Iron Bru › Forums › Blast Furnace › Head of Recruiting › Reply To: Head of Recruiting
First thing the new man might want to look at on the analysis side of the new role is why in 21 competitive games (of which we have won 9) we only ever win if we keep a clean sheet.
It got me wondering if any other teams suffer from this problem. Out of 164 teams in the top 6 tiers of English football there are only 6 other teams that cannot win if the other team score.
Of these 4 are firmly in the relegation zone in their leagues so by default have not actually won many games. They are Cambridge United, Boston, Ebbsfleet and Enfield. They have actually had the same number of victories between them as the Iron have managed.
The other 2 are Preston who are only outside the relegation places by a goal difference of 1 goal and Stevenage who are in 15th place in League 1 – 5 points above the relegation zone. Much like ourselves they have developed a recent habit of conceding goals and losing games. Just reflect on that for a minute – 157 teams have managed to win a game despite conceding a goal but we have never managed it in 11 games against some pretty mediocre opposition.
The omens do not look good if we continue to only have a chance of winning a game if we keep a clean sheet – move to a back 6 or a back 7 anyone? We pretty much tried that at Scarborough and it did not end well. I don’t think their keeper had a save to make.
Leaving aside formations for the moment are there any fundamental issues contributing to this situation?
Could it be the players? Is the team mentality really that weak that conceding a goal ends all hope of winning a game. We certainly went to pieces at Southport, Spennymoor and at home against Rylands when we conceded. A very similar bunch of players won quite a number of games last season after conceding.
Tactics? We have seen 2 main responses from the coaching staff to conceding. Flood the team with substitutes and/or hoof the ball forward very forcefully. Never seen either of these bear fruit as yet. I think we have tentatively switched to a back four a couple of times but probably more often brought off our best attacker of the day (Roberts, Carlton, Whitehall or Beestin at various times) often for an additional defender.
Whatever the reason in the eleven games we have not won (i.e. that we conceded in) we have demonstrated an alarming lack of resilience for a full time professional team supposedly the fittest and highest paid in the League.
Probably a bigger issue than 5 at the back for our current poor league position (relative to the fans, managers and boards expectations) – although I am sure some would say that might be a contributory factor.
Whilst we wait for the new man to start feeding his analysis to the coaching team any suggestions to be directed to them care of the Attis Arena.
