| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town 09:34 - Sep 14 with 2870 views | unstableblue |
1) after viewing MOTD, the highlights, been on the forum - you’d have thought we were lucky to win yesterday and 10 man Palace dominated for long periods. But in reality Town looked strong bar a 10min spell second half, and deserved the win.
2) Town had good control in the game prior to the red, but Towns biggest issue in the first half was ourselves. So many unforced errors, including Scherpens howler. Eradicate these, tweak our judgements somewhat, we’d have dominated periods of that first half.
3) Our defence is stronger and more structured than many posts suggest last week. Greaves was good, as was Diop. OShea was excellent, he is now very much at Premier League Level. The issues for our defence are coming from the central midfield or cheap errors/turnover in the front 4. It’s good we have 6 going forward in such numbers, often with Leif. But the defence get exposed when we allow poor turnover.
4) Yes our central midfield did expose the defence on occasion. But wow, Lukic and Palacios are a massive step up for Town over Morsy/Luongo (Cajuste/phillips/taylor). Lukic is far better than I expected. Palacios is a dream - he covered the most distance of any Town player during the game. And I think there is more to come.
5) Davis - wow, just wow. Like OShea he’s returned to the Premier League and is beyond the level. Our fastest player at Selhurst Park - solid and oh so attacking. MOTM.
6) Clarke has come back a better player. He has the Sunderland goal. Yet I was concerned we’d miss Maeda protection for Leif. But our left was mainly solid and also dangerous. Still, you can criticise Clarke as he had 3-4 chances to create true threat - either with shot or pass. More to come. And we can bring Jaden on!! Who is rusty, but had some brief moments, where the quality oozed, off the bench.
7) Town were dominant and very easy on the eye after the red, and for the start of second half - we have to be more clinical in those periods. This is the period the highlights missed. We played great stuff against the 10 and Enciso movement is a nightmare for the opposition, but do need to put games beyond teams. A bit like getting the second at Old Trafford when in the ascendency.
8) Emersonn is a buy, he really is. That is proper transfer business. They’re still working on his technical skills - and there were moments where his touch would have provided real box danger, but failed. Yet his output in that game was remarkable - FOTMOB had him as MOTM in stats. Also Ouatarra is looking good, what a prospect. So calm and technical on the ball. Excited to see him start Tuesday.
9) Really like GON post match - he clearly could have over gilded the lilly. But pointed out those errors and the need to improve - we were poor in turnover up to their first goal. He’s really grown on me. I think he is genuinely impressed by the Town fans and the travelling blue army - who were superb! Some good (if simple) songs emerging, and Town in Five captures the joy in our away end really well.
10) As stated Greaves was good in South London, not seeing many posts praising him after all the negativity. His positional awareness is better, and he seems quicker. But I wanted to call out Scherpen - it was such a howler to Wharton as stated. But I noted down all his game moments - I do think on the goals he can’t do more, a very lucky nick off Davis heel. I think Larsson shot is too good (what a battle he had with Diop all afternoon). But there was a lot of positives in our giant keepers display, he is growing in confidence. I like his throwing and kicking, Fatawu needs to do better on some. And he makes good saves. Let’s back the lad.
We made Saturday harder than it should have been. But I’m excited about the Hill Dickinson. We can threaten any team at this level.
COYFB. |  |
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| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 09:39 - Sep 14 with 2447 views | N2_Blue |
Clarke was fantastic, shame he couldn't put away that chance as that would have been a goal his performance really deserved. Alos very good to see such a performance starting rather than from off the bench.
Still can't believe how many were happy to offload him before the season started. |  |
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| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:13 - Sep 14 with 2210 views | BseaBlue |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 09:39 - Sep 14 by N2_Blue |
Clarke was fantastic, shame he couldn't put away that chance as that would have been a goal his performance really deserved. Alos very good to see such a performance starting rather than from off the bench.
Still can't believe how many were happy to offload him before the season started. |
He had a great game and the understanding between him and Leif was excellent. I thought we lost a bit of an outlet when he went off but then that is probably a bit harsh on Philogene who was clearly lacking some match fitness. |  | | |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:19 - Sep 14 with 2159 views | Radlett_blue |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 09:39 - Sep 14 by N2_Blue |
Clarke was fantastic, shame he couldn't put away that chance as that would have been a goal his performance really deserved. Alos very good to see such a performance starting rather than from off the bench.
