Quote:
Originally Posted by FoldnDark
It looked to me like the dude who recieved the ball would most likely try to quickly pass it to the teamate charging into the box (as seen from the aerial view in your second video). I think Denayer anticipated this pass and was headed to block the upcoming shot on goal.
This is what i thought also initially to excuse this nowhere land movement but there is no such player appearing in the video in any view on the right side charging yet. Robson-Kanu is alone at that point as it was a very fast attack break. In any case if that was a concern he should have been moving towards the center and right not fully right.
I like how when Brian is "cornered" he goes on the attack to insult people now that play the game also. Of course a striker is not a defender by training and will not play as well if forced to think like a defender but they play the same game all the time and they see how others defend also (against him even) and indeed something is very off with the choice of Denayer here.
Basically Denayer moves mechanically to the right to do what a defender typically would be doing to cover the risk of sending the ball there to another. But there is no such person coming there. He simply behaved mechanically not rationally adapting at the actual risk moment.
Yes it is better said than done live but the fact remains he charged with substantial speed towards a direction he wasnt needed to be there so fast and left open the back of Robson-Kanu that was only one rotation away from shooting or moving towards the keeper and shooting as it happened.
The ball would be very hard to go where Denayer was moving because the right defender would prevent such easy pass of Robson-Kanu to himself (plus it would take some time) . So only a pass to another was the risk but nobody was going there to receive the ball yet (see it again and tell me who is?) so he effectively was placing himself out of defending anything.
Keepers like to have a clean view of the ball also so its not a great idea to be going in front of them making the ball harder to see so close but the moment was urgent and the important detail was to close the corridor in his back. Nobody thought to do that but its the obvious risk here. You do not have to imagine he will do a brilliant move to find a very clean shot, any move to rotate would be a risk leading to a shot. The brilliance is in making the shot clean by throwing them off and buying critical fractional second edge to move a bit further in also before shooting.