It was interesting watching the analysis last night on Ireland's goal. According to general analysis Welsh failure seemed to boiled down to four main points.
1. Yes we failed to break them down and that was partly a failure on our side. Agreed.
2. Credit for this must also goes to Ireland's resolute defending. I never quite understand why people complain about "parking the bus", or "defending deep". A team with inferior players is well within their rights to use all means necessary to get a result. Ireland did that. Football is about defence as well as attack, as much as it frustrated me. So yes, good defending.
3. Yes Hennessy made a mistake but that was recoverable if Williams played safe.
4. Yes Williams was also at fault. Although under undue pressure he had an opportunity to clear. Williams tried to be too cool and turned a recoverable situation into one of big pressure. Granted.
All four of the above points have been well observed. The first two were general observations of the overall game. The last two points are individual mistakes, but to my mind were not fatal. There were some technical points here that went missed.
Wind the clock on the video to 2 minutes on the link below to see what happens. When the balls is crossed into the box it became a 4 v 2 situation. That should really be bread and butter to defend if the players were correctly marked. Mc Lean's marker in midfield makes a mistake in letting his man go. But perhaps he calculated that a 4 v 2 situation in the box is safe enough, but then that requires the man letting him go to communicate to the defenders to watch Mc Lean. If Mc Lean's marker had followed him into the box from midfield (see left side of camera) instead of standing outside the box that would have made it it a 5 v 2, which is how it started at the point of losing the ball.
Then look at what the the Welsh players inside the box are doing as the cross is delievered. They are staring at the crosser which is ridiculous as he is already marked. They should be concentrating on the 2 Irish players in the box, or at least positioning their body so that they are angled 50/50 so they can partly see both the ball and the runner.
So even though the 4 points commonly raised are true there was a lot more to it. It was a combination of poor man marking on the cross, poor communication between the midfielder and his defence, and poor body positioning / ball watching from the Welsh boys in the box.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wJbhaN5u9Y
Reply With QuoteOriginally Posted by Keyser Soze
It was interesting watching the analysis last night on Ireland's goal. According to general analysis Welsh failure seemed to boiled down to four main points.