Still can't believe how many were happy to offload him before the season started. |
It was only a half chance & he did hit it hard & low to the corner. sometimes those go in & sometimes you get a rebound. A decent effort. Worth continuing to start Clarke on Saturday's evidence. |  |
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| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:22 - Sep 14 with 2143 views | jayessess |
Think the level we are at is being taken for granted a bit. We have no right to expect to just control the whole game and win easily against 10-man Premier League teams. Hell, during our promotion seasons we often dropped points against Championship teams that were a man light.
The 'real quiz' for staying up is that you are as good as your opponent most weeks, that you are putting yourself in a position to take fine margins and benefit from bits of luck. We're never going to put in flawless performances and canter to big wins in this division. It's going to be positives/negatives every week. |  |
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| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:24 - Sep 14 with 2131 views | baxterbasics |
I think my biggest takeaway - from all the games so far, not just Palace - is we are finally seeing the Leif Davis we thought we would see last time around. Am not sure what the explanation is - was he not coached or used correctly by McKenna? Or did he just need more time and experience to grow into a PL left back? Anyway lovely to see and long may it continue. |  |
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| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:25 - Sep 14 with 2112 views | PositivelyPortman |
You like “his throwing and kicking”??
His throwing is ok, but his kicking is diabolical.
Seriously, how many times did he kick straight into the crowd?
I thought that his kicking was supposed to be a strong part of his game. |  |
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| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:25 - Sep 14 with 2106 views | Bluemike31 |
Agree with all of the OP except for a couple of things, at the moment Scherpen's kicking is awful, hopefully it will improve, and the pass out to Lukic was actually not a bad ball at all, only a yard away from Lukic who made little attempt to get it. |  | | |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:26 - Sep 14 with 2096 views | Radlett_blue |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:13 - Sep 14 by BseaBlue |
He had a great game and the understanding between him and Leif was excellent. I thought we lost a bit of an outlet when he went off but then that is probably a bit harsh on Philogene who was clearly lacking some match fitness. |
I still think Philogene's a bit lightweight for the PL but he did generally retain the ball well against Palace & did one of his trademark cut in & shoots, but it was too central. | |
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| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:31 - Sep 14 with 2061 views | jayessess |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:26 - Sep 14 by Radlett_blue |
I still think Philogene's a bit lightweight for the PL but he did generally retain the ball well against Palace & did one of his trademark cut in & shoots, but it was too central. |
I think his athleticism compensates for him being a bit slight. He retains the ball under pressure better than Fatawu, for instance. My concern is that he just isn't that much of a threat on the dribble against better one-on-one defenders. | |
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| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:36 - Sep 14 with 2025 views | Steve_M |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:24 - Sep 14 by baxterbasics |
I think my biggest takeaway - from all the games so far, not just Palace - is we are finally seeing the Leif Davis we thought we would see last time around. Am not sure what the explanation is - was he not coached or used correctly by McKenna? Or did he just need more time and experience to grow into a PL left back? Anyway lovely to see and long may it continue. |
I think Leif has just learnt from the experience two seasons ago, realised he has to be physically stronger to defend against much stronger attacking players. THere are probably things he's worked on over last season to be better prepared.
Hard to know on the tactical side just yet, as I think GON's changes are still working through the team, certainly a lot of lazy analysis - yes, you MOTD - gave him a lot of blame for being too far forward but that was normally what McK wanted from him. Not many signs of us being too defensive this season so I suspect Leif will get caught at times, or covering for midfielders as on Saturday. |  |
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| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:39 - Sep 14 with 2008 views | _CliveBaker_ |
I think point 1 is a stretch, personally. We started poorly, they were the better side until we equalised. Red card obviously changed things and for 10 minutes either side of h/t we look comfortable and good to watch. I was disappointed in our performance after that tbh, we don't have a right to go away to Palace and have it all our own way but I thought we demonstrated a soft underbelly and shat the bed really considering our numerical advantage. Enciso is class, but tried too much when we really needed to let the ball do our work for us. Philogene looked lost, we didn't seem to have a street wise nous about us to take the momentum out of the game and put a foot on the ball and not let them build up the momentum. We were all over the place at times, sliced clearances, last gasp blocks, relying on some wayward finishing from Palace. On another day we could have seen that scoreline reversed and it would go down as a pretty shambolic 2nd half.
