🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 Frank Lampard

[Strike 7,489]

15 hours ago, Mana said:

"Hardly any pre-season" - So did 19 other clubs in the PL. In fact we are one of the lucky ones who had a couple of friendlies while others had 1. If this was Lamps' first season, then you have a strong case here but it's not.

"Constantly changing backline" - This is mostly Lamps' fault, nobody else's. Only player injuries or absences you can't say it isn't. Also again, 2nd season now - we shouldn't still have to see constant changes back there.

"Kepa" - Fair enough, but I felt like Willy would had been a better option or a youth keeper. I know Willy is poor as well, but it was a matter of principle.

Chelsea had just the one pre-season game vs Brighton. Leicester for example played three.

Lot of the defensive improvement is due to Thiago Silva. The other pairings still ooze panic I think.

It maybe the second season but it was the same defense that leaked the record number of goals until Chilwell Silva and Mendy came in 

 

[Atomiswave 6,117]

[Jap Si. 50]

Super Frank Super Franklin Lampard. Go go Lampy.

[milka 3,394]

 

[Atomiswave 6,117]

12 minutes ago, milka said:

 

I dont care if he was a spurs manager, if the offer comes he will grab it on the spot. But I doubt we will see that, Lamps is starting to build something good and progress is coming nicely.

[Jase 43,479]

 

[Fernando 6,585]

4 hours ago, milka said:

 

United bound. 

[ZAPHOD2319 4,815]

 

[Atomiswave 6,117]

Saw all the quotes of Kai Silva etc recently, they all sing the same tune which is marvelous. Silva already wants a renewel, Kai snubbed BM for us. He knew the BL is a shit show, easy title every season for BM, thats why he said the title with Chels is worth alot more. And man FL so far can lure most players, they really look up to him.

[manpe 10,861]

What I really can't wait, is his first trophy with us. It's gonna be fucking special! It's a dream scenario I always fantasized about when I was a teen idolizing him in his playing days, but never thought would have a high chance of happening. BUT it must happen with crowds back in the stadium! 

[1chelsea 864]

What I really can't wait, is his first trophy with us. It's gonna be fucking special! It's a dream scenario I always fantasized about when I was a teen idolizing him in his playing days, but never thought would have a high chance of happening. BUT it must happen with crowds back in the stadium! 

The Premier League

[blu35_army 551]

really interesting,,it's prove how bayern can almost reach CL semifinal every year. so do city and pool that always dominate PL in the last 3 years. frank must learn more about this tactics...

[Atomiswave 6,117]

51 minutes ago, blu35_army said:

really interesting,,it's prove how bayern can almost reach CL semifinal every year. so do city and pool that always dominate PL in the last 3 years. frank must learn more about this tactics...

Your pic/link do not show up

[Jase 43,479]

19 hours ago, manpe said:

What I really can't wait, is his first trophy with us. It's gonna be fucking special! It's a dream scenario I always fantasized about when I was a teen idolizing him in his playing days, but never thought would have a high chance of happening. BUT it must happen with crowds back in the stadium! 

Last season's FA Cup...URGH! 

[milka 3,394]

 

[communicate 2,703]

I believe right now we have a good balance in the team with 433.

The stranget part imo probably the players that are not natural in their role are Havertz, Werner. 

 

[milka 3,394]

Some interesting point : 

 

Lampard / Klopp

===================

Kepa Big Flop  /  Karius Big Flop --- >  Then   Mendy / Alisson

Thiago Silva IN /  Van Dijk  IN 

Ben Chillwell IN / Andy Robertson IN

Reece James Academy / Trent Alexander Arnold / Academy

Ziyech IN  /  Salah IN

Werner IN /   Mane IN

 

 

 

[Vesper 30,170]

22 hours ago, milka said:

Some interesting point : 

 

Lampard / Klopp

===================

Kepa Big Flop  /  Karius Big Flop --- >  Then   Mendy / Alisson

Thiago Silva IN /  Van Dijk  IN 

Ben Chillwell IN / Andy Robertson IN

Reece James Academy / Trent Alexander Arnold / Academy

Ziyech IN  /  Salah IN

Werner IN /   Mane IN

 

 

 

bloody shame Silva is not the same age (26) that VVD was wen he came to the dippers

[Vesper 30,170]

How Lampard tweaked tactics to ease Chelsea’s set-pieces troubles

https://theathletic.com/2205157/2020/11/18/corner-lampard-goals-chelsea/

There was a point last season, crystallised by a 3-2 loss to West Ham United at the London Stadium in July, when every corner kick that Chelsea conceded was cause for panic.

