Little concerned about Lafferty.

[lyb]

Personally, I think Lafferty's got it in him to be a very important player for us. He grafts and he's very tenacious. That incident last week when he was tripped at the edge of the box and still tried to get a shot off while on the ground summed him up for me. 

Out of all of our strikers, he's the only one who hasn't scored yet, yet he has goals in him as he has delivered them for Northern Ireland. I'm just a little concerned that if goals don't start coming for him in the not too distant future he may fall by the wayside a bit, if he isn't already, which I think will be a shame because he looks like the sort of leader on the pitch, by example, that we lost somewhat when Grant Holt left.

Does anyone else feel like this or am I overegging it?

 

[KeiranShikari]

I've wanted him to have a run in the team all season but with the Jerome/Hooper partnership looking like it has potential I'm not sure he'll get that.

With a squad this big there will always be losers unfortunately.

 

[Salopian]

It would be great to have all strikers in form and competing for their place, but it can be difficult to achieve and we certainly don't want any of the four main strikers wanting to leave because of lack of games.

Lafferty is something of an enigma - a tall man but not terribly good with his heading, a striker shoots from distance but struggles to get into the area for tap-ins. When he was at his prime he was a very good player, and he seemed to achieve great things in Europe and for Ireland. I was excited when I heard that we had signed him, but now I don't know what to make of him. He does not seem your average striker, and NA tends to use him as a wide player, rather than in the centre.

I suspect that the Hooper/Jerome partnership is the preferred combination, and unless one or both is injured or out of form both Grabban and Lafferty will struggle to get into the team.

 

[Yellow Fever]

Lafferty doesn't seem the sort of player to sulk, but it would be great to see him get a goal to get things going. He has been contributing to the team via other means and his work-rate is incredible. He and Grabban both make excellent impact subs as well. Unfortunately for them, the Hooper-Jerome partnership seems to get better each week.

 

[Lake District Canary]

Definitely agree with the op on this subject.  One of the reasons I have been dismayed with Adams this season was his persisting with Grabban, even when obviously off form, when there was a player like Lafferty there who could step in.   There may have been reasons why this wasn't done,  but he has come close to scoring on quite a few occasions - and yes, he's a bit unorthodox, as was GH, but could have been given more of a chance up front before now.  His headless chicken displays didn't help his cause, but it could just be he is one of those players who once he gets going, will be essential to the team and hard to leave out. 

 

[Canaryboy]

Sorry to say but whilst I get a sense that there is a decent player in there somewhere, I've not seen much evidence of it on the pitch. Perhaps he just needs a goal, a bit deja vu though because RVW just needed a goal for an entire season too.

I agree with the above, that Adams persevered with Grabban for too long when he was clearly struggling for form, but in my opinion it was Hooper who should have been back in the team getting minutes during that period rather than Lafferty. Hooper was fit for weeks before he started his first game this season. 

 

[Din]

The main reason that he probably hasn't got a goal yet, is because he's been stuck out on the left wing for pretty much every game he's played in, and I don't think he's played as a striker once so far this season, despite the fact that he's proven for Northern Ireland that it's his best position.

As others have said, he does contribute in many other ways than just score goals. And as Keiran said, unfortunately when you have a big squad there are going to be players that miss out, through no real fault of their own.

 

[hogesar]

Definitely agree with the op on this subject.  One of the reasons I have been dismayed with Adams this season was his persisting with Grabban, even when obviously off form, when there was a player like Lafferty there who could step in.   There may have been reasons why this wasn't done,  but he has come close to scoring on quite a few occasions - and yes, he's a bit unorthodox, as was GH, but could have been given more of a chance up front before now.  His headless chicken displays didn't help his cause, but it could just be he is one of those players who once he gets going, will be essential to the team and hard to leave out. 

But I don't think Lafferty has done enough with his time on the pitch to warrant a regular place, as of yet. He looks Okay on the left, but even in our flat midfield four Bradley Johnson has offered more than him. Particularly in goals.

I quite like him, but so far he's not managed to score and managed to get himself booked in pretty much every appearance he's made.

 

[Paul Handscombe]

Stop playing him as a winger and play him up top that is the answer he isn't a winger he is a bully boy like Holt was and will cause havoc with Hooper playing off him 

 

[Yellow Fever]

You would play Lafferty up front and break up the Hooper-Jerome partnership that has looked so good in recent matches, Paul? I don't think I would.

 

[lyb]

You would play Lafferty up front and break up the Hooper-Jerome partnership that has looked so good in recent matches, Paul? I don't think I would.

I started this thread some days back then, lo and behold, there's a quote from Adams: "“When you have strikers of the four we’ve got, and I include Kyle Lafferty in that, then we are confident we can hurt teams,”

It's uncanny. Is Adams reading Norwich Talk?   

 

[Canaryboy]

You would play Lafferty up front and break up the Hooper-Jerome partnership that has looked so good in recent matches, Paul? I don't think I would.

I wouldn't. At the moment our best partnership is Jerome-Hooper, and if we play a lone striker then I think Jerome is the best equipped for that role. 

 

[Canaryboy]

I started this thread some days back then, lo and behold, there's a quote from Adams: "“When you have strikers of the four we’ve got, and I include Kyle Lafferty in that, then we are confident we can hurt teams,”

It's uncanny. Is Adams reading Norwich Talk?   

In one of his Thursday pre-match YouTube interviews I'm sure he pretty much quoted me word-for-word so perhaps he is! 

Hi Neil, good taste in forum  B)

 

[Yellow Fever]

Don't lets get too carried away CB! 

 

[SussexYellow]

I am not convinced we play a style of football that suits our Kyle which is why he is down the pecking order.

Much is made of how he plays for Northern Ireland, but let's be honest they play most of their games under the cosh! So either they attack on the break where he has the chance to show his power by stretching his legs, or they are playing an out ball looking for him to hold it up and give the defence a break. Which suits his natural instinct to control the ball on his chest rather than flick it on.

Contrast that to our preferences of either to cross from the wing where whilst I would not classify any of our strikers as being that great in the air KL does seem to be the weakest, or trying to probe an opening with an intricate pass and again I would not rate KL ahead of our other strikers at operating in congested penalty boxes.

Ironically he may have been a bigger player for us in the system Hughton deployed last season.