Alas, we didn't and got the win, but the result is dictating the narrative a bit I would suggest.
I don't really fault Scherpen for either goal tbh. 2nd is good centre forward play by a £50m striker and arrowed finish into the bottom corner, not sure the 1st is really on him either. There are clear benefits to being 9ft 8 but one of them probably isn't his ability to get down quickly for those low ones. Supporters might need to accept that, like all keepers, he has his pros and cons. You won't find perfection in a keeper, certainly not for £8m in this market. It just about gets you a George Hirst or Jack Taylor now. Is he better than Walton? Probably. Jury is still out a little bit but I think people need patience and time to grow into the role. |  | | |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:44 - Sep 14 with 1967 views | tractorboy1978 |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:36 - Sep 14 by Steve_M |
I think Leif has just learnt from the experience two seasons ago, realised he has to be physically stronger to defend against much stronger attacking players. THere are probably things he's worked on over last season to be better prepared.
Hard to know on the tactical side just yet, as I think GON's changes are still working through the team, certainly a lot of lazy analysis - yes, you MOTD - gave him a lot of blame for being too far forward but that was normally what McK wanted from him. Not many signs of us being too defensive this season so I suspect Leif will get caught at times, or covering for midfielders as on Saturday. |
A big problem for Davis in 24/25 was that our midfield was honking relative to the level. Phillips was totally shot and we had nobody either capable enough or athletic enough to sniff defensive danger and deal with it on transition. And Davis seemed to bear the brunt of the criticism whilst everyone waxed lyrical about Cajuste oblivious of his shortcomings. | | | |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:44 - Sep 14 with 1964 views | LeightonBuzzardBlue |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:24 - Sep 14 by baxterbasics |
I think my biggest takeaway - from all the games so far, not just Palace - is we are finally seeing the Leif Davis we thought we would see last time around. Am not sure what the explanation is - was he not coached or used correctly by McKenna? Or did he just need more time and experience to grow into a PL left back? Anyway lovely to see and long may it continue. |
In addition to Steve_M's response - I think having Palacios / Lukic / Florentino as the left CM cover is also a reason as to why he looks more comfortable |  | | |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:44 - Sep 14 with 1957 views | unstableblue |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:25 - Sep 14 by PositivelyPortman |
You like “his throwing and kicking”??
His throwing is ok, but his kicking is diabolical.
Seriously, how many times did he kick straight into the crowd?
I thought that his kicking was supposed to be a strong part of his game. |
I see BlueMike has made the same point on Scherpen kicking.
I agree his kicking has for me to date been problematic - it his throwing, which is strong.
However, when I watched the whole game back, his kicking was actually 50-60% good. And the issue was often the control of Fatawu or Emersonn.
Don’t get me wrong he’s not perfect, far from it, but I do think this can be strength. So just hope he can refine and his forwards can control. | |
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| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:51 - Sep 14 with 1906 views | Billywitch |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:25 - Sep 14 by PositivelyPortman |
You like “his throwing and kicking”??
His throwing is ok, but his kicking is diabolical.
Seriously, how many times did he kick straight into the crowd?
