Lets talk about set piece defending

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jono_t2000

jono_t2000

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Specifically corners.

It would be foolish not to discuss our woeful defending of corners as we come up to one of the current best teams at scoring from set pieces.

I have never seen a team defend corners as bad as we have this season, alot of the time we are not even looking at the ball and more concerned about holding onto the opposition. (see Trusty on Sunday when the ball ricocheted off his back, without him knowing where the ball was and luckily fell into Grbic arms.)

Correct me if I'm wrong but we do not have a specialist set piece coach? Is it time we hired one?

Even with our lack of focusing on the ball, as Paul on Blades Ramble mentioned, by simply having a defender on the back stick we would have prevented a decent chuck of set piece goals conceded this season.

The worrying thing is, its the same type of set piece goals conceded week in, week out, without any changes to how we set up to defend them.

As Einstein once said, "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results."
 

We've been shocking all season. This is a none negotiable that any team expected to struggle at any level simply has to get right to even things up a little bit. Set pieces and fitness. I do think our attacking set pieces have improved somewhat. I was impressed by Arblaster's free kicks the other day.
 
We are indeed awful at defending set plays.

My issue is we just don’t have loads of players who are really good at heading and other teams have way more.

Mcburnie is excellent in the air.
Anel is decent but a slight frame.
Trusty is fairly decent
Robbo is good for his size but won’t ever beat someone good who’s a couple of inches taller.

When the ball comes into our box you are looking at one of these 4 to head it. This isn’t good enough in the Premier League which is why we will continue to concede.

In the summer you bring in a Worrall / Souttar and all of a sudden our defensive corners are no more. It’s an easy fix.
 
It's a surprise because we were genuinely outstanding at defending set pieces last season

We've missed Egan but otherwise wise there's no reason we should have got worse. Did Mark Hudson help fuck things up?

It probably just highlights the vast difference in quality and physicality in the PL
 
jono_t2000 said:
Even with our lack of focusing on the ball, as Paul on Blades Ramble mentioned, by simply having a defender on the back stick we would have prevented a decent chuck of set piece goals conceded this season.
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By "simply having a defender on the back stick" you remove a defender that could otherwise be attacking the ball or covering a man/zone, making it easier for the team taking the set piece to create a chance. If you cut out the chance in the first place, you don't need a man on the post - which is why teams don't do it.
 
jt64 said:
By "simply having a defender on the back stick" you remove a defender that could otherwise be attacking the ball or covering a man/zone, making it easier for the team taking the set piece to create a chance. If you cut out the chance in the first place, you don't need a man on the post - which is why teams don't do it.
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Oh I agree it's not as straightforward as that. I'm just pointing out that our defensive set piece structure is a mess and doesn't look like anything has been done to look into it.
 
We have really struggled with this and it's one of the areas where as a promoted team you want to get the margins on your stronger opponents. However terrible we have been this season, if we had managed to tighten this area, we could somehow still be in a survival battle. I also think the strength and combativeness of Premier League teams in the air has really gone up a notch in the last couple of years. This was one of our strengths in the Championship, both in the air and at set pieces, but we have been blown away this season. I was listening to a tactics podcast at the start of the season and they were saying, as opposed to a few years ago, when pace and ability on the ball were considered the extra qualities and Prem defender would, now even the top teams are looking at aerial ability first and foremost.
 
Hamandcheese said:
It's a surprise because we were genuinely outstanding at defending set pieces last season

We've missed Egan but otherwise wise there's no reason we should have got worse. Did Mark Hudson help fuck things up?

It probably just highlights the vast difference in quality and physicality in the PL
Click to expand...

Not sure we were that great at defending them last season but I stand to be corrected.
 
We're having to defend them more often than the others:

1712829200105.png

Can't find a conceding from corners stat.

We seem to be making more headed clearances than any other team:

1712829417361.png

The amount of defending we have to do surely plays a part. PL set piece coaches have a lot of material to look at, trying to find weaknesses in our marking.

We've selected teams where we've lacked height and strength, certainly at this level. Picking a very small midfield vs Chelsea may have been one of the reasons Trusty was picked at left wing back, so it's surely something Wilder is aware of.
 
