Striker for 4-5-1/4-3-3

[Southbank Old Boy]

I can't remember us having a striker who could also score 2 or 3 direct from free kicks, (or reliably from the penalty spot for that matter) so NHunt might just pick up a few more than from "normal" striking.

(Forster I suppose wasn't bad from dead ball - anyone else? Not Caskey, he wasn't a striker.)

Seem to remember Butler scoring a few from free kicks, but only when he could get the ball off of Caskey

By far and away the best was Jimmy Quinn though. He could rocket in a thunderbolt of free kick from 20/25 yards and it was almost as good as a penalty for a time

[Royal Rother]

Yes, indeed!!! How could I forget?

[Vision]

Look at what percentage we're strikers' goals though - take away Long, N Hunt, Doyle, Kitson and Lita's solitary goal against Watford themselves and the goals aren't really coming from elsewhere. At Watford you had all 3 of their main strikers scoring level or above our top scorer in Long even with Smith playing deeper a lot of the time. It's also worth pointing out that their wide players McAnuff and Cowie (who only signed in the January window over a month into these games) both managed thrice as many each as ours and were playing in what most would say is a weaker team.

A touch facetious because i actually agree with the point you're making but percentage wise the higher % of goals were scored by Watford's strikers than Reading's.

Without getting into stats, remember that last season Shane only started 13 games (7 goals) and played the equivalent of 18 games in total time (9 goals)

That shows quite clearly he can score goals when starting (best ratio in the club by a very long way)

There is no LOGICAL reason why he shouldn't score 20 goals if he plays 40+ games

This is where the whole thing falls flat for me because you simply cannot take a specific figure over a short period and extrapolate it over a longer period and consider it logical. Not when it comes to football and all the variables out side of the one basic stat you're using.

Using your reasoning Doyle had scored 16 goals before Christmas therefore there was no logical reason why he wouldn't score 16 after Christmas.

I'm not having a pop because at times some of the stats you provide are quite illuminating but football is not a mathmatical equation where you can simply multiply a figure from a short period over a longer period. There are too many variables. In Long's case, the first glaring one for me is whether he can even stand up to the rigours of 40 games at 2 a week over a season. Thats before we get to other questions such as .. will he be playing with the same strike partners he had during this 13 game period? Who supplied the assists and will they be playing next season?. Will we create as many chances? etc etc etc.

[Hoop Blah]

A touch facetious because i actually agree with the point you're making but percentage wise the higher % of goals were scored by Watford's strikers than Reading's.

I haven't looked at how the numbers break down, but where did you include Smith's goals for Watford? Was it as a forward or a midfielder?

Rodgers himself has referred to him as being a midfielder last season, although I think he played upfront as well....a hard one to judge probably.

[Vision]

A touch facetious because i actually agree with the point you're making but percentage wise the higher % of goals were scored by Watford's strikers than Reading's.

I haven't looked at how the numbers break down, but where did you include Smith's goals for Watford? Was it as a forward or a midfielder?

Rodgers himself has referred to him as being a midfielder last season, although I think he played upfront as well....a hard one to judge probably.

Royalee refers to him as a striker so I've taken him as such. he's certainly nearer to that than a conventional midfielder in my view. Given the areas of the field he was operating in for a lot of his spell even Kitson's position as a striker could be open to interpretation. Which is also another reason why cold hard stats can only tell part of the story.

[Hoop Blah]

A touch facetious because i actually agree with the point you're making but percentage wise the higher % of goals were scored by Watford's strikers than Reading's.

I haven't looked at how the numbers break down, but where did you include Smith's goals for Watford? Was it as a forward or a midfielder?

Rodgers himself has referred to him as being a midfielder last season, although I think he played upfront as well....a hard one to judge probably.

Royalee refers to him as a striker so I've taken him as such. he's certainly nearer to that than a conventional midfielder in my view. Given the areas of the field he was operating in for a lot of his spell even Kitson's position as a striker could be open to interpretation. Which is also another reason why cold hard stats can only tell part of the story.