I thought that his kicking was supposed to be a strong part of his game. |
When he kicked it out of touch for the second time, and a few moans followed, the man next to me said "he's told to kick it to the wings instead of down the middle"
right.... so do that then, judge the kick better, and do as he's told to do | | | |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:53 - Sep 14 with 1868 views | unstableblue |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:51 - Sep 14 by Billywitch |
When he kicked it out of touch for the second time, and a few moans followed, the man next to me said "he's told to kick it to the wings instead of down the middle"
right.... so do that then, judge the kick better, and do as he's told to do |
On 8mins and 12mins good kicks from Scherpen. | |
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| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 11:00 - Sep 14 with 1801 views | rickw |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:24 - Sep 14 by baxterbasics |
I think my biggest takeaway - from all the games so far, not just Palace - is we are finally seeing the Leif Davis we thought we would see last time around. Am not sure what the explanation is - was he not coached or used correctly by McKenna? Or did he just need more time and experience to grow into a PL left back? Anyway lovely to see and long may it continue. |
I agree with this, perhaps last time it was because we started with 2 really though games and players like Salah made him pay when he went forward, he then seemed to be unsure how to play his role - some of the criticism he got from pundits really didn't help - as he was just trying to do what was asked.
His defending has also improved since last time, I'm sure that's mainly down to experience of playing against better wingers though |  |
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| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 11:01 - Sep 14 with 1801 views | unstableblue |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:39 - Sep 14 by _CliveBaker_ |
I think point 1 is a stretch, personally. We started poorly, they were the better side until we equalised. Red card obviously changed things and for 10 minutes either side of h/t we look comfortable and good to watch. I was disappointed in our performance after that tbh, we don't have a right to go away to Palace and have it all our own way but I thought we demonstrated a soft underbelly and shat the bed really considering our numerical advantage. Enciso is class, but tried too much when we really needed to let the ball do our work for us. Philogene looked lost, we didn't seem to have a street wise nous about us to take the momentum out of the game and put a foot on the ball and not let them build up the momentum. We were all over the place at times, sliced clearances, last gasp blocks, relying on some wayward finishing from Palace. On another day we could have seen that scoreline reversed and it would go down as a pretty shambolic 2nd half.
Alas, we didn't and got the win, but the result is dictating the narrative a bit I would suggest.
I don't really fault Scherpen for either goal tbh. 2nd is good centre forward play by a £50m striker and arrowed finish into the bottom corner, not sure the 1st is really on him either. There are clear benefits to being 9ft 8 but one of them probably isn't his ability to get down quickly for those low ones. Supporters might need to accept that, like all keepers, he has his pros and cons. You won't find perfection in a keeper, certainly not for £8m in this market. It just about gets you a George Hirst or Jack Taylor now. Is he better than Walton? Probably. Jury is still out a little bit but I think people need patience and time to grow into the role. |
The whole observation on point 1 was that only when watching it back last night, if you stripped out our errrors up to their goal and after we were much better in the game.
Nice control and shape.
After the red card we were really good, causing them problems, lovely interplay.
As stated we just let them get their tails up before the equaliser.
But again on a watch again - we were better than I perceived. | |
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| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 11:13 - Sep 14 with 1738 views | _CliveBaker_ |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 11:01 - Sep 14 by unstableblue |
The whole observation on point 1 was that only when watching it back last night, if you stripped out our errrors up to their goal and after we were much better in the game.
Nice control and shape.
After the red card we were really good, causing them problems, lovely interplay.
As stated we just let them get their tails up before the equaliser.
But again on a watch again - we were better than I perceived. |
I think if it ends 2-2 nobody can have too many complaints. It was pretty even on balance by most metrics. We had chances to kill the game at 2-1, they had a massive chance at 2-2. That's every bit an even game IMO, I'm not sure either side really deserved to win it (or lose) but appreciate others will see it differently. Fine margins though innit, if Fatawu or Clarke put 1 of those chances away to make it 1-3 we're probably all sat here saying it was a comfortable away win. | | | |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 11:29 - Sep 14 with 1601 views | gringoblue |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:36 - Sep 14 by Steve_M |
I think Leif has just learnt from the experience two seasons ago, realised he has to be physically stronger to defend against much stronger attacking players. THere are probably things he's worked on over last season to be better prepared.
Hard to know on the tactical side just yet, as I think GON's changes are still working through the team, certainly a lot of lazy analysis - yes, you MOTD - gave him a lot of blame for being too far forward but that was normally what McK wanted from him. Not many signs of us being too defensive this season so I suspect Leif will get caught at times, or covering for midfielders as on Saturday. |
I think offensively Leif was a bit unlucky last time in the Prem. He was still our main chance provider, and only second to Trent for defenders, we just didn't take many of the ones he created.
