Our Finishing

[Mr.Ridiculous__]

It's killing us isn't it? The amount of point blank opportunities we miss are not being compensated by the chances we create.

 

[Bastian]

Yep. Maguire with his headers off target, Martial and Rashford with their 1 in 3 chances taken. But it's still the defense that is the problem. Our attack would get enough goals to win games, if we were defensively sound.

 

[amolbhatia50k]

Our finishing is below par this season. But it's far from the only problem. The overall performance against Leicester was weak and we evidently didn't look like a team that belongs at a different echelon of the league than them. The day we can play teams like Leicester genuinely looking a properly superior football team, we can think about challenging. They're better in possession and at pressing FFS.

 

[CallyRed]

Imagine if we had managed to get Haaland.

 

[kouroux]

Finishing is poor but we still score goals. Biggest issue is the defence, not capable of consistently keeping clean sheets.
Forget the title if we never resolve this

 

[kouroux]

Imagine if we had managed to get Haaland.

It still wouldn't help us defensively which is the biggest problem right now

 

[Godfather]

Finishing is poor but we still score goals. Biggest issue is the defence, not capable of consistently keeping clean sheets.
Forget the title if we never resolve this

This

 

[Ekeke]

No. If you need to score more than 2 goals away from home you've got other big problems

 

[arthurka]

Harry Maguire gets a free header every single game that he heads way over the target. Plus Rashford just isn't a natural finisher.

 

[SirAnderson]

Our Achilles was our defense, now it seems its our finishing.

 

[acnumber9]

Our finishing is mostly fine. The problem is that we seem to need to take 80% of our chances because we can’t defend worth a shite despite playing two defensive full backs and two defensive midfielders.

 

[SuperiorXI]

It still wouldn't help us defensively which is the biggest problem right now

No but we would have won a game like today with a clinical striker like Haaland, this team is missing a player like him. Cavani can do it but he's not got the legs over the course of the season I don't think.

 

[100]

Actually came away from that with more sympathy for the attackers.

Bruno, Rashford and Martial/Cavani create everything amongst themselves with little help from the midfield or fullbacks. Testament to them that they create so many opportunities, but otherwise they're expected to thread a needle or beat 3 or 4 players.

 

[Raw]

I mean you can't expect to finish every chance, but feck me the quality of chances we piss away is ridiculous. Could do with a super clinical striker up front instead of hoping Rashford and Martial get a high enough amount of chances to even score one.

 

[spiriticon]

Stop shooting at the bloody keeper and expect him to jump out of the way.

I mean, common sense innit?

 

[yumtum]

Our defence isn't up to much either, only four teams have conceded more than us in the league, two of which are Sheffield United and Fulham.

£80m Maguire really needs to step up and lead this defence, seems he just isn't that type of guy unfortunately - then we have £50m AWB who, well, is only really good defensively, which says alot considering the amount we've conceded.

 

[kouroux]

No but we would have won a game like today with a clinical striker like Haaland, this team is missing a player like him. Cavani can do it but he's not got the legs over the course of the season I don't think.

No way to know with our backline bro, this team doesn't reassure defensively. Haaland would help, like Bruno helps to score but doesn't impact the defending

 

[Lennon7]

The absolute perfect player we could sign for what we need upfront I think would be Son. He’d likely cost as much as someone like Mbappe, yes, but his link up play, silky touch, smart decision making and ability to play from the right is what we’re sorely missing. And he’s due a move from Spurs to be honest.

 

[3KDré]

I don’t think (usually) we miss any more than other teams. Salah and Mane miss plenty of chances. The difference between us and them is our defence is solid but not top class. Top class defences make just that many fewer mistakes to turn games like today from 2-2 to 2-1 and gets us that few extra points that we need.

 

[Zen86]

Our finishing is below par this season. But it's far from the only problem. The overall performance against Leicester was weak and we evidently didn't look like a team that belongs at a different echelon of the league than them. The day we can play teams like Leicester genuinely looking a properly superior football team, we can think about challenging. They're better in possession and at pressing FFS.

Disagree. We were the better team today against a side who are no pushovers. If we took our chances we may have well have run away with the game. Possession is meaningless if the best chances fall to the other team.

Try watching the heir apparent Mourinho’s recent performance against Leicester for a benchmark.

