Weekly Review 2nd – 8th April 2012 [easter]

No game and only two training’s because of Easter weekend. Most players probably wouldn’t bother to do any stuff on their own, but for me, I did over a dozen hours on my own. This has been like my life story the last two years. Ever since April 2010 and making this 20 hr a week schedule, I’ve been doing this and accumulated roughly 1900 – 2000 hours in pure practice! To give you an idea of what that means, players training 3 x 1.5 hour sessions a week and a game to complement, would be training between 250 – 300 hours per year. Hard work pays!

But really nothing much to report since it is Easter and everything’s a bit quiet.

Below are the notes to myself I took from watching games this week to give you an idea of exactly what I look for:
Match Analysis

– torres reads body position of kalou and knows where the ball is going to drop almost before kalou crosses it (ronaldo intelligence)
and that allows torres to get a few steps ahead
– good 1 touch combination play between mata, kalou and torres to get mata on goal
– bellamy tries one-two with suarez
– ball is with suarez near bellamy in attacking right inside channel (where simmo would be), as soon as suarez receives the ball and turns – bellamy makes run and gets through ball between defenders.
– shelvey wasn’t scanning before he tried to stop ball going out for throw in
– cisse has the calmness to take a touch into a better position two metres from goal instead of shoot.
– cisse creates that little bit of movement to get header from cross
– terrible body language from caroll, doesn’t look like he wants to get on the end of ball.
– assou kotto (like ashley cole earlier) quick touch will ball across his body and lobs it to bale
– the positioning of the swansea defender allows lennon to get past him easily one on one and get in a cross
– good pressure on swansea midfield/attack by tottenham causing them to lose the ball
– junior hoilett sees the space to the left of wolves, cuts between defenders to get there and gives him time and space to pick his spot
– ashley young does a quick turn as most players do when the space is behind them – but he takes an extra touch which gives him the momentum to get power on shot
– peter crouch takes a chance with his volley and it pays off! Confidence.
– sturridge just drives into the space.. even if he hesitates beforehand
– victor moses hunts down the stoke defender and boom he is away one on one to score.
– van persie chases down collochini and gets slide tackle on him after miscontrol
– walcotts first touch is more towards goal cutting inside rather than a straight run
– rosicky sets up bounce pass for song and oxlade chamberlain was making a run for the through ball while this was happening – intelligence and anticipation
– gibbs also lets it run across body and left foot lobbed ball to chamberlain (like cole and akkoto)
– chamberlain quick chest and volley, that’s showing confidence and skill
– again, walcotts first touch is towards goal – not down the line
– van persie points to where he wants the ball before he gets the through ball to him
– chamberlain always driving forward
– marcelo hits first time ball to the wing because he sees the space there – was a bad ball, but at least the intelligence shows
– I can see the relationship with the bounce pass on runner onto the through ball
– higuain excellent timing of run as soon as midfielder gets ball on inside right attacking channel, he’s run is behind the defender – like bellamy earlier
– dani alvez tracks all the way back when barca loses ball in milans box and tackles seedorf to win it back
– fabregas makes right sideways run, bringing with him a defender infront of messi to give messi space to go left and shoot
– alvez quicky makes a metre of space on the right and gets a powerful cross in using that momentum
– great pressure by messi to win ball from mexes
– alvez dummies to the right and dummies again forcing the defender to change his body position and that allows alvez to beat him

– messi sprints full pelt to shut down goalkeeper
– robinho shows good awareness to cut into the centre of field
– iniesta just has the intelligence and awareness to stagger his run so he doesn’t go offside and can receive the pass to score
– when ball comes to him in the box, he takes his touch so his body and ball is infront of milan defender – if defender tries to tackle, likely it will be a penalty.
– when bernie says make two runs to block pass – I understand more now why
– good pressure by robinho to block defenders clearance and get a one on one chance
– great pressure from boateng
– great pressure from dani alvez
– ITS ALL ABOUT SCANNING – fabregas does it countlessly, all the time, messi, all the players do every few seconds .. has to become an ingrained habit!
– you can win ball more, running full pelt and as defender is about to receive – slide tackle
– milan player just lets ball run across body, tricking marking player with a quick scan dummy

– on the wing barca attacking, adriano dummies by going to the player with the ball and then turns to get the ball in
– suarez touch towards goal and shot
– kuyt can only do really good turn in the crowded area of the park, because before he receives the ball, he keeps looking over his shoulder
– suarez makes outside of foot pass full of confidence
– milner, no second thoughts – turn touch AND cross
– adam johnson straight away,
– great slide tackle block by de jong
– kuyt just waiting on the corner of the box on the right
– suarez great pressure on triangle
– if you have your back to goal and are close to it, take a touch in space infront of you (if any) and shoot on turning
– ribery saw the run in front of him going to left and was bringing a defender with – so ribery goes right and sets up the goal

– raul merieles tracks victor moses back all the way and eventually gets the tackle – dedication
– gary cahill makes his body as wide as possible to block the cross
– bertrand again first touch towards goal
– olic does well again just to stagger his run not to be offside
– olic makes a run in front of the ball into the space on the left of ribery – leaves defenders cautious about what ribery will do
– yabala the bayern left bck makes great attacking runs down the flank

Next Week
Full week next week – missed two hours of training so will do 20 hours! Big game against Deakin and I really want to win this game, against the best team in the city and prove to Robbie why he should of put me in the first team there.