rock as usual.

a couple of times gibbs tracked back well and made some last ditch tackles.

the problem is the midfield.

you can have the best defense in the world but if your midfield dont help out and the opposition keep going at you then you will always make mistakes, especially if the opposition make wave after wave of attack. one of them is bound to lead to a mistake or show you up.

[Kano]

First half Gibbs left too much space yet again behind him and Kos had his worst half for a while.

Much more organised and solid second half.

With everyone fit, the back four should be:

Sagna-Kos-Merts-Santos

[Flavs]

Suarez's movement and constant cheating was causing the issues as Song had done his usual thing and just wandered off so the CB's were having to step out to cover allowing Liverpool even more space.

Clever tactic and if Wenger ever actually looked at what the other team he might have done something to change it

[LDG]

All came from midfield I'm afraid.

Gibbs pushes out to cover off two runners, Verms or Kos come accross, space opens up.

They were playing straight through us. Song was awful on Saturday, and Arteta wasn't much better. In fact, Diaby coming on made things better....until the enevitable happened...(surely we can't keep carrying this guy now...FFS....great player when on form...but jesus).

Of the matches we've played well this season, the prime reason for playing well has been our players putting pressure on the ball when we don't have it.

We don't have to defend like GG's back four if we do our job properly all over the pitch. Other teams deny us time on the ball every match, so why do we not work as hard ourselves. Laziness is what it's about. And Song was on the fuckin weed again this weekend....

[GP]

I guess you could say that....
(•_•)

( •_•)>⌐■-■

(⌐■_■)
There's no case for the defense...

YEAAAHHHH!

[KSE Comedy Club]

The defending was ok, it wasn't brilliant but it was enough to seal the win.

Would've been a totally different result if the defending was as bad as some people think.

[Letters]

I didn't think we defended that badly. Liverpool had what, 12 corners? Never looked like scoring .
They did get through midfield too easily but I thought we dealt with crosses reasonably well.

[LDG]

The defending was ok, it wasn't brilliant but it was enough to seal the win.

Would've been a totally different result if the defending was as bad as some people think.

Of if they'd not hit the post twice, and missed an open goal, socred their pen etc....

[KSE Comedy Club]

I didn't think we defended that badly. Liverpool had what, 12 corners? Never looked like scoring .
They did get through midfield too easily but I thought we dealt with crosses reasonably well.Yeh that was something I noticed too.

They had 13 corners and we dealt with them all. Two seasons ago we would have been shitting ourselves every time the ball went out for a corner.

The defending was ok. Agree, it was the midfield that made us look shit.

[KSE Comedy Club]

Of if they'd not hit the post twice, and missed an open goal, socred their pen etc....True, but they had numerous chances that we stopped from happening too.

Then there was the corners that we dealt with and the crosses from the wings.

[LDG]

True, but they had numerous chances that we stopped from happening too.

Then there was the corners that we dealt with and the crosses from the wings.

Yeah one of those crosses was dealt with brilliantly :lol:

I see what you're getting at from the corners etc, but in all fairness, if it wasn't for Liverpool not taking the chances, we would be talking about losing by two or three.

[Dog Toffee]

We have Van Persie, we dont need a defence.

[AKBapologist]

Liverpool moved the ball from attack to defence exceptionally quickly. Hard to defend that, especially when your fullbacks don't have any time to recover.

[Flavs]

Liverpool moved the ball from attack to defence exceptionally quickly.

Hoof Ball :bow:

[Fist of Lehmann]

They moved the ball from attack to defence? King Kenny's anti-football :bow:

Really I don't think this was our worst defensive performance of the season, but if Liverpool had been more clinical with their finishing and/or their final pass we would be looking at a hefty defeat.

Someone in the midfield has to cover when our fullbacks go forward. Arteta nominally has the left, Song the right. I don't think either of them had great games, and the goal came about because Arteta didn't cover Gibbs run forward.

Song gets typecast as the midfield enforcer because he is the biggest and most African of our midfield. And frankly we have no-one else right now who fits more naturally into that role. Frimpy was loaned and then knacked. And The Coq pulled up lame. Diaby? :haha:

But Song is unused to playing a disciplined defensive role, plus in that position you lose some of the attacking things he does (most successful through balls in the Premiership? Did I hear that stat somewhere?).

The game that sticks in my mind though, is the home game against Dortmund. First half they were killing us. Second half Song plonked himself centrally and sat. After that I think the only pass Song made in the final third was his crazy dribble and far post cross for Rvp. BVB were nullified and we ran out winners.

As a blueprint for the bigger games, against teams that actually come at us, we need to look at that.

[selassie]

I thought we defended OK, first half we got run ragged and I think that was for a couple of reasons.

1. Midfield didn't track their runners and left the Defence with quite a bit of work to do.
2. Wingers didn't help out the fullbacks.
3. CB's were getting pulled all over the place and leaving big gaps in between each other.

We improved 2nd half in all of the above mentioned things.