Alan Young on Yakubu

[alex]

Not sure this is worthy of a bloody article at all really. How does this help?

 

[Kingy_85]

I opened this expecting Youngy had been sacked for a racial comment !

 

[Si Nick]

I don't think Yak should chase lost causes all afternoon, but I also think Youngy has a point

Yak is physicallty very strong, yet wins little in the air (becomes more apparant when Howard comes on & starts winning similar challanges)

To score goals more often you need to shoot, somehow put one over from 2 yards on Tuesday, but he has had very few shots in recent games other than the hat trick game at Boro

One hat-trick should not disguise the goalless spell

I want to see more from him to convince me he is worth a permenant contract

 

[Mawsley]

And five minutes ago Alan Young was the only person on RL providing honest, balanced, informed comment...

 

[spionfox]

And five minutes ago Alan Young was the only person on RL providing honest, balanced, informed comment...

Literally five minutes ago?

 

[Hazzman]

Oh dear , what a wrong answer and Hazzman is usually one of the more sensible posters.

I believe Alan Young is wrong but Hazzman's criticism is IMO absurd.
Any punditry on football or dozens of other subjects is based on History. If you do not know the History you do not know the subject.

Your opinion is fine, David and you are correct in saying punditry is based on history but it's relevant history.

Football scouts and tacticians use the last game (or games of the current season) as a judge of a team or a player. Not a game played three million games ago. Its a short lived history which is worth taking notice of. For example, the sweeper or libero role was all the rage in the early 90s, now it's forgotten. The current formation in trend is 4-3-2-1 or a variation of that or a variation of 4-3-3, its all very different from it was pretty much 4-4-2 throughout the English leagues. Football changes, there's no way Ian Rush would get the goals he did now...defenders physically and skill-wise have vastly improved since then. So Ian Rush comparison is poor as are most 'back in the day' comparisons.

It's part of punditry which gets me, it's lazy and cliched. I dont actually have any problem with the actual intention of Young's comments which could be summed up better in 'leading from the front'.

As for Yak, it's clear his injury has left him short of a yard.

 

[Billyjof]

I really couldn't care less about his work rate. He was brought in to help fire us to promotion or at the very least help get us to the playoffs. We can blame the Sousa farce all we want, the combined team has had the opportunites since and not taken them.

Excluding Bellamy How many players in the eight teams above us get his wages? At this point in time I'm veering towards an expensive gamble that doesn't look to be paying off.

I will of course eat a hat cabonara if we somehow salvage this season.

 

[Lako42]

It's the defence who need to up the workrate, we score enough goals to win most games.

 

[Mawsley]

Literally five minutes ago?

Not now

 

[Ike O'Noclassed]

And five minutes ago Alan Young was the only person on RL providing honest, balanced, informed comment...

I think he had a particularly dodgy pre-season and it's beginning to catch up with him.

 

[spionfox]

Not now

:icon_lol:

 

[Boy Genius]

Alan Young when he was playing was not the fastest on the pitch by a long way, and you could also have called him a lazy player as I dont remember him chasing many balls, he expected the ball to be delivered to him by DHL!
Also what was Alan Young's goals to game ratio?

 

[Profondo Rosso]

Yak is physicallty very strong, yet wins little in the air (becomes more apparant when Howard comes on & starts winning similar challanges

Can people stop saying that he doesn't win balls in the air? Look again: Yakubu doesn't win little in the air at all, he doesn't go for the ball in the air full stop.

Instead he deliberately tricks the defender into looking like he's going for it, then let's it bounce and tries to turn to get a free run on goal, with the defender left behind.

Although it's not going to work most of the time, I think playing percentages it will lead to a lot more chances than heading the ball aimlessly as if he succeeds it essentially gives him a free run on goal.

It's a clever piece of attacking intelligence and to be criticised for doing it seems bizarre to me.

 

[SwedeFox]

PF is spot on as always.

It's like people critizing Pippo Inzaghi for being offside a lot - well, every time he's onside he's through on goal and will most likely score, even though it's only 1 out of 10 times. The Serie A defenders are so good so you need that extra yard.

 

[Profondo Rosso]

Remember reading an interview with Lineker a couple of years a go where someone asked him how he got into so many goalscoring opportunities and he said the trick was to go where you think the ball will end up, not where it is going and that 19 times out of 20 nothing would come of it, but when something did come from it it would inevitably lead to a one-on-one or a guilt edge goalscoring opportunity.

 

[SwedeFox]

Walking out of a football ground especially in England/Scandinavia you can still hear people going, "he did **** all except for those two goals!" :icon_lol:

 

[Jeff]

a guilt edge goalscoring opportunity.

Come on Prof, you know better than that.

 

[Profondo Rosso]

Walking out of a football ground especially in England/Scandinavia you can still hear people going, "he did **** all except for those two goals!" :icon_lol:

Someone on another forum who had a vendetta against Fryatt said exactly that about him last season in our first league cup match (the opposition escapes me - Macclesfield?). Had to laugh at the time.

Come on Prof, you know better than that.

:icon_redf Sorry, have never seen that phrase written down before, I just assumed (ass out of u and me etc.) that's how it was spelt.

 

[Brown Nose]

I think the combination of Stringer and Young are the best on RL ever.

I don't always agree with either of them but they are streets ahead of the likes of Barber and Piper.

 

[Macky]

I don't always agree with either of them but they are streets ahead of the likes of Barber and Piper.

That wouldn't be difficult though, would it?
Joey Deacon used to do Matt Piper impressions