16 games in and still no goals from midfield

[Mo Gosfield]

( and before anyone starts, I'm classing Will Buckley as a forward player )
Crofts, Hammond, Orlandi, Lopez, Dicker, Bridcutt, Harley and Uncle Tom Cobley and all....No goals, none, nought, nothing, zero, zilch, f--k all. Yes they get into positions but none of them can hit a bovine rear-end with a musical instrument.
Orlandi. Missed sitter against Leeds. Cost us two more points. No question.
Lopez. Ridiculous miss v Wolves. Dobbie racing in to bury it, sees Lopez take it off his toe, spin, unbalanced and scoop it over the bar from close in. ( He also had a good position early on but screwed his shot hopelessly wide ) Crofts. Set up by Buckley early in the game v Posh. Very good scoring position. Lifts his head and blazes miles over ( schoolboy stuff ) Hammond v Derby. Decides to barge Greer out the way when he is about to knock a rebound into an empty net and heads pathetically wide. ( two more points down the swanee )
Need I go on? Gus has been recruiting midfielders for fun but it remains the weakest area of the team. We cannot go through a season expecting our front men ( with help from the defence ) to carry the goalscoring burden. Midfielders will get into scoring positions. They have to convert.
Sadly, on the evidence thus far I have no confidence in this lot scoring at all! We all know that we need 15-20 goals from the midfield to have a reasonably successful season. Without these goals we will be treading water, in mid-table. No better, no worse.

 

[DBL]

( and before anyone starts, I'm classing Will Buckley as a forward player )
Crofts, Hammond, Orlandi, Lopez, Dicker, Bridcutt, Harley and Uncle Tom Cobley and all....No goals, none, nought, nothing, zero, zilch, f--k all. Yes they get into positions but none of them can hit a bovine rear-end with a musical instrument.
Orlandi. Missed sitter against Leeds. Cost us two more points. No question.
Lopez. Ridiculous miss v Wolves. Dobbie racing in to bury it, sees Lopez take it off his toe, spin, unbalanced and scoop it over the bar from close in. ( He also had a good position early on but screwed his shot hopelessly wide ) Crofts. Set up by Buckley early in the game v Posh. Very good scoring position. Lifts his head and blazes miles over ( schoolboy stuff ) Hammond v Derby. Decides to barge Greer out the way when he is about to knock a rebound into an empty net and heads pathetically wide. ( two more points down the swanee )
Need I go on? Gus has been recruiting midfielders for fun but it remains the weakest area of the team. We cannot go through a season expecting our front men ( with help from the defence ) to carry the goalscoring burden. Midfielders will get into scoring positions. They have to convert.
Sadly, on the evidence thus far I have no confidence in this lot scoring at all! We all know that we need 15-20 goals from the midfield to have a reasonably successful season. Without these goals we will be treading water, in mid-table. No better, no worse.

Well spotted. We have all been spouting about the need for an additional forward, but our midfield has been the WORST in over 30 years in watching the Albion for scoring, but inevitably the BEST for defending!

I think Gus main priority is NOT to go down, realising that we are not good enough with the current squad to compete with the top 6 yet. Hence why he sets up his stall accordingly.

 

[Codner pharmaceuticals]

Depends on where you think Barnes, Buckley and Dobbie are playing.

 

[LamieRobertson]

Well spotted. We have all been spouting about the need for an additional forward, but our midfield has been the WORST in over 30 years in watching the Albion for scoring, but inevitably the BEST for defending!

I think Gus main priority is NOT to go down, realising that we are not good enough with the current squad to compete with the top 6 yet. Hence why he sets up his stall accordingly.

we havent all been spouting on about an additional forward ..u might also say that mid table is reasonably successful for some teams ..although personally i would be hoping for top half

 

[Zebedee]

( and before anyone starts, I'm classing Will Buckley as a forward player )
Crofts, Hammond, Orlandi, Lopez, Dicker, Bridcutt, Harley and Uncle Tom Cobley and all....No goals, none, nought, nothing, zero, zilch, f--k all. Yes they get into positions but none of them can hit a bovine rear-end with a musical instrument.
Orlandi. Missed sitter against Leeds. Cost us two more points. No question.
Lopez. Ridiculous miss v Wolves. Dobbie racing in to bury it, sees Lopez take it off his toe, spin, unbalanced and scoop it over the bar from close in. ( He also had a good position early on but screwed his shot hopelessly wide ) Crofts. Set up by Buckley early in the game v Posh. Very good scoring position. Lifts his head and blazes miles over ( schoolboy stuff ) Hammond v Derby. Decides to barge Greer out the way when he is about to knock a rebound into an empty net and heads pathetically wide. ( two more points down the swanee )
Need I go on? Gus has been recruiting midfielders for fun but it remains the weakest area of the team. We cannot go through a season expecting our front men ( with help from the defence ) to carry the goalscoring burden. Midfielders will get into scoring positions. They have to convert.
Sadly, on the evidence thus far I have no confidence in this lot scoring at all! We all know that we need 15-20 goals from the midfield to have a reasonably successful season. Without these goals we will be treading water, in mid-table. No better, no worse.

Perhaps they should practise shooting as well as passing in training.

 

[Mo Gosfield]

Depends on where you think Barnes, Buckley and Dobbie are playing.

I still class them all as forward players.

