Football Myth Busting Thread Number 1: Setpiece marking schemes

LuckyLloyd

Post here when a team scores a goal either from a corner or an indirect freekick, and state whether zonal or man to man marking was used. Probably best to state the teams involved and the goalscorer aswell. Cheers.

keane2097

08/04/09

Liverpool 1 - 3 Chelsea

Two goals for Chelsea (Ivanovic), zonal marking by Liverpool

Villain

lol talk about a mod trying to win an argument

Using all games is a silly comparison i.e. a top 6 team using Zonal marking against lower teams in the league shouldn't make much difference as the quality isn't there to expose it.

So comparing zonal marking of Liverpool against Sunderland and Liverpool against Chelsea or Everton is chalk and cheese.

dreamers75

LuckyLloyd wrote: »

Post here when a team scores a goal either from a corner or an indirect freekick, and state whether zonal or man to man marking was used. Probably best to state the teams involved and the goalscorer aswell. Cheers.

tbh you should have posted this in the gambling forum and asked for odds.

Zonal is 9/10 effective.
Man marking is 9/10 effective.


When either done right its 9/10 effective

LuckyLloyd

Villain wrote: »

lol talk about a mod trying to win an argument

Using all games is a silly comparison i.e. a top 6 team using Zonal marking against lower teams in the league shouldn't make much difference as the quality isn't there to expose it.

So comparing zonal marking of Liverpool against Sunderland and Liverpool against Chelsea or Everton is chalk and cheese.

Maybe so, but let's accumulate the data and then debate what conclusions, if any, can be reached.

Worth noting that tonight's game against Chelsea was the sixth of the year versus top four opposition (and there was another 4 games in the CL versus top four Spanish teams) and was the first in which they conceded a goal from a setpiece...

Anyway, we'll see. Might be a platform for interesting discussion in a few months...

Villain

Umm posts vanishing, do we really need a sticky for this tbf?

LuckyLloyd

Villain wrote: »

Umm posts vanishing, do we really need a sticky for this tbf?

Do we really need a soccer forum at all tbf? The post I deleted was OT at the very least.

Villain

LuckyLloyd wrote: »

Do we really need a soccer forum at all tbf?

Thats a very odd post, I say we don't need this to be a sticky and you ask if we need a soccer forum at all?

gosplan

Wouldn't it just be easier to compare Liverpool goals conceded from crossed set pieces to other teams?

LuckyLloyd

Villain wrote: »

Thats a very odd post, I say we don't need this to be a sticky and you ask if we need a soccer forum at all?

My point being that I am trying to further intelligent discussion on an individual topic. You may not have an interest in the topic, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't be discussed. Much as the majority of registered users on boards.ie believe soccer is a silly game, but that doesn't mean we don't have a forum for those who do like it. Get it?

And I think this is a good way to go about getting some evidence for a discussion, because goals scored from setpieces is not a stat that is widely tracked - and when it is tracked, it isn't broken down in terms of the marking schemes employed by the conceding team.

dreamers75

gosplan wrote: »

Wouldn't it just be easier to compare Liverpool goals conceded from crossed set pieces to other teams?

Not really, a decent ball will be smacked in regardless so you go back to the 9/10 thing where you think you can defend this 1/10 ball.

My corner plan would be fullbacks on the posts (zonal) 2 CBs and big CF standing on 6 yard box man marking their biggest players from a distance (they on 18 yard line to try get a run at the ball) in theory. All but the 2 wingers and pacy CF who are on the halfway line are in the box "contesting" space, any 1st ball in should be dealt with any 2nd ball should be covered by keeper and FBs and "passed" to the WF/CF for the counter.


Damn me and my attacking mentality

Villain

LuckyLloyd wrote: »

My point being that I am trying to further intelligent discussion on an individual topic. You may not have an interest in the topic, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't be discussed. Much as the majority of registered users on boards.ie believe soccer is a silly game, but that doesn't mean we don't have a forum for those who do like it. Get it?

And I think this is a good way to go about getting some evidence for a discussion, because goals scored from setpieces is not a stat that is widely tracked - and when it is tracked, it isn't broken down in terms of the marking schemes employed by the conceding team.

TBH I think JPA had a point

LuckyLloyd

dreamers75 wrote: »

Not really, a decent ball will be smacked in regardless so you go back to the 9/10 thing where you think you can defend this 1/10 ball.

My corner plan would be fullbacks on the posts (zonal) 2 CBs and big CF standing on 6 yard box man marking their biggest players from a distance (they on 18 yard line to try get a run at the ball) in theory. All but the 2 wingers and pacy CF who are on the halfway line are in the box "contesting" space, any 1st ball in should be dealt with any 2nd ball should be covered by keeper and FBs and "passed" to the WF/CF for the counter.