David Moyes tailored his game plan that night to exploit the visitors’ glaring weaknesses when defending set pieces, matching 6ft 4in midfield giant Tomas Soucek against 5ft 10in Cesar Azpilicueta at the back post. The strategy proved highly effective, and briefly threw Frank Lampard’s bid to deliver a top-four finish into doubt.

Moyes wasn’t alone in identifying this particular route to success against Chelsea, who ended last season as the worst team in the Premier League at defending corners.

In terms of raw numbers, only relegated Norwich City conceded more goals (12) from corners, but they faced 266 across their 38 matches. Lampard’s team managed to let in 10 from 133 — exactly half that number.

Premier League corner defending 2019-20

 

TEAM	CORNERS FACED	CORNER GOALS CONCEDED	%
Chelsea	133	10	7.50%
Manchester United	186	9	4.80%
Norwich	266	12	4.50%
Brighton	204	9	4.40%
Aston Villa	242	10	4.10%
Manchester City	97	4	4.10%
West Ham	219	9	4.10%
Wolverhampton Wanderers	148	6	4.10%
Arsenal	229	9	3.90%
Watford	201	7	3.50%
Everton	182	6	3.30%
Newcastle United	252	8	3.20%
Burnley	238	7	2.90%
Leicester City	175	5	2.90%
Crystal Palace	235	6	2.60%
Southampton	223	5	2.20%
Tottenham	207	4	1.90%
Bournemouth	251	4	1.60%
Liverpool	160	2	1.30%
Sheffield United	218	2	0.90%

 

Overall, 7.5 per cent — around one in every 13 — of the corners Chelsea conceded in the Premier League last season resulted in opposition goals. It was a rate of defensive failure that distinguished them from every other team in the division for all the wrong reasons; in fact, the only team in any of Europe’s top five leagues who conceded goals from a higher proportion of corners faced in 2019-20 was French side Amiens, who ended up relegated from Ligue 1.

 

Europe's worst corner defences 2019-20

TEAM	CORNERS FACED	CORNER GOALS CONCEDED	%
Amiens	140	12	8.60%
Chelsea	133	10	7.50%
Borussia Dortmund	102	7	6.90%
Werder Bremen	198	13	6.60%
Bayern Munich	102	6	5.90%
Cologne	200	11	5.50%
Sassuolo	213	11	5.20%
Monaco	137	7	5.10%
Schalke	178	9	5.10%
Manchester United	186	9	4.80%

 

Finding a way to solve or at least mitigate Chelsea’s set-piece problems was an urgent priority for Lampard heading into this season, even within the context of the team’s broader defensive issues. After that West Ham game, he suggested the solution might be as simple as recruiting taller players, but he has also been proactive in switching up his system in his search for a configuration that works.

For the first few months of 2019-20, Chelsea lined up with striker Tammy Abraham guarding the near post area in a similar manner to predecessor Didier Drogba, with four team-mates deployed in a line along their six-yard box and most of the rest of the side stationed in front of them, tasked with blocking or disrupting opposition runners.

When that purely zonal system yielded too many free headers, Lampard switched to a mixed strategy, with Abraham and Kurt Zouma the only men given freedom to attack the incoming ball while virtually everyone else was given a man to mark. That change improved things for a while, but teams soon found weak spots to target; either nipping in front of Abraham at the near post, as Ajax midfielder Edson Alvarez did at the Amsterdam Arena, or drifting in behind Zouma to meet a floated delivery to the back post, the way Soucek did for West Ham.

Roman Abramovich’s spectacular spending spree has built a very different Chelsea team in almost every aspect this season, and Lampard has in recent weeks seemed to settle on a defensive structure that balances the attacking firepower now at his disposal. He has also made changes to the way his team defend corners, and the early returns look reasonably positive.

 

Premier League corner defending 2020-21

TEAM	CORNERS FACED	CORNER GOALS CONCEDED	% ▼
Liverpool	14	2	14.30%
Brighton	25	2	8.00%
Manchester City	26	2	7.70%
Leicester City	42	3	7.10%
Sheffield United	47	3	6.40%
Fulham	34	2	5.90%
Burnley	42	2	4.80%
Leeds United	42	2	4.80%
Newcastle United	43	2	4.70%
Chelsea	44	2	4.50%
Everton	39	1	2.60%
West Bromwich Albion	44	1	2.30%
Southampton	43	1	2.30%
Wolverhampton Wanderers	44	1	2.30%
Crystal Palace	48	1	2.10%
Tottenham	37	0	0.00%
Arsenal	41	0	0.00%
West Ham	42	0	0.00%
Aston Villa	27	0	0.00%
Manchester United	28	0	0.00%

 

Lampard’s latest system appears to blend elements of the previous two, with four players — including centre-backs Zouma and Thiago Silva — stationed zonally in a line along the edge of the six-yard box and three or four colleagues in front of them marking and tussling with opposition runners. Behind them, new goalkeeper Edouard Mendy is encouraged to be proactive in venturing off his line to intercept high balls into the box in contrast to Kepa Arrizabalaga, who too often remained rooted to his line.