 

[CallyRed]

It still wouldn't help us defensively which is the biggest problem right now

Noted. Though winning 3-2, 6-2 is far more fun

 

[Mr.Ridiculous__]

This thread isn't for the defence. Get that to the other threads.
With slightly better finishing we would have been in the CL (PSG game at home) and our title bid (however early it is) wouldn't get wrecked right at the start.

 

[kouroux]

Noted. Though winning 3-2, 6-2 is far more fun

But it won't get us a title any time soon

 

[Dinghy]

Three headers free on goal, all three went far over the bar. How difficult could it be to just get over the ball. I swear it happens every fecking game with our players.

 

[Betson]

It is good that we are creating so many chances these days(thanks Bruno) but there certainly is an issue with the amount of clear cut chances we are missing has this to be a concern and has to be addressed for us to progress to a title challenging side, especially with our defense so weak.

 

[Annihilate Now!]

It needs to improve of course, but what I would say is we were poor after we scored both goals today, so even if we take earlier chances I'm not sure anything would have changed.

 

[Ali Dia]

Yep. Maguire with his headers off target, Martial and Rashford with their 1 in 3 chances taken. But it's still the defense that is the problem. Our attack would get enough goals to win games, if we were defensively sound.

It’s every game. Maguire should have about 5 more goals for us. Start aiming for someone else in there because he keeps missing sitters.

Rashford and Martial are still warming up but so wasteful.

 

[kouroux]

This thread isn't for the defence. Get that to the other threads.
With slightly better finishing we would have been in the CL (PSG game at home) and our title bid (however early it is) wouldn't get wrecked right at the start.

We do score enough goals to win most games though tbh.

 

[CallyRed]

But it won't get us a title any time soon

Yeah probably won't. I don't know what frustrates me more, seeing poor finishing or poor defending.

 

[My only Eric]

If only we had clinical strikers

Go all out for haaland when he becomes available

 

[Mr.Ridiculous__]

We do score enough goals to win most games though tbh.

We do? But don't you think that after we won those games and we are in a good spot to take advantage...we feck it up. We need more clutch finishers in the side. That's how we will transition from also rans to winning shit.

 

[iluvoursolskjær]

You can't win titles simply outscoring the opposition everytime. You need to keep them out of your end too and we are incapable.

 

[kouroux]

We do? But don't you think that after we won those games and we are in a good spot to take advantage...we feck it up. We need more clutch finishers in the side. That's how we will transition from also rans to winning shit.

We feck it up defensively, yeah. Yes, I think scoring isn't the most urgent issue. It doesn't mean we shouldn't improve in the scoring

 

[Offside]

Yes but we do score plenty of goals. Problem is at tother end. A title-winning side should be able to score once and there’s a feeling of game over.

 

[Siorac]

We're not that wasteful. The Caf overstates this problem quite a bit. Rashford missed two good chances today, sure, but that happens to every team.

We still scored twice in a difficult away game so it's not the attack that cost us. It's the inability to keep the ball and poor defending.

 

[Mr.Ridiculous__]

This is not a reactionary thread. I probably would have made this even if we had won. If you aren't seeing that our strikers have sunk a level with their finishing and we can't score a header (apart from Cavani) then you aren't recalling the countless clutch games we could have won.

Also, I clearly remember the 2012/2013 season where our clutch finishing by Rvp, Hernandez and Rooney saved many a average performance. Even when Rvp had that miniature drought, we still scored.

 

[Ekeke]

This is not a reactionary thread. I probably would have made this even if we had won. If you aren't seeing that our strikers have sunk a level with their finishing and we can't score a header (apart from Cavani) then you aren't recalling the countless clutch games we could have won.

Also, I clearly remember the 2012/2013 season where our clutch finishing by Rvp, Hernandez and Rooney saved many a average performance. Even when Rvp had that miniature drought, we still scored.

They are different players. Worse at finishing yes, but their movement to get into the positions in the first place is why we could have had 4 goals away from home today. Plus Fernandes is our top scorer and gets so far forward that he needs to be counted too

 

[FrankDrebin]

Our control of the ball is killing us more.

 

[charlenefan]

Finishing is poor but we still score goals. Biggest issue is the defence, not capable of consistently keeping clean sheets.
Forget the title if we never resolve this

This, you can't expect players not to miss chances. Bruno won us the game today it was then on the defence to see it out. Can't need to score 3/4 goals away from home to be able to see a game out

 

[Siorac]

Our control of the ball is killing us more.

Exactly. And that's why signing a top class striker or a top class CB isn't going to fix everything. Our games have too much 'randomness', we don't have enough control.