Bergen Blade said:
We're having to defend them more often than the others:

View attachment 181915

Can't find a conceding from corners stat.

We seem to be making more headed clearances than any other team:

View attachment 181916

The amount of defending we have to do surely plays a part. PL set piece coaches have a lot of material to look at, trying to find weaknesses in our marking.

We've selected teams where we've lacked height and strength, certainly at this level. Picking a very small midfield vs Chelsea may have been one of the reasons Trusty was picked at left wing back, so it's surely something Wilder is aware of.
Click to expand...
Very good stats. I thought it was more down to us being a team of dwarfs at times. But this shows another side to things.
 
It's very simple. Every player to check that they are marking someone. If you're not marking someone then work out who isn't marked and bloody mark them. When the ball comes into the box stay with your man and don't abandon them to attack the ball.

We constantly have players unmarked in the box who fans can see from the stands. Against Villa I could see Bogle marking two at the Kop end from where I was sat in the BLUT, and one of them went on to score as they were unmarked. On top of that as the cross comes in, 2 to 3 of our players abandon who they're marking to attack the ball.

This is amateur stuff that kids do better on a Saturday or Sunday. It's football basics ingrained into you when you first start playing. We are painfully woeful at it and still making these same costly errors every single game. We're 31 games into a season and still doing it. It's nailed on that we will concede from a corner nearly every match.

It can't be Mark Hudson as he's no longer here but we're still doing this. Who organises the defence? Where's the leadership? Where's the communication?
 
Tony spot on. All these technical analysts etc over complicate things. Decide b4 the game who is marking who and make sure u mark your man. If u jump with them even if they get to the ball u have a good chance of putting them off.

We r definitely hampered by our midget midfield and could do with a few Billings in there but we've still got enough 6 footers to be more secure than we have been
 

Tony_Kaufman said:
It's very simple. Every player to check that they are marking someone. If you're not marking someone then work out who isn't marked and bloody mark them. When the ball comes into the box stay with your man and don't abandon them to attack the ball.

We constantly have players unmarked in the box who fans can see from the stands. Against Villa I could see Bogle marking two at the Kop end from where I was sat in the BLUT, and one of them went on to score as they were unmarked. On top of that as the cross comes in, 2 to 3 of our players abandon who they're marking to attack the ball.

This is amateur stuff that kids do better on a Saturday or Sunday. It's football basics ingrained into you when you first start playing. We are painfully woeful at it and still making these same costly errors every single game. We're 31 games into a season and still doing it. It's nailed on that we will concede from a corner nearly every match.

It can't be Mark Hudson as he's no longer here but we're still doing this. Who organises the defence? Where's the leadership? Where's the communication?
Click to expand...
I thought one of Alan Knill’s strengths was sorting out defences. He doesn’t seem to have much impact so far. Let’s hope he gets his sort of players for next season.
 
FriethBlade said:
Tony spot on. All these technical analysts etc over complicate things. Decide b4 the game who is marking who and make sure u mark your man. If u jump with them even if they get to the ball u have a good chance of putting them off.

We r definitely hampered by our midget midfield and could do with a few Billings in there but we've still got enough 6 footers to be more secure than we have been
Click to expand...
I much prefer man marking from corners than zonal. Zonal marking just breeds a lack of accountability.
 
ReeceofBDTBL said:
That corner against Chelsea was fucking pathetic, regardless of the season we're having that was a disgrace.
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It looked to me like one of our players was blocked off. We had three vs three but as the ball came in two Chelsea players formed a wedge and pushed our players back, enabling the goalscorer to run around behind unmolested.
 
Rochdaleblade said:
It looked to me like one of our players was blocked off. We had three vs three but as the ball came in two Chelsea players formed a wedge and pushed our players back, enabling the goalscorer to run around behind unmolested.
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Teams use blocking tactics all the time, no excuse for not molesting an attacker, especially one who ends up in so much free space.