Damn me and my attacking mentality

Well, the last team I played for sticks their best header of the ball on the edge of the six yard box with no man marking responsibility, and he just attacks the ball as best he can. Having him tracking a run would be a waste of his aerial prowess.

LuckyLloyd

Villain wrote: »

TBH I think JPA had a point

Objection noted, and dismissed.

Villain

LuckyLloyd wrote: »

Objection noted, and dismissed.

Fair enough but its a silly thread to sticky and I think you will find the Soccer forum is one of the biggest on this site.

dreamers75

LuckyLloyd wrote: »

Well, the last team I played for sticks their best header of the ball on the edge of the six yard box with no man marking responsibility, and he just attacks the ball as best he can. Having him tracking a run would be a waste of his aerial prowess.

indeed tis a tricky one but you cant allow a free header so puts you in a position of defending "the ball" rather than defending the man.


but he has a one in 3 chance of getting a good ball (near post flick on and hes out game game, dipped to centre and its his unless someone nips in from 18 yard line, back post and hes out of the game if their someone free there.


unpossible to defend that 1/10 cross and what pisses me off is these guys are paid ****ing stupid amounts of money and yet somehow cant beat the 1st man after years of coaching and traing.


****ing annoys me that.

leninbenjamin

in fairness, this is only useful if we were to compile a mean of the average number of corners conceeded per corner taken. thus, need to include the total number of corners taken, discounted for those poorly hit (i.e. don't make it past first man, taken short etc.), and weighted according to both teams level (perhaps just use the final league standings and keep the data to the prem?).

LuckyLloyd

dreamers75 wrote: »

indeed tis a tricky one but you cant allow a free header so puts you in a position of defending "the ball" rather than defending the man.


but he has a one in 3 chance of getting a good ball (near post flick on and hes out game game, dipped to centre and its his unless someone nips in from 18 yard line, back post and hes out of the game if their someone free there.


unpossible to defend that 1/10 cross and what pisses me off is these guys are paid ****ing stupid amounts of money and yet somehow cant beat the 1st man after years of coaching and traing.


****ing annoys me that.

I do agree that it is puzzling as to why professional set piece takers lack consistency. One would think that a guy with all week to prepare for taking corners would always get it into the mixer. I guess we underestimate the pressure of a match situation infront of thousands though...

And yeah, I also agree that a perfect delivery is near impossible to defend against, irrespective of what you do. And if that perfect ball is allied to guys who are good in the air and attack the ball strongly it is going to be a goal most of the time (unless they get unlucky to hit the woodwork, or a keeper or man on the post makes a great block).

The problem this team I played for had was that - a couple of players aside - most of the team was either small or naturally poor in the air. So it was a question of how do you create the opportunity for the three guys who are good in the air to make a play on the ball?

_blank_

Why is this a sticky?

Jesus Lloyd, that's a bit extreme.

In my opinion.

dreamers75

LuckyLloyd wrote: »

I do agree that it is puzzling as to why professional set piece takers lack consistency. One would think that a guy with all week to prepare for taking corners would always get it into the mixer. I guess we underestimate the pressure of a match situation infront of thousands though...

And yeah, I also agree that a perfect delivery is near impossible to defend against, irrespective of what you do. And if that perfect ball is allied to guys who are good in the air and attack the ball strongly it is going to be a goal most of the time (unless they get unlucky to hit the woodwork, or a keeper or man on the post makes a great block).

The problem this team I played for had was that - a couple of players aside - most of the team was either small or naturally poor in the air. So it was a question of how do you create the opportunity for the three guys who are good in the air to make a play on the ball?

The smaller players are there to contest the space, i was told do some nasty things in that situaton by various managers over the years.

Bottom line is you are to make sure HE doesnt get near the ball.


But the 1/10 cross is undefendable, i would be more bitchy towards the taker rather than the players contesting space. This ****er is practicing them all week, beat the 1st man make the keeper move and your job is done

LuckyLloyd

Des wrote: »

Why is this a sticky?

Jesus Lloyd, that's a bit extreme.

In my opinion.

The reason it's a sticky Des is because if it is to work it will require people posting about setpieces when they happen. There is a better chance of that happening if the thread is in view on page one. For instance, there are no games till Saturday. There will probably be no posts here between now (well a few hours from now after we've got past 'sticky zomg' ) and then. And I'm hoping that if some is watching a game at the weekend and see this here they'll post in it...does that not make sense?