 

[Woodchip]

Buckley is a winger not a striker, thus you're speaking shit.

 

[Stat Brother]

This thread should be:-

No goals from Hammond, Crofts & Dicker.

Assuming that is factually correct, it would be equally hard hitting and CORRECT.

 

[Paris]

Would have expected a goal or 2 from the likes of Crofts and Hammond by now. Both proven at this level in that department. Still 30 matches to go

 

[severnside gull]

love it

complain about Barnes not playing as a striker.......... until he scores when he automatically becomes one.


talk about Dobbie playing in the hole as an advanced midfielder..... until he scores when he becomes the main striker.



hail Buckley as a winger....... until he scores when he too becomes a striker.



so what we come down to is our defensive midfield not scoring



oh boy!

 

[perseus]

I had the same view and posted before. And none of the midfielders have a career goal scoring record either except Dobbie scored a few for Blackpool (who had goalscoring midfielders to play with). Buckley thought of as a striker/winger.

Sparrow seems the best at shooting ahead of Crofts, Hammond, Bridcutt, but Orlandi, Lopez, both go as close as Noone did.

 

[LamieRobertson]

I had the same view and posted before. And none of the midfielders have a career goal scoring record either except Dobbie scored a few for Blackpool (who had goalscoring midfielders to play with). Buckley thought of as a striker/winger.

Sparrow seems the best at shooting ahead of Crofts, Hammond, Bridcutt, but Orlandi, Lopez, both go as close as Noone did.

I'd fancy Oralandi to score a few on the basis that his efforts go nearer the goal than the other lot

 

[Silk]

I think it's the way we play. There seems to be a mindset in there that we pass the ball in midfield, we don't run at the opposition, we certainly don't shoot. We try to pass the ball into the net a bit too much. I have visions of Hammond against Leeds making a forward run, and as the space opened up a head of him he.. checked back and passed the ball wide to Bruno. We totally lost momentum, and that happens lots. I wouldn't expect Bridders to score many in view of his role but I think Crofts and Hammond have been instructed to play more defensively and give the ball out wide instead of getting too far forward.

 

[perseus]

No one to score the Goals from Midfield

I'd fancy Oralandi to score a few on the basis that his efforts go nearer the goal than the other lot

That's what I was thinking about Noone before he left.

 

[Silk]

That's what I was thinking about Noone before he left.

And Nooney has scored four for Cardiff already, as many as he scored for us the whole time he was here. It's the way we play, I tell you.

 

[Silk]

The thing is, Buckley and Barnes are both in midfield. We have one up front, two wide players behind and sometimes a guy in the hole (Dobbie, Vicente). Our midfield do score. Have you not witnessed the moaning about Barnes not being up front? Should we play Buckley up front?

I think we play with three "forwards". I'm not sure that the position he plays does Barnes any favours. If we played two "strikers" I'd be happy with Mackail-Smith and Barnes, but I think the way we play we need someone else in the Barnes role. Like Dobbie. Personally I think we could play Mackail-Smith and Barnes up front with Dobbie in the hole, at least for home games.

 

[Jack Daniels]

( and before anyone starts, I'm classing Will Buckley as a forward player )
Crofts, Hammond, Orlandi, Lopez, Dicker, Bridcutt, Harley and Uncle Tom Cobley and all....No goals, none, nought, nothing, zero, zilch, f--k all. Yes they get into positions but none of them can hit a bovine rear-end with a musical instrument.
Orlandi. Missed sitter against Leeds. Cost us two more points. No question.
Lopez. Ridiculous miss v Wolves. Dobbie racing in to bury it, sees Lopez take it off his toe, spin, unbalanced and scoop it over the bar from close in. ( He also had a good position early on but screwed his shot hopelessly wide ) Crofts. Set up by Buckley early in the game v Posh. Very good scoring position. Lifts his head and blazes miles over ( schoolboy stuff ) Hammond v Derby. Decides to barge Greer out the way when he is about to knock a rebound into an empty net and heads pathetically wide. ( two more points down the swanee )
Need I go on? Gus has been recruiting midfielders for fun but it remains the weakest area of the team. We cannot go through a season expecting our front men ( with help from the defence ) to carry the goalscoring burden. Midfielders will get into scoring positions. They have to convert.
Sadly, on the evidence thus far I have no confidence in this lot scoring at all! We all know that we need 15-20 goals from the midfield to have a reasonably successful season. Without these goals we will be treading water, in mid-table. No better, no worse.

Your opinion, nothing else. Buckley and dobbie are both midfielders.

Pointless rubbish waste of time.

 

[Kumquat]

Would have expected a goal or 2 from the likes of Crofts and Hammond by now. Both proven at this level in that department. Still 30 matches to go

Exactly this. There are several reasons why I think. 1) We've missed sitters. That won't go on for ever. 2) Hammond has played deeper sometimes than in the past. 3) Crofts by his own admission has only just come back to full fitness and said he will now be at full fitness. 4) Many teams have come to defend and that usually means getting blocks in and closing down which makes long shots harder to score. Have lost count of how many blocks there were in the home defeats.

It'll come good.

 

[OSRGull]

I think Orlandi will chip in with 5/6 this season, I really do rate him.

 

[Behind Enemy Lines]

Crofts has been disappointing since his return. Haven't seen anything like his best.