Hopefully the new set piece coach will show us how to diddle the opposition effectively
 
Rochdaleblade said:
It looked to me like one of our players was blocked off. We had three vs three but as the ball came in two Chelsea players formed a wedge and pushed our players back, enabling the goalscorer to run around behind unmolested.
Click to expand...
Problem is you go man for man you get blocked off as we did for Chelsea’s 1st, or (Anel) doesn’t look at the ball just grapples ‘his man’

Zonal stops this but allows the attacker to get a run on the defender

We will be better next season, purely because the opposition will be weaker

Says something when our best defender of crosses is our striker
 
jono_t2000 said:
Specifically corners.

It would be foolish not to discuss our woeful defending of corners as we come up to one of the current best teams at scoring from set pieces.

I have never seen a team defend corners as bad as we have this season, alot of the time we are not even looking at the ball and more concerned about holding onto the opposition. (see Trusty on Sunday when the ball ricocheted off his back, without him knowing where the ball was and luckily fell into Grbic arms.)

Correct me if I'm wrong but we do not have a specialist set piece coach? Is it time we hired one?

Even with our lack of focusing on the ball, as Paul on Blades Ramble mentioned, by simply having a defender on the back stick we would have prevented a decent chuck of set piece goals conceded this season.

The worrying thing is, its the same type of set piece goals conceded week in, week out, without any changes to how we set up to defend them.

As Einstein once said, "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results."
Click to expand...

Set piece coach incoming?

www.yorkshirepost.co.uk

Sheffield United set to appoint first set-pieces coach as they chase 'the small gains that can make big differences'

Sheffield United are set to appoint their first set-piece coach this summer as part of an overhaul of the club on and off the field.
www.yorkshirepost.co.uk www.yorkshirepost.co.uk
 
jono_t2000 said:
Specifically corners.

It would be foolish not to discuss our woeful defending of corners as we come up to one of the current best teams at scoring from set pieces.

I have never seen a team defend corners as bad as we have this season, alot of the time we are not even looking at the ball and more concerned about holding onto the opposition. (see Trusty on Sunday when the ball ricocheted off his back, without him knowing where the ball was and luckily fell into Grbic arms.)

Correct me if I'm wrong but we do not have a specialist set piece coach? Is it time we hired one?

Even with our lack of focusing on the ball, as Paul on Blades Ramble mentioned, by simply having a defender on the back stick we would have prevented a decent chuck of set piece goals conceded this season.

The worrying thing is, its the same type of set piece goals conceded week in, week out, without any changes to how we set up to defend them.

As Einstein once said, "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results."
Click to expand...
1. Chris Wilder "walks away" in spring 2021 after doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
2. The owner reappoints Chris Wilder in December 2023, possibly on the basis of having the same manager but expecting different results.

Insanity indeed!
 
Numpty's Dusty Ruts. said:
1. Chris Wilder "walks away" in spring 2021 after doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
2. The owner reappoints Chris Wilder in December 2023, possibly on the basis of having the same manager but expecting different results.

Insanity indeed!
Click to expand...
We were always good under Wilder with set pieces?
 
Especially early on under wilder and knill we actually had inventive free kick routines where we would essentially pass it around the wall and make sides look silly. Obviously most set pieces lead to nothing statistically even for the very best.

That said our defensive ability this year has been poor. I think losing baldock, bash, Egan and mcburnie for a lot of the season has played a part in that but it's still been far too many completely unmarked goals!
 

steve26272 said:
Problem is you go man for man you get blocked off as we did for Chelsea’s 1st, or (Anel) doesn’t look at the ball just grapples ‘his man’

Zonal stops this but allows the attacker to get a run on the defender

We will be better next season, purely because the opposition will be weaker

Says something when our best defender of crosses is our striker
Click to expand...
I hate zonal marking, for the reason you rightly pointed out about the man getting the run on you.
But, thats what McBurnie does. He doesn't usually pick up a man. Does that only work because the defenders mark their men and it allows Oli to be spare and if they all marked a zone then we'd be constantly on the back foot? I don't know. But there's definitely room to mix it up and each player defend to their own strengths, and when we get a more settled lineup all defend as a single unit.
 
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