Interesting that the tactical changes from last season - Leif not taking set pieces, playing inverted at times in the opposition final third - have continued under O'Neil and, early days and all that, it seems to be reaping rewards. |  | | |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 12:16 - Sep 14 with 1382 views | JammyDodgerrr |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:24 - Sep 14 by baxterbasics |
I think my biggest takeaway - from all the games so far, not just Palace - is we are finally seeing the Leif Davis we thought we would see last time around. Am not sure what the explanation is - was he not coached or used correctly by McKenna? Or did he just need more time and experience to grow into a PL left back? Anyway lovely to see and long may it continue. |
Agree with this. He has been excellent so far. |  |
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| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 12:24 - Sep 14 with 1340 views | Steve_M |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 11:29 - Sep 14 by gringoblue |
I think offensively Leif was a bit unlucky last time in the Prem. He was still our main chance provider, and only second to Trent for defenders, we just didn't take many of the ones he created.
Interesting that the tactical changes from last season - Leif not taking set pieces, playing inverted at times in the opposition final third - have continued under O'Neil and, early days and all that, it seems to be reaping rewards. |
That is true on chances created, he put a lot of good crosses in (curiously they seemed to mainly come early in matches) but I think Hirst was the only player to score more than one header that season (and he missed large parts of it injured).
And on your second point, we have multiple options, At our best under McK we did too but happened more towards the end of last season than earlier. | |
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| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 12:30 - Sep 14 with 1298 views | USA |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:36 - Sep 14 by Steve_M |
I think Leif has just learnt from the experience two seasons ago, realised he has to be physically stronger to defend against much stronger attacking players. THere are probably things he's worked on over last season to be better prepared.
Hard to know on the tactical side just yet, as I think GON's changes are still working through the team, certainly a lot of lazy analysis - yes, you MOTD - gave him a lot of blame for being too far forward but that was normally what McK wanted from him. Not many signs of us being too defensive this season so I suspect Leif will get caught at times, or covering for midfielders as on Saturday. |
Leif also has a much stronger team (and individuals) around him than 2 years ago. The extra quality in finding him, assisting with defending (see Leif's comments about Maeda) are all additional factors as well as the fact he has developed himself too. Long may it continue. | |
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| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 12:35 - Sep 14 with 1266 views | Dubtractor |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 11:13 - Sep 14 by _CliveBaker_ |
I think if it ends 2-2 nobody can have too many complaints. It was pretty even on balance by most metrics. We had chances to kill the game at 2-1, they had a massive chance at 2-2. That's every bit an even game IMO, I'm not sure either side really deserved to win it (or lose) but appreciate others will see it differently. Fine margins though innit, if Fatawu or Clarke put 1 of those chances away to make it 1-3 we're probably all sat here saying it was a comfortable away win. |
The key thing for me, is that if we can keep ourselves in it until later in games, and then have options from the bench to make a difference, then we can get the right side of fine margins more often.
That's exactly what happened in our two wins, and we were the team pushing for the win at the end in both games.
No arguing that we were poor for a fair spell in the second half Saturday, and oddly them scoring helped us as it changed our mentality back to trying to win, rather than (badly) managing a 2-1 lead. [Post edited 14 Sep 12:56]
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| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 12:39 - Sep 14 with 1227 views | norfsufblue |
| 10 quick thoughts having watched the Full Match Replay - Palace 3-2 Town on 10:44 - Sep 14 by unstableblue |
I see BlueMike has made the same point on Scherpen kicking.
I agree his kicking has for me to date been problematic - it his throwing, which is strong.
However, when I watched the whole game back, his kicking was actually 50-60% good. And the issue was often the control of Fatawu or Emersonn.
Don’t get me wrong he’s not perfect, far from it, but I do think this can be strength. So just hope he can refine and his forwards can control. |
Maybe the problem with his free play kicking is we are asking him to kick it wide over a short distance ( for him ) and he just gets too much height on it. He can easily kick it miles from a dead ball goal kick so may be the answer is for the wide players to stretch it further up the pitch. He can easily throw it accurately half way so no need to be trying to chip it out there. |  | | |
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