West Ham 2 - 2 Newcastle United - 26/4/08 - Post match reaction from page 16

[Baggio]

Owen's passing is steady, he doesn't give the ball away very often because he knows his limitations with a football and doesn't try many speculative passes.

[Baggio]

No idea why every fucker wants to dwell on what any of our players can't do. Sure they're not perfect, but who is? Let's embrace what they can do ffs.

 

Well personally, that's what I was doing. What I'm finding here is that if you give a balanced picture of Martins, others are only picking on the reservations that you've expressed, and not the positive bits.

 

The guy has done better than I was expecting this last few weeks. Our attack looked pretty toothless without him, and we now look like scoring goals, however ragged we look in other areas.

 

All the focus has been on Owen and his new role, but I'm still not convinced. I'm only going by the 60 minute Sky highlights, but he looked pretty anonymous yesterday, and he didn't produce much the week before. Opposing managers will now be devising plans to keep him quiet, and that's a fresh challenge.

 

In my opinion, the focus has quite rightly been on Owen and his new role -- it's been a major turning point, and let's be honest, as both captain and the far-and-away most prestigious player Newcastle have got, he's going to be the "main man" when it comes to coverage of the club.  Plus, it was probably the most surprising aspect of the change in form, so it got the attention.  6 goals in 7 matches is nothing to snigger at, either.  Fair enough he was fairly anonymous v. West Ham, he was bound to have a quiet match at some point, just as Martins did the week before.  But to say "he didn't produce much the week before" seems a bit...ludicrous.  Merely two goals and a helluva lot of build-up play, won every MOTM I saw, essentially delivering the win in the derby match.  No, he wasn't great v. West Ham, but aside from Martins who looked particularly good?  It was an off day, away from home, and the lads still managed a draw.  Not a bad result, imo.

 

Never mind, I forgot to whom I was speaking (or posting...whatever).  Owen sucks, blah, blah, blah....  Gotta give you credit, though, you're consistent.  Not one of those who switches opinions with the tide of the masses.

 

Well let me put it another way. The new formation, and the new role for Owen, has got us out of the mess we were in. Owen has been able to score by making runs from deep, and that's been an asset. However, as I said, other teams are going to get wise to that.

 

What bothers me is that Owen is not a particularly good passer of the ball, and if we're looking to progess from where we are now, I don't think Owen should be an automatic choice. I don't want a situation where we're trying to fit the team around one player, rather than trying to get the best out of all eleven. All this exaggerated praise that comes Owen's way does worry me for the future.

 

I'm not saying he's a bad player. Just not as good as his reputation suggests.

 

This is where we must agree to disagree.  Owen's passing has been rather good, imo, not always particularly adventurous, but he's got good vision and he's efficient on the ball.  There have been a few of his passes that if it were one of the regular midfielders putting them through they'd be pointed out as a great pass and evidence of that player's class (one particular perfectly weighted pass to Martins last week springs immediately to mind).  In general, I find his link play to be far better than the other three strikers, which makes him vital to the new formation as there's no one to take his place (I've seen no evidence that Owen is too slow to play in Martins' place, if the situations were reversed).  Martins had a good game v. West Ham, and I look forward to more of the same -- if it comes.  But Martins has never been as consistent as Owen (even when Owen was the same age Martins is now), so I prefer to "pin my hopes" so to speak on Owen.  But I think the current system which uses both well ought to dispel the myth that for one to prosper, the other must wither. 

 

I think Owen's recent display of versatility has proven he is as good as his reputation suggests, maybe better.  His reputation was of a one-dimensional but very gifted striker.  Turns out he's not so one-dimensional.  And considering he still gets goals like v. Reading and the first v. Sunderland, I don't think his time as a striker playing on the shoulder are over either.  That was a classic sort of Owen goal, both times. 

 

How many times have you seen him race away from defenders since he's come back from his knee injury?

 

He couldn't even get away from Dawson when we played Spurs and he's one of the slowest centre backs about.

[Guest rebel_yell12]

From what I've seen, Owen's "pace" has been increasing over this run of games.  Whether that is because it really is coming back or because he is more confident in his body's ability to accelerate without injuring himself, I've no idea.  But while he's never as quick as he was before his hamstring problems, I don't think he's much slower, if at all, than he was when I watched him play for Liverpool in 2002-3 and 2003-4, when he was very effective as an out-and-out last-defender striker.  He's very quick over the first five yards, which was always his strength after his hamstrings -- Martins is probably far quicker over 10-20 yards but Owen's reaction time makes a big difference over five yards. 

 

My point, though, was that Owen's reading of the game, his intelligence and ability to beat a man over 5 yards still make him a very effective striker off the last shoulder -- the position I think Martins is currently playing.  Martins may be better at it (I would never argue Owen was quicker than Martins) but Owen could play there effectively, as he did for England last September (noticeably after he done his knee).  I have less confidence that Martins could play as consistently in Owen's new position.  Essentially, if Martins were hurt (unlikely) then Owen could slot in for him, but there's no one for Owen's position.  Am I making sense at all? 

 

As for spinning Dawson but not pulling away -- Well, it didn't help that Dawson damn near landed on him.  He's only little, after all.    With his luck at Tottenham...

[Baggio]

From what I've seen, Owen's "pace" has been increasing over this run of games.  Whether that is because it really is coming back or because he is more confident in his body's ability to accelerate without injuring himself, I've no idea.  But while he's never as quick as he was before his hamstring problems, I don't think he's much slower, if at all, than he was when I watched him play for Liverpool in 2002-3 and 2003-4, when he was very effective as an out-and-out last-defender striker.  He's very quick over the first five yards, which was always his strength after his hamstrings -- Martins is probably far quicker over 10-20 yards but Owen's reaction time makes a big difference over five yards. 

 

My point, though, was that Owen's reading of the game, his intelligence and ability to beat a man over 5 yards still make him a very effective striker off the last shoulder -- the position I think Martins is currently playing.  Martins may be better at it (I would never argue Owen was quicker than Martins) but Owen could play there effectively, as he did for England last September (noticeably after he done his knee).  I have less confidence that Martins could play as consistently in Owen's new position.  Essentially, if Martins were hurt (unlikely) then Owen could slot in for him, but there's no one for Owen's position.  Am I making sense at all? 

 

As for spinning Dawson but not pulling away -- Well, it didn't help that Dawson damn near landed on him.  He's only little, after all.    With his luck at Tottenham...

 

The only way I could see Owen playing up top in a 4-4-2 now is if we pack the team with pace because his pace has suffered a lot since his operation, the new formation however really does suit him and as someone pointed out a while back (tmonkey) we'll beat a lot of poor teams if we play it next season because they just won't be able to handle all of our front men, his goal against Sunderland just showed how hard it will be for average teams to stop us, both centre backs have picked up our two strikers leaving Owen up against an average fullback who didn't really have a clue who to mark, his movement off the ball will just kill off the average defenders who get caught out with not knowing who to mark, as someone else said if Owen isn't performing then it's likely one of our other strikers will be.

 

Replacing Viduka with someone who offers us pace and who can hold the ball up too can see the team really move on next season.

[maze]

Really a memorable game. Coming all the way from Norway for the away game in London

 

My first ever EPL game, and I got to say... Toon Army = crazy côôl fans! haha!