Totally agree.

From my perspective I don't think it really matters where the goals come from, but if we're playing a variation of 4-3-3/4-5-1 etc then we'll need to see goals coming from more than just the poor sod alone upfront. If you look at the teams that play those systems effectively, irrespective of the finer details of the formation, they have midfielders/wingers chipping in with plenty of goals (Lampard, Gerrard, Patterson, Campbell-Ryce, Gomez and Bodde etc etc).

We'll need the same whether it's from the wide positions or centrally as there isn't a centre forward who could provide enough goals to carry the rest of the team.

[Negative_Jeff]

I know little about Smith but every time I look someone has him down as playing a different position.
He must be as versatile as an egg.

By the by, the last time we played a successful period with a lone striker (Forster) was in 2002/03.
At what point in the season did Pardew move to that system, was the change forced on him and how were the goals distributed around the team?

[Hoop Blah]

I know little about Smith but every time I look someone has him down as playing a different position.
He must be as versatile as an egg.

By the by, the last time we played a successful period with a lone striker (Forster) was in 2002/03.
At what point in the season did Pardew move to that system, was the change forced on him and how were the goals distributed around the team?

Not sure exactly when it was, but Pardew adopted the system because he realised that our central midfield wasn't good enough with just two in there.

On Hughes he had a player who had the energy, stamina and timing to support both the midfield two and the lone forward effectively. It was a perfect combination and Hughes, for all his lack of technique was excellent in what would now be called the 'Gerrard Role.'

From memory Hughes and Forster still scored the majority of the goals though, but as a team we didn't actually score that many. I think the likes of Cureton and Butler got a few coming off the bench but neither winger (Salako or Igoe/Little/Murty??) scored many.

[Royalee]

A touch facetious because i actually agree with the point you're making but percentage wise the higher % of goals were scored by Watford's strikers than Reading's.

I haven't looked at how the numbers break down, but where did you include Smith's goals for Watford? Was it as a forward or a midfielder?

Rodgers himself has referred to him as being a midfielder last season, although I think he played upfront as well....a hard one to judge probably.

Royalee refers to him as a striker so I've taken him as such. he's certainly nearer to that than a conventional midfielder in my view. Given the areas of the field he was operating in for a lot of his spell even Kitson's position as a striker could be open to interpretation. Which is also another reason why cold hard stats can only tell part of the story.

I don't refer to him as an out and out forward - he regularly played on the right under Rodgers last season, although obviously he's played there. My point is that there'll be 4 or 5 goal threats in the team with players running through rather than the 2 at a time we seemed to have last year.

[Vision]

Don't want to get drawn into a pointless argument because as i say i agree with your general point but you did describe him as "one of their 3 main strikers".

[Royalee]

Well he is, but he's not always playing as one. Either way it shall be interesting.

[papereyes]

I know little about Smith but every time I look someone has him down as playing a different position.
He must be as versatile as an egg.

By the by, the last time we played a successful period with a lone striker (Forster) was in 2002/03.
At what point in the season did Pardew move to that system, was the change forced on him and how were the goals distributed around the team?

Not sure exactly when it was, but Pardew adopted the system because he realised that our central midfield wasn't good enough with just two in there.

On Hughes he had a player who had the energy, stamina and timing to support both the midfield two and the lone forward effectively. It was a perfect combination and Hughes, for all his lack of technique was excellent in what would now be called the 'Gerrard Role.'

From memory Hughes and Forster still scored the majority of the goals though, but as a team we didn't actually score that many. I think the likes of Cureton and Butler got a few coming off the bench but neither winger (Salako or Igoe/Little/Murty??) scored many.

Butler barely scored, Cureton got quite a few but he wasn't used as much as in previous seasons.

The stuff about midfield is pretty much spot on. Sidwell and Harper looked weak without a third body in there.

[Hoop Blah]

I think that was the beginning of the end for Butler wasn't it?

