why do we seem to waste so many set pieces?

[doddisalegend]

I'm not talking about Rickies free kicks here (they haven't been great but yesterdays ones were getting better) but more our corners and wide free kicks. So often they either go clear over everyone or fail to beat the first man. Lee holmes took the first decent corners I've seen at SMS this season and even he fluffed one. We got a lot of set pieces yesterday and failed to do anything with any of them. Something for Nigel to work on trainning surely?

[oxfordshire_saint]

I've always struggled to fathom why we are so crap at set pieces, it's been that way for years.

 

Anyone remember Oakley always floating his corners in when swinging it in with a bit of pace would be far more dangerous?

 

Nowt much has changed!

[Pilchards]

I said to my son at the game around the 65th minute mark. I will buy you the away Saints shirt if the ball beats the first man.

 

haha I was very safe as the ball hit the first defenders knee area.

 

I still believe the best corner is to lob the ball 70 yards in tha air to land on the 6 yard box.

I love scrambles :-)

[Doctoroncall]

Adkins was very good at scunny in getting the team organised for set pieces so I expect there will be a huge improvement as the season progresses.

[Toadhall Saint]

Adkins was very good at scunny in getting the team organised for set pieces so I expect there will be a huge improvement as the season progresses.

 

You can organise all you like but if we can't get the ball over the first defender then............

[ladysaint]

Took better corners when Holmes came on.

[bpsaint]

Always winds me up when we have left footed players taking corners from the left and right footed players taking them from the right meaning the ball swings outwards. Would much rather reverse this so the ball gets whipped in towards goal and not away from it.

[david in sweden]

I'm not talking about Rickies free kicks here (they haven't been great but yesterdays ones were getting better) but more our corners and wide free kicks. So often they either go clear over everyone or fail to beat the first man. Lee holmes took the first decent corners I've seen at SMS this season and even he fluffed one. We got a lot of set pieces yesterday and failed to do anything with any of them. Something for Nigel to work on training surely?

 

One would hope so, but there are many players who can't even pass 10 yards to a team-mate or even find someone with a throw-in. Only when you see the " Beckham's " of this world do you have a chance to make comparisons. Unfortunately, you are right when you say we lack players to do this task, BUT is it the poor kicking, or the lack of talent to score from these chances?.

 

I recall people heaping criticism on Rory Delap's long throws, but at Stoke he became the terror of the Premiership...so was it his fault, or did we lack the strikers to convert the chances?. Looking back over several decades we were always reliant on one or two players to take set-pieces but very few were really good at it. The stories about the Paine-Davies partnership are legend, and MLT had his own range of specialist kicks. More recently Gareth Bale did well from those free-kicks in his early seasons.

 

Perhaps a good few training sessions will help us find a new talent, but they are very few.