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Demba Ba (now retired)


jdckelly

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Guest BooBoo

Genuine question, when we had Shearer and Ferdinand how did we make that work? I was too young to really remember it.

 

They weren't a great partnership but as a side we created tons of chances and they filled their boots. In terms of partnerships, nothing I've seen has topped Cole and Beardsley.

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Genuine question, when we had Shearer and Ferdinand how did we make that work? I was too young to really remember it.

 

They weren't a great partnership but as a side we created tons of chances and they filled their boots. In terms of partnerships, nothing I've seen has topped Cole and Beardsley.

 

Do you think we could replicate that with maybe Ben Arfa and Ba? Or Ben Arfa and Cisse? I'd quite like to see that tbh.

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Guest BooBoo

For that to happen, HBA would have to become a lot less selfish. Beardsley was the perfect second striker as he seemed to take more enjoyment from creating chances for others than scoring himself.

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Genuine question, when we had Shearer and Ferdinand how did we make that work? I was too young to really remember it.

 

They weren't a great partnership but as a side we created tons of chances and they filled their boots. In terms of partnerships, nothing I've seen has topped Cole and Beardsley.

 

I'd agree with that, though Shearer and Bellamy worked well on a similar pattern.

 

Shearer and Ferdinand scored goals, but the team has a whole began a slippery slope backwards. My memory is that Ferdinand was the one who tended to have to drop deeper, and he never looked comfortable there. At the end of the season, Dalglish decided to try something more along the previous pattern, with Shearer and Tomasson, but Shearer got injured and Tomasson wasn't good enough.

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Shearer and Bellamy was a joy to watch. Bellamy stretching them and making up so much ground to create space for Robert and Solano's crosses while also latching on to throughballs from them and Dyer. Shearer on the end of everything.

 

Demba does some legwork, but neither of him and Papiss could ever be the sort of whirlwind Bellamy was. The perfect foil.

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What formation did Freiburg play? I'd be pretty surprised if it's been a case of he's only been able to play up on his own. I think there's heaps of potential with a Cisse-Ba front two even if they don't gel in the conventional partnership sense.

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Was a 4-5-1.

 

Having said that i do believe in Cisse and Ba as a 2 if we actually play through teams and have Cisse running in behind stretching the defenders and Ba coming deep and to help with the build up.

 

ATM they are so isolated and there's no real movement from the midfield or Ba or Cisse themselves or chances created that it's understandable why it doesn't work so well.

 

I think it can work under the right style of play and set up though.

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The issue is that with the way we play, which is too often lobbed long balls, you need to be playing Ameobi with one of Ba or Cisse, since he acts as the target man and holding up the ball is his strength.

 

I agree that Ba and Cisse could work, but it would take more focused play through the centre and we don't really do that enough.

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Shearer used to go wide a lot and whip in pin point crosses for Ferdinand.

 

He was excellent at creating half a yard for a cross and his delivery was superb.

 

Ginola, Lee, Tino, Beardsley and Gillespie used to create loads of chances for them both though.

 

The 2 big men partnership wasn't really an issue due to the chances we created.

Latter years when Shearer then partnered Ferguson, Ameobi or Cort it didn't work as well whereas when he partnered Bellamy it worked a treat.

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Shearer used to go wide a lot and whip in pin point crosses for Ferdinand.

He was excellent at creating half a yard for a cross and his delivery was superb.

 

Ginola, Lee, Tino, Beardsley and Gillespie used to create loads of chances for them both though.

 

The 2 big men partnership wasn't really an issue due to the chances we created.

Latter years when Shearer then partnered Ferguson, Ameobi or Cort it didn't work as well whereas when he partnered Bellamy it worked a treat.

That cross during the 5-0 v Man Utd  :megusta:

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Shearer used to go wide a lot and whip in pin point crosses for Ferdinand.

He was excellent at creating half a yard for a cross and his delivery was superb.

 

Ginola, Lee, Tino, Beardsley and Gillespie used to create loads of chances for them both though.

 

The 2 big men partnership wasn't really an issue due to the chances we created.

Latter years when Shearer then partnered Ferguson, Ameobi or Cort it didn't work as well whereas when he partnered Bellamy it worked a treat.

That cross during the 5-0 rv Man Utd  :megusta:

 

And against villa.

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Genuine question, when we had Shearer and Ferdinand how did we make that work? I was too young to really remember it.

 

They weren't a great partnership but as a side we created tons of chances and they filled their boots. In terms of partnerships, nothing I've seen has topped Cole and Beardsley.

They were a good partnership but you're right about the chances we created for them.
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By the time Shearer was partnered by Bellamy his role had changed. When Ferguson was brought in, the idea was that he'd win everything in the air, bully the defenders and make room for Shearer, who at that point was still trying to play as though he was as quick as he had been before his big injury. Bellamy was a very different kind of partner, the quick legs running off Shearer as target man.

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Gullit was vocal about wanting Ferguson to play alongside Shearer, idea was basically as Ozziemandias outlined with reference to the Chris Sutton partnership at Blackburn and us previously going for Dion Dublin.

 

Entirely possible however that Gullit was secretly intending for Ferguson to be his Shearer replacement.

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