Mendy seemed particularly keen to be assertive in this regard on his Chelsea debut, against Tottenham Hotspur in the Carabao Cup in September. Spurs got four corners in the game and of the three they decided to send directly into the penalty area, the Senegal international rose highest to connect with two and almost punched Zouma in the head in his eagerness to clear the other one.

Mendy’s formidable 6ft 6in frame has impacted Chelsea’s set-piece defending beyond his willingness to use it to command his penalty area. It also acts as a deterrent, discouraging some opponents from swinging corners directly into the box and leading them to take more of their corners short. It is here that Lampard’s new system has been caught out a couple of times, most notably in the opening minutes at home to Sheffield United in the final game before the current international break.

Here, Oliver Norwood takes a corner short to an unmarked George Baldock and the pair of them then take advantage of miscommunication between Hakim Ziyech and N’Golo Kante, combining slickly to work space for a cutback that leads to David McGoldrick’s ninth-minute opening goal.

Manchester United’s best chance of the second half in a dour goalless draw against Chelsea at Old Trafford last month also came from a short corner: Bruno Fernandes giving the ball to Luke Shaw and getting it back, before whipping in a low cross that substitute Edinson Cavani pokes just wide after darting in front of Kai Havertz.

Lampard can reduce the short-corner risk by moving one player closer to the taker and anyone who shows for a short pass, but he must also be wary of leaving too much space on the edge of Chelsea’s penalty area.

West Bromwich Albion capitalised on this to score their third goal of a shocking first half for Lampard’s team in September, when Darnell Furlong was granted the freedom of The Hawthorns to redirect a floated delivery to Kyle Bartley at the back post. Marcos Alonso compounded the system failure by losing his man.

Another scare came in the second half of the goalless draw with Sevilla in last month’s opening Champions League group game.

In this example, Timo Werner is stationed at the edge of the penalty area, as he generally is when he is in the team, both to put himself in a position to provide defensive support and to offer the threat of a rapid counter-attack. But behind him, Sevilla midfielder Joan Jordan is unmarked in space.

The ball is floated towards Jordan and Werner can’t get close enough to bother the midfielder, who tries to beat Mendy with a spectacular volley. Silva’s smart decision to retreat to the goalline once the corner has gone over his head, however, basically means Jordan can only score if he finds the top corner from nearly 20 yards. He gets impressively close to scoring what would have been one of the greatest goals in Champions League history, but instead his shot sails narrowly over the crossbar and loops onto the roof of the net.

John Terry was a master at picking exactly the right moment to put himself on the goalline to make a crucial block, and Silva’s defensive talents are underpinned by similarly intelligent instincts. The bulk of the Brazilian’s value to Chelsea’s defending of corner kicks comes from the fact that, though he isn’t the overwhelming aerial force that Zouma is, he generally puts himself in the right positions and times his jumps well. He has directly cleared six of the 37 corners Chelsea have faced with him on the pitch across all competitions.

It isn’t quite as simple as buying taller players, but Lampard’s system looks more convincing with many of his new personnel in the team. Mendy is a more confident, dominating presence than Kepa was, while Silva and Ben Chilwell are both proving to be adept in the air. Havertz is not a particularly physical player but he is tall at 6ft 2in and does not shy away from headers, meaning that Chelsea lose less defending corners when 5ft 11in Werner plays up front instead of 6ft 3in Abraham or 6ft 4in Olivier Giroud.

Defending corners at an average level of efficiency constitutes a big improvement on last season for Chelsea, and Lampard deserves credit for the systemic tweaks he has made — as well, of course, as signing the right players. In the coming weeks and months, however, the biggest scope his team has for further progress in this area has nothing to do with individuals or scheme.

If they want to concede fewer goals from corners, Chelsea simply need to concede fewer corners.

Over the first eight matches of the new Premier League season, they have given up an average 5.5 per game; by way of contrast, in 2019-20 they averaged just 3.5 — second-fewest in the league. So far in 2020-21, they have conceded 30 more corners than Liverpool and 18 more than Manchester City, the two teams Lampard constantly holds up as the benchmark for his young group.

Greater control of matches, and therefore of their opponents, is the key to Chelsea eliminating goals conceded from corners as a significant issue.

Lampard and his players are working on that but, in the meantime, upgrading their corner defence from extraordinarily bad to average is a big step forward.

[Fernando 6,585]

November - December time frame was the appointed time for me to see the real deal. 

And have to say I'm glad I waited and I'm seeing the results that I thought we should see by this time frame. 

That being said I'm still cautiously optimistic.