Having just looked at the stats from that year he hardly really played (12 starts and 9 sub appearances, 2 goals). Cureton didn't get much more of a look in (13 + 14) but did manage to get 9 goals.

Forster got 16 and Hughes 9. Henderson was next best (tied with Salako) and he got 4 in 1 start plus 21 as sub.

We really didn't score many goals considering we made the play offs.

The other thing that jumps out is our lack of a right winger. It must be a Reading thing! We had Igoe, Little, Chadwick, I presume Hughes played out there a bit too. I really don't remember it being a massive problem position at the time though.

[Snowball]

I know little about Smith but every time I look someone has him down as playing a different position.
He must be as versatile as an egg.

Not all he's cracked up to be...

[Snowball]

Without getting into stats, remember that last season Shane only started 13 games (7 goals) and played the equivalent of 18 games in total time (9 goals)
That shows quite clearly he can score goals when starting (best ratio in the club by a very long way)
There is no LOGICAL reason why he shouldn't score 20 goals if he plays 40+ games

This is where the whole thing falls flat for me because you simply cannot take a specific figure over a short period and extrapolate it over a longer period and consider it logical. Not when it comes to football and all the variables out side of the one basic stat you're using. Using your reasoning Doyle had scored 16 goals before Christmas therefore there was no logical reason why he wouldn't score 16 after Christmas.

I'm not having a pop because at times some of the stats you provide are quite illuminating but football is not a mathmatical equation where you can simply multiply a figure from a short period over a longer period. There are too many variables. In Long's case, the first glaring one for me is whether he can even stand up to the rigours of 40 games at 2 a week over a season. Thats before we get to other questions such as .. will he be playing with the same strike partners he had during this 13 game period? Who supplied the assists and will they be playing next season?. Will we create as many chances? etc etc etc.

Viz, I do not say Long WOULD score these goals and I have made that clear more than once.

But I do say there is no LOGICAL REASON why he couldn't. "Theoretically" he could get 23 (based on his hit-rate), if he got TWELVE (c half his theoretical rate) that would be not-to-bad, and 15 in a full season looks, IMO, highly likely.

Here is my bet. Any takers? if Long is a starting regular he'll closely match Noel or any other striker and get 15+ in a full season (as a regular)

I am fully aware of "other variables" and anything CAN go pear-shaped. Doyle was burned out by over-use IMO (when did he get the hernia BTW?)
and I believe more judicious use of his talents, occasionally resting him and developing Long/Mooney and maybe Church or Henry might have
seen him "only getting 14-15 goals in the first half, BUT ANOTHER TEN IN THE SECOND HALF

[Ian Royal]

I know little about Smith but every time I look someone has him down as playing a different position.
He must be as versatile as an egg.

By the by, the last time we played a successful period with a lone striker (Forster) was in 2002/03.
At what point in the season did Pardew move to that system, was the change forced on him and how were the goals distributed around the team?

Not sure exactly when it was, but Pardew adopted the system because he realised that our central midfield wasn't good enough with just two in there.

On Hughes he had a player who had the energy, stamina and timing to support both the midfield two and the lone forward effectively. It was a perfect combination and Hughes, for all his lack of technique was excellent in what would now be called the 'Gerrard Role.'

From memory Hughes and Forster still scored the majority of the goals though, but as a team we didn't actually score that many. I think the likes of Cureton and Butler got a few coming off the bench but neither winger (Salako or Igoe/Little/Murty??) scored many.

Curo got about 6 goals in the first 6 games and then didn't score for a fair few, so unless he was playing up on his todd as well I'd guess after about 12-15 games. Curo was dropped to the bench after that prolific start and then was slowly frozen out by Alan "man-management" Pardew.

EDIT: Curo got 6 in the first 5 actually. Having not scored in our opening game.

[SteveRoyal]

I know little about Smith but every time I look someone has him down as playing a different position.
He must be as versatile as an egg.

Not all he's cracked up to be...

I prefer you're stats to your jokes.