JPA

LuckyLloyd wrote: »

The reason it's a sticky Des is because if it is to work it will require people posting about setpieces when they happen. There is a better chance of that happening if the thread is in view on page one. For instance, there are no games till Saturday. There will probably be no posts here between now (well a few hours from now after we've got past 'sticky zomg' ) and then. And I'm hoping that if some is watching a game at the weekend and see this here they'll post in it...does that not make sense?

So at the end of the season what? what is the point of this?

LuckyLloyd

JPA wrote: »

So at the end of the season what? what is the point of this?

The point is to see whether football pundits who wave their hands in the air and scream blue murder about zonal marking actually have a point, or whether it is most probably a myth that the scheme itself is flawed.

JPA

LuckyLloyd wrote: »

The point is to see whether football pundits who wave their hands in the air and scream blue murder about zonal marking actually have a point, or whether it is most probably a myth that the scheme itself is flawed.

And Boards will finally be the ones to show them the light and everyone's argument against zonal will be null and void?

dreamers75

methinks me is missing something

LuckyLloyd

JPA wrote: »

And Boards will finally be the ones to show them the light and everyone's argument against zonal will be null and void?

No, but we'll be able to point here when it comes up in a match thread the next time.

Villain

LuckyLloyd wrote: »

The point is to see whether football pundits who wave their hands in the air and scream blue murder about zonal marking actually have a point, or whether it is most probably a myth that the scheme itself is flawed.

The only way to know would be for all teams that currently don't use Zonal Marking to change to use it and compare the %'s of before and after and while boards has a strong community I think that might be beyond our influence

LuckyLloyd

Villain wrote: »

The only way to know would be for all teams that currently don't use Zonal Marking to change to use it and compare the %'s of before and after and while boards has a strong community I think that might be beyond our influence

Maybe, or maybe by paying closer attention to these types of goals would leave us better informed on it anyway?

Villain

LuckyLloyd wrote: »

Maybe, or maybe by paying closer attention to these types of goals would leave us better informed on it anyway?

I don't see how, I mean teams would have to change from one to another to give us any viable statistics surely?

keane2097

Villain wrote: »

I don't see how, I mean teams would have to change from one to another to give us any viable statistics surely?

I don't see why teams would have to change system to give us any valid info.

Surely simply having Liverpool defending well with it over the coming weeks using the zonal system would be enough to prove the system is viable overall?

If one team can show it as workable then theoretically any team should be able to implement it successfully, and that would be the argument settled.

LuckyLloyd

Villain wrote: »

I don't see how, I mean teams would have to change from one to another to give us any viable statistics surely?

Not necessarily. Hypothetically, if you had a league of 10 teams and 5 ran zonal and 5 ran man to man, and the man to man teams conceded twice as many goals as the zonal teams from setpieces over the course of the season then, while you couldn't be 100% sure that it wasn't purely down to them being rubbish in the air, you could maybe assume zonal was a more effective scheme?

dreamers75

LuckyLloyd wrote: »

Not necessarily. Hypothetically, if you had a league of 10 teams and 5 ran zonal and 5 ran man to man, and the man to man teams conceded twice as many goals as the zonal teams from setpieces over the course of the season then, while you couldn't be 100% sure that it wasn't purely down to them being rubbish in the air, you could maybe assume zonal was a more effective scheme?

depends on the ball, thought we al agreed that earlier.


good ball undefendable

LuckyLloyd

dreamers75 wrote: »

good ball undefendable

I think so. But the detractors of zonal marking seem to frequently forget / ignore this point.

Jazzy

liverpool get 2 goals scored against them from corners by the same player and we now have a sticky thread.
some ppl say summer is the silly season in football. they are wrong. its the last 12 weeks of the premier league on this forum

keane2097

dreamers75 wrote: »

depends on the ball, thought we al agreed that earlier.


good ball undefendable

Not entirely, while there will of course be a small number of "undefendable" crosses it stands to reason that in the case of a cross that is "defendable" one or other of the systems should be better at coping.

The "undefendable" crosses aren't really worth considering, it's how each system copes with the rest that's interesting...

dreamers75

keane2097 wrote: »

Not entirely, while there will of course be a small number of "undefendable" crosses it stands to reason that in the case of a cross that is "defendable" one or other of the systems should be better at coping.

The "undefendable" crosses aren't really worth considering, it's how each system copes with the rest that's interesting...

would you say theres 9/10 chance of this happening?



maybe theres a 1/10 chance of you reading every post on this thread?

**** me if ever someone needed updates...........

5starpool

Lloyd's lost it I think.

keane2097

dreamers75 wrote: »

would you say theres 9/10 chance of this happening?



maybe theres a 1/10 chance of you reading every post on this thread?

**** me if ever someone needed updates...........

I'm sorry, I don't understand why the 9/10 defendable crosses are not a valid topic of discussion simply because there's a 1/10 undefendable cross.

