Matt Clarke

WilderBall said:
I read this earlier.. found it quite interesting...

bleacherreport.com

Analysing the Importance of a Left Foot-Right Balance in Central Defence

When scouting new central defenders, managers take into account far more than the average fan reading tabloid links does...
bleacherreport.com bleacherreport.com

With the importance of Wilder's centre backs bringing the ball out, overlapping and being involved in overloads down each flank, it really does help if their natural foot is the one of the side they're playing down.
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Thanks for that, very interesting.
 
Ash88 said:
Great signing for £2.25m if it's true, but I still don't get this "left footed centre back" thing...

Last season Matt Clarke played in the middle of the back three 12 times, and the right side of a back five 10 times.... In nearly all of those games they had a right footed centre back playing on the left...

It doesn't seem to matter for West Brom, or most other teams who play three at the back. Why does it matter so much for us?

He only played LCB in the back three once last season
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They'll be able to pass the ball sideways quicker.

Hopefully this means he will play mcnair on the right.
 
Middlesbrough123 said:
We only need 1 striker and 1 midfielder and we’ve almost had the perfect window , fans must be well chuffed 🫣
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In numbers, absolutely.

But we've always got to wait a few months to judge signings, I've been satisfied with plenty of windows that turned out to be duds with hindsight.
 
Hoping Clarke can play a bit. He may be a good defender and it's great that he's left-footed but as we saw with Frys' performance at the weekend, we need defenders who are decent on the ball playing the overlapping centre halve roles.
 
parmoboy said:
Hoping Clarke can play a bit. He may be a good defender and it's great that he's left-footed but as we saw from Frys' performance at the weekend, we need defenders who are decent on the ball playing the overlapping centre halve roles.
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The fans of his previous clubs on twitter seem to think he is decent on the ball, just lacking pace.
 
Alexander Supertramp said:
I think McNair is tailor made for that RCB role.

I know Dijksteel has his fans on here, and his pace can be useful in recovery etc… but I think McNair is an upgrade on him
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Dijksteele's better on the ball, and it's more important when you're meant to be having more of the ball. If we were **** or playing long ball then I'd pick McNair.

McNair may be more solid (albeit Dijksteele catching up on that), but he doesn't have the legs of Dijksteele, which is necessary to get up and support Jones, who is rapid. It also helps for covering other defensive positions, as he's quick getting back and over.

Plus it's better McNair not playing, as he can cover about 5 positions quite well, he'll get a lot of game time, and rightly so, but not in my 1st XI once we have our signings. Dijksteele can only really play there, or maybe RWB, but we have RWB cover.

Same with why Bola was picked ahead of McNair, he can get up and support Giles better and has been good on the ball for a CB. His defending isn't as good, especially not in the air, but in theory that should be less of a problem.

We've conceded a lot of goals, but a lot of them are us being caught out by fouls, or strikes from the edge of the box which shouldn't be going in with such frequency. Attacking we're creating enough, largely as the LCB and RCB have been pushing up, freeing other players and giving other options.
 
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