Transfer Rumours Saint Jan! (Transfer completed)

I know Saints (and other academies) try to improve the weaker foot, but I suspect that the better the player is with his dominant foot, the less likely he is to try and use the standing foot. If you had a right-footed genius, would you want to risk confusing his little footballing brain.

 

This is bang on Fran.

Maradona probably the best ever example.

 

My reply to San Pellegrino - (As I said "trying to sound as if I understand the first thing about these things", but clearly showing that I don't know anything, really. I'll stick to cheering from the stands ) Is an admission of my immense lack of knowledge about anything football-related, beyond spelling 'fooball'

 

One thing about our new signing - on first glance he appears to be Toby Alderweireld's Love Child

 

With better hair...

 

He definitely has a likeliness. Hope he has the same the ability

 

Sounds like an innovation from hell.

 

Surely if Maradonna was a teenage kid at Boca Juniors today, his coaches would work on that with him?

I accept that you know a lot more than me about how youngsters are coached, but do you think a player's weaker foot can't or shouldn't be improved at an early stage in his development?

If I had offered a teenage you the chance of a life changing salary, dependent on you learning how to write with both hands, would you have done it?

Finally, do you think a cricketer in the field should be able to catch a ball with either hand?

 

Wouldn't use the word 'shouldn't' or 'can't'. I'm sure every coach tries to improve a player's weaker foot, but it isn't as necessary with a player who is an out and out genius. Such a player will stand above his peers and get selected for what he can do rather than what he can't do.

 

I played football to a fairly high level in my youth and my coaches were trying to get me to improve my right foot rather than it just being something to stand on. Whilst I definitely improved from totally and utterly hopeless with it to just hopeless. The amount of time and effort that would be required to get my right foot up to anything like the ability in my left foot just wasn't worth it. You would need to start very young in my view (although my Dad still maintains that when I was 3/4 whenever he started kicking a ball about with me I preferred my right and I started using my left when I was about 6 after he told me to), or there will be some who are pretty natural with both feet and pick it up quickly.

 

As a child I would always practice with my wrong (left) foot. It was never as good as my right but it was good enough to use for a pass that was on, with it.
This is what bugs me with modern players, and I see it so often at SMS.
A simple forward pass, down the line with the wrong foot, is ignored, and becomes a simple backwards pass with the better foot.
Stops momentum and allows defences to cover.

 

A lot of it will be a confidence thing. I would be 100% shocked if any of our players couldn't play "a simple forward pass down the line" with their wrong foot. They will definitely be able to do that 99 times out of 100, probably more. I'd be surprised if they couldn't hit a 30 yard pass with the wrong foot more often than not, but it is just natural to favour your strong foot and a lot of times in games it will be done on instinct from years of playing the game rather than consciously thinking. That is where it needs to be trained into you and that takes a hell of a long time.

 

Yeah, I accept that most players will have one foot stronger than the other. But imo they ought to be able to pass or shoot with either. You don't see boxers who can only punch with one hand, though the knockout blow nearly always comes from the favoured hand.

 

I'm sure all players can use both feet to pass the ball, but most will try to get the ball onto their favoured foot for important shots or crosses.

 

Isn't that a problem that naturally gifted people in any walk of life can end up defeating themselves with? Sometimes things come so easily that they never have to work for anything. What was that Adkins line about hard work beating talent?

 

And supporting the right team, clearly

 

Oh they do coach them to use both feet. I was just saying that a huge number of players, professionally and amateur, can only use one foot.

There is a good argument both ways. Some say it is better to be good with both, others say it is better to be even better with the favoured foot.

 

Rhetorical question I know, but he said: Hard work beats talent if talent doesn't work hard. In football, most players now do work hard....little room for coasting. Rickie Lambert admitted that he was coasting until he came to Southampton and had to work....and had his best seasons here.

 

I was born to support Saints, but spelling 'fooball' has taken me a lifetime

 

Nadal is naturally right handed, but was taught by his Uncle from an early age to play tennis left handed. It is reportedly the reason why his two handed back hand is the best in the game... Don't know if he's any good at football..