What might have been....

[Salopian]

On Saturday I was too busy to follow the Canaries World commentary, or even a printed one. Instead I made a few snatched visits to look at the BBC Football Championship coverage.

My first visit occurred after about 20 minutes, with the score at 0-1. What struck me immediately was the running total of attempts at goal. We had made 9, presumably including Graban's rather glaring miss, with none of them on target. (By my next visit we had made 12, with two on target. (At the first visit Birmingham has had five, with two on target.) There is nothing wrong with our creation of chances - the BBC reckoned 28 by the end of the game, with two goals to show.

I am not making my usual point about our low conversion rate of chances, and lack of clinical finishing, from which I would have to exempt Jerome. The point I am trying to make is that the game could have had a very different result if, with better technique, shot selection and coolness, we had scored first. We gave Birmingham the lead and gave ourselves a mountain to climb.

 

[The Ghost of Michael Theo]

We had every chance at the end of the game to win. Redmond puts his chance in the bottom corner, or Hoovield converts one of his 3 free headers, and we have 3 points. It was an odd feeling for me. Not many times we're 0-2 down at halftime, and then you leave Carrow Road thinking 'we should have won that'. I guess that's the feeling you get when we start scoring the plethora of goals we've enjoyed at the start of this season.

You can look at it another way. You could look at those stats and think we had 'one of those days'. However, how often do you have 'one of those days', and end up drawing from 2 goals down? Maybe it actually bodes well?

 

[Canaryboy]

Birmingham's first goal was a complete fluke, it took a wicked deflection which sent Ruddy completely the wrong way. 

Our attempts on goal were also massively inflated by the number of long range pot shots that we had, particularly in the second half, Tettey the main culprit as he tried 35 yarders about three or four times unnecessarily. Then we had three headers from Hooiveld which would have registered as attempts but in reality were him just getting his head to a corner and the ball going 'wherever'. 

Not disagreeing with your overall premise, that we seem to be conceding the first goal and giving ourselves a mountain to climb, and that we had enough possession and enough chances over the course of 90 minutes to win the game (particularly in the final 15 to 20 minutes), but the problem with relying on stats is that they never tell the whole story. 

We probably only squandered 2 real clear cut chances, but Birmingham squandered at least 1 with Clayton Donaldson. 

I don't really begrudge Birmingham their point, they went 2-0 up, we shouldn't be getting ourselves in that position at home. Despite us being the better team over 90 minutes I hope it teaches us a bit of a lesson. 

Would have be nice if Redmond's superb run and shot towards the end had crept in the bottom corner though, he had a fantastic game and would have deserved that goal. 

 

[Din]

We definitely had chances, but as said above, I wouldn't say too many of them were clear cut. Hooiveld had a couple of headers, Johnson and Tettey between them had a few long shots go wide. Redmond hit a couple wide as well. Apart from the 2 goals the only clear chance I can think of is when Grabban scissor kicked the ball over from a few yards out.

 

[ZLF]

Grabbans was a very poor miss,  Tettey waltzed into the area and the hit with the outside of his right boot instead of his left and the otherwise impressive Redmond forced a good save from the keeper by at least getting it on target - they were the best three chances of the day.

Missed chances (Grabban again - he could be well into double figures already) and some poor defending - what might have been heh?    We didnt lose and need to make up for it in Blackpool on sat

 

[splutcho]

I must say, though I don't want to criticise too strongly considering the goals he HAS scored, but Grabban has disappointed me a little at times with poor decision making when given chances. I get the feeling that had Jerome been given the chances Grabban has had, he may have scored an extra 3 or 4. The chance on Saturday being a perfect example. Why smash it? Just get it on target.