lancs blue said:
So just how many clear-cut chances were created for Dzeko and Balotelli on Saturday?? Our big problem away from home is the midfield IMO - at Everton, Swansea, and now Stoke the strikers have been feeding off scraps. We don't get the ball forward quickly enough and the delivery from crosses, corners etc has been piss poor.
Totally agree with you pal, its soooo easy to be really simplistic and say it must be the strikers fault. Its narrow minded bollox.
We are way to narrow, our wing play has been shocking. To be honest we have been fairly narrow all season its just that earlier on Silva was capable of delivering a sublime pass that would unlock the door or Milner would overlap and deliver from the right.
Dzeko doesn't get supplied anything useful at all, which makes him come deep and exposes some of the weaker parts of his game.
We need to address this otherwise we will have further problems, especially away from home.
Sergio works hard but he is affected by the same lack of supply, don't assume he can get us out of this.
Decent wing play is important because even if the ball isn't ultimately delivered from the winger, they still stretch the opponents back line across the field. At the moment they just need to cover the width of the area making it too compact, meaning the only way through is a sublime pass like Tevez's or a deflected long range effort like Yaya's.
The assumption that a lack of goals means poor strikers is wrong.
