Alan Smith

[ElDiablo]

This post is going to cause several on here to want to fish slap me into a canal, but stick Smith next to Owen and we will score a bucket load.

 

Martins just doesn't offer the threat of Owen or the link up play of Smith.

 

Martins has pace, good shooting ability, and an infinitely higher work rate than Owen. He's also shown he can play down the flanks to a moderately decent degree.

 

Owen on the other hand is slow, hardly in the game, and only wants to play in a central position, which is where Smith does his best work. Itd cause Smith to either drop very deep or play wide, neither of which makes Smith as effective as when hes up front causing problems for a centreback. As a partnership, Owen + Smith would have no pace in it.

 

But neither of them get into goalscoring positions or gamble on flicks and on a defender missing a cross which should be one of the first if not the first thing you look for in a striker.

[James]

This post is going to cause several on here to want to fish slap me into a canal, but stick Smith next to Owen and we will score a bucket load.

 

Martins just doesn't offer the threat of Owen or the link up play of Smith.

 

Martins has pace, good shooting ability, and an infinitely higher work rate than Owen. He's also shown he can play down the flanks to a moderately decent degree.

 

Owen on the other hand is slow, hardly in the game, and only wants to play in a central position, which is where Smith does his best work. Itd cause Smith to either drop very deep or play wide, neither of which makes Smith as effective as when hes up front causing problems for a centreback. As a partnership, Owen + Smith would have no pace in it.

 

Martins never attacks the ball, and unless he can be taught, he isn't the answer. Owen can attack the ball, and as for your description of what Owen cant do, that is completely blown out of the water by his performance against Russia at Wembley, when he did all of these things.

 

By all means replace Owen with someone like Anelka, but Smith and Martins just wont get goals, and we'll be relying on the likes of Milner, N'Zogbia, Taylor, Barton, Butt and Geremi for our goals.

[johnnypd]

with martins and smith you really need a midfielder to get beyond them and into the box, as well as wingers who will get into good positions, as both of the strikers do their best work outside the box and don't tend to get into poaching positions. we don't have this at the minute. you'd also have to say that while they do a lot of hard work, smith battling and martins making runs, neither are particularly clinical so you're looking for creativity and vision to come from midfield, another thing we don't really have. a good partnership to play in this type of game where we need a battling, bolton-esque team pressing from the front but in games where we're up against teams that play more conservatively and defend i don't think they'd be as effective.

 

you'd think replacing martins with owen would sort this out and it does look like a good partnership in theory. the problem then is that we've just removed the one bit of real pace and movement in our team and we'd be forced deep by any opposition with a bit of sense which would be a huge problem. no clear answers for the striker partnership, smith and owen would be alright if we had pace in abundance in the rest of the team (down the flanks specifically) martins-viduka is another that looks good but viduka's movement is genuinely awful and ends up playing half the time in midfield. he is a good player but his major weakness is a real issue and if he can't sort it out soon it would be fair to say he is finished as a player who can do it on a regular basis.

[Guest nufc 4 life]

Smith played brilliantly today, i haven't read the rest of this thread, but i think it's plain to see that Smith plays his best game of football when he is up front. He won a lot of headers, his work-rate was huge and his link-up play was very good considering Martins wasn't really making the runs that he should of been making.

[Shearer9]

If we're to play with a target man, especially in a 4-5-1, it should be Smith up there as the lone striker.  He's the only one who can put in the effort necessary.  Not saying we should overlook the position in January, but for right now, he's a better option than Viduka.  He also didn't do much during the last 10 minutes when he moved back to midfield.  Up front or nothing.

[Cajun]

If we're to play with a target man, especially in a 4-5-1, it should be Smith up there as the lone striker.  He's the only one who can put in the effort necessary.  Not saying we should overlook the position in January, but for right now, he's a better option than Viduka.  He also didn't do much during the last 10 minutes when he moved back to midfield.  Up front or nothing.

 

More mobile than Viduka but the FAB will get you more goals imo.

[Skirge]

His best game for us so far by miles..

[Decky]

So good tonight, if he keeps that up he might turn out to be a bargin for us

[Ember]

Simply fantastic tonight. That's enough said.

[Incognito]

A Smith/Owen partnership has me drooling!!!!!!!

[Guest RodrigoPalacio]

Won EVERY header.  Couldn't have asked much else from him.  Played class.

[stozo]

Was fucking brilliant tonight. Must play as a striker.

[The College Dropout]

If we're to play with a target man, especially in a 4-5-1, it should be Smith up there as the lone striker.  He's the only one who can put in the effort necessary.  Not saying we should overlook the position in January, but for right now, he's a better option than Viduka.  He also didn't do much during the last 10 minutes when he moved back to midfield.  Up front or nothing.