Why are you being so aggressive?

LuckyLloyd

Jazzy wrote: »

liverpool get 2 goals scored against them from corners by the same player and we now have a sticky thread.
some ppl say summer is the silly season in football. they are wrong. its the last 12 weeks of the premier league on this forum

Clearly, I've lost my marbles. The pressure of a title challenge as late in the season in April has got to me!

OR, just avoid posting if you think this is silly, and leave anyone who is interested to make of it what they will.

eagle eye

I posted this in the match thread and I'll post it here as well.

This zonal vs man marking debate is so silly really.

Both types of defending will work nearly everytime if you have the right players to play the system.

There are some teams that one might not work against where the other will. Chelsea would be one of those teams where zonal seems less effective but the reason for that is the amount of players who are good in the air.

You can't train your team to do one, and then expect them to automatically be able to do the other when the occasion requires it. That zonal system will work against the other big four teams and most teams in Europe. Its rare that you meet a team with the arial prowess of Chelsea.

I do think that Hypia would have been a better player for Liverpool in Central defense but thats only because Anelka did not start. Benitez does not have this information when he picks his team so the point is irrelevant really. I'm quite sure also that if he was brought on, you would have seen Hiddink immediately counter with the introduction of Anelka.

Jazzy

LuckyLloyd wrote: »

Clearly, I've lost my marbles. The pressure of a title challenge as late in the season in April has got to me!

OR, just avoid posting if you think this is silly, and leave anyone who is interested to make of it what they will.

well, thing is its an almost unanswerable question. so its a custom designed thread to go round in circles... and guess who uses zonal? Liverpool. and man to man? Utd.
and as well all know those 2 sets of fans ALWAYS agree on stuff

Mr Alan

afaik Jazzy, Utd use a mixture of zonal & man marking, at least they did when Quiorez (sp?) was there.

JPA

Johnny Giles would say that too much emphasis is placed on the importance of tactics. But he's a bit crazy....

Mr Alan

said this in the match thread, but i'll repeat here.

Whether or not zonal marking works shouldn't even be up for discussion. It does, its as simple as that. Conceding a couple of goals tonight doesn't change that. Our record when employing it over the last 4/5 years shows how effective it is.

Too many people listen to the lunatics on RTE, end of story.

JPA

Mr Alan wrote: »

said this in the match thread, but i'll repeat here.

Whether or not zonal marking works shouldn't even be up for discussion. It does, its as simple as that. Conceding a couple of goals tonight doesn't change that. Our record when employing it over the last 4/5 years shows how effective it is.

Too many people listen to the lunatics on RTE, end of story.

Lloyd agrees with you and has made this thread I think to prove his point.
We'll see Boro and Stoke or someone concede a hatful of goals from man marking and his point will be made.

Jazzy

in the match thread it was almost like "zonal marking is inferior because liverpool use it and i really dont like them!". if the white noise was taken out of these forums it would be great.

as for wat works and wat doesnt.. they both can work and they both can fail. it really is as simple as that

kamobe

Anyway - this might save the trouble of documenting...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/606/A14371797 15 September 2006

Liverpool only conceded from two corners all last season, both coming in Premiership games (Chelsea away and Everton at home). In total the Reds faced 137 corners in the league, meaning Benítez's men conceded on just 1.5 per cent of them. Only one team, Chelsea, were able to come even close to that, allowing three goals from 127 (2.4 per cent).

When looking at the facts it is clear that last season Liverpool had the strongest record in defence period, whether this be from open play or when facing corners or freekicks. However commentators still push this myth of us suffering from a zonal marking system.

So to put it one way... even after playing more games than anyone else, we still conceded less than the rest.

Zonal marking works. Of course you can find instances (like last night) where other teams have found a hole otherwise Liverpool would never concede. Liverpool are challenging for the Premier League and the Champions League (again) using the Zonal Marking system. Clearly it works.

Xavi6

Hmmmm struggling to understand the value of this thread myself but to add to the debate (?), City concede from corners and set pieces all the time simply because we're shite at defending them. Zonal/man marking has nothing to do with it.

kinaldo

What's Football Myth Busting Thread Number 2 going to be?

A couple of possibilities spring to mind...

Drogba: great striker or one season wonder?

Gary Neville: great player or most over rated/decorrated player ever to play rb?

LuckyLloyd

kinaldo wrote: »

What's Football Myth Busting Thread Number 2 going to be?

A couple of possibilities spring to mind...

Drogba: great striker or one season wonder?

Gary Neville: great player or most over rated/decorrated player ever to play rb?

Newcastle: a big club?

kinaldo

LuckyLloyd wrote: »

Newcastle: a big club?

thread already exists!!!