 

More mobile than Viduka but the FAB will get you more goals imo.

 

true.

[Jamie87]

I'd have Smith's babies after that performance. Actually have a womb inserted and be pregnated for the lovely bastard after tonight. SMITH = NEW BORN LEGEND.

[Alberto2005]

I'd have Smith's babies after that performance. Actually have a womb inserted and be pregnated for the lovely bastard after tonight. SMITH = NEW BORN LEGEND.

Oh dear

[Jamie]

Truely outstanding tonight !

 

Looked like Shearer is disguise

 

Everything about his play tonight was brilliant.

 

Should now look to play around him as a centre foward....he's wasted in midfield

[Parky]

Some on here will have to start looking for the 'take it all back' pills.

[ohmelads]

Viduka has been pretty poor himself since he came here and on current form I think a Martins-Smith partnership would benefit the team more. Viduka is painfully slow and he gets beaten to most aeriel balls, so he's actually contributing very little to the team. He rarely presses defenders either, so when we don't have possession it feels like we're playing with 10 men. It's just too easy to defend someone so immobile, we had this problem when Shearer's legs had well and truly gone. He'll produce the odd bit of magic but entire games are passing him by.

 

Smith to his credit does plenty of pressing for the team and if he can do that up front he'll be contributing more than Viduka is at the moment. Even when Bellamy had poor games he would press from the front and this rushed the opposition to play the ball quickly and forced them into mistakes, and took some of the pressure off our midfield. Liverpool had it way too easy yesterday, their defenders were strolling out of defence unchallenged and our midfield found themselves quickly outnumbered. Torres and Kuyt on the other hand pressed our defenders in our own half, giving them no time to find a teammate and we struggled to pass our way out of our own half, punting it long instead.

 

The way things are at the moment it's got to be Smith and Martins for me.

 

Whilst I hate the idea of quoting myself I feel this point has been refinforced by today's game.

 

We have to ask ourselves why teams like Liverpool make defensive errors every week yet they play us and it's a stroll in the park, they can play the ball out of defence and amble up to the halfway line unchallenged every time. Viduka and to some extent Owen and Martins haven't been pulling their weight up front this season. Smith set the tone today. His pressing in midfield has been a weakness, he leaves big gaps chasing the ball and makes rash challenges, while his lack of creative skills on the ball are exposed when he's surrounded by bodies. Put him up front and his weakness becomes a strength, he can run and challenge to his heart's content and it's all for the good for the team. Arsenal are the best passing team in the league and for periods today they couldn't play it out of their own half. To see Kolo Toure punting long balls put a smile on my face, and this wouldn't have happened if Viduka had started in Smith's place. Toure would have strolled up to the half way line, their midfield would have pushed on and we'd have found ourselves under pressure. When Viduka is playing and we don't have the ball, we're basically down to ten men and that's unacceptable. Martins today followed Smith's lead and we penned Arsenal back. I haven't seen that sort of thing here since we had Bellamy. Defending from the front is very important and it's the reason Benitez signed Bellamy and Kuyt. Neither are really Liverpool standard in terms of their on the ball ability, but they were signed for their teamwork and Smith can be that sort of player for us.

 

For a team playing fantastic football I think Viduka would score more goals than Smith, but for a team struggling for form and lacking the creativity to put it on a plate we need to be pressing defenders into errors and we got that today.

[Wullie]

Fan-fucking-tastic tonight. Hats off to you Alan.

 

Still never had a chance though.

[David Icke - Son of God]

I wouldn't say fantastic but he certainly lead from the front. Chased and challenged for every ball and should start against Brum.

[Guest optimistic nit]

we wont score many goals with smith up front, but i'd play him in games like today where we need to defend from the front and chase every ball (big 4 and away from home). it may be a good idea to start him always until we have a decent midfield and orginised defence, because smith does the most off the ball of any of our strikers, and when you are shit at setting up chances that is what you need.

[Keefaz]

Fan-fucking-tastic tonight. Hats off to you Alan.

 

Still never had a chance though.

 

Aye, for someone with a goal ratio of a goal every 40 matches, you'd think he'd be sticking them away.

[Jamie]

I think we have found a new way to play against the big teams now.

 

Lesson 1 starts at Chelsea....get these tickets rolling Mr Mort 

[Mick]

I'm really pleased for him, he's a model professional and will always give 100%, he's an asset when played up front and also allows a better player to go into midfield.

[Parky]

Will be spoilt for choice who's errant anti-Smith rants to dig up first. lol