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[Football] Zaha watch - *** The SEGW finally managed to escape***



Icy Gull

Back on the rollercoaster
Jul 5, 2003
72,015
Is that disruptive **** not being sold for 100 million in the window then?
 




Springal

Well-known member
Feb 12, 2005
23,712
GOSBTS
The problem he's made for himself is that he reacts so badly / well (delete as applicable) to the chants etc. He was soooo close to tears at the Amex a few weeks ago. That doesn't go un-noticed.

That’s why he won’t ever make it at a big club. Doesn’t have the mental strength or ability to do so.
 


Triggaaar

Well-known member
Oct 24, 2005
49,989
Goldstone
How can that be true? That is saying that no other player other than Zaha and Hazard has been shoved, pulled or Whacked more than 10 times a season.
Eh? It says Zaha has been pulled etc 387 times, Alexis Sanchez nearly 100 less. How do you get to 10?
 


Publius Ovidius

Well-known member
Jul 5, 2003
45,919
at home
IMG_0239.JPG

Cry over that zaha you hypocritical ****
 




Kinky Gerbil

Im The Scatman
NSC Patreon
Jul 16, 2003
57,846
hassocks
I've said it before, but I mean... he DOES get the shit kicked out of him and it is because he's very good at dribbling with the ball.

The thing which the author of that article fails to mention is Zaha's past. The reason he gets hammered is because he's the sort of player who posts pictures of himself sitting on his Rolls Royce. He's the sort of player who throws a strop when he doesn't get the ball. And.. he's the sort of player who dived A LOT in his earlier career. People don't forget that.

And if we're going to compare him and Eden Hazard. I would suggest that if Hazard can handle being the most fouled player in the league without looking like he's going to burst into tears, getting up and getting on with the game. Then I'd suggest poor old Wilf could do the same.

I dunno about that... Hazard sulks like crazy
 




























LlcoolJ

Mama said knock you out.
Oct 14, 2009
12,982
Sheffield
This. Will be Albion folklore. Reduced to a gibbering, petulant wreck. Fecking hilarious
"Cry in a minute, he's gonna cry in a minute!"

I don't think he's coming back from that. Well, apart from sitting on his Roller that God bought him.

The ****.
 








Stato

Well-known member
Dec 21, 2011
6,528
Zaha is one of the Premier League’s most persecuted players, partly because lots of people pretend he is not persecuted at all. Eden Hazard – and only Eden Hazard – is fouled more often than Zaha, who, in the last four seasons, has been booted, shoved, pulled or whacked 387 times in the Premier League, nearly 100 times more than the next most assailed (Alexis Sánchez). And that only includes the times the referee has spotted the offence. Yet every time Zaha hits the ground he is accused of making something up, even when fans know their man has attacked him. They just pretend, for titillation or for illegitimate gain, that they are watching something other than what they are watching.

https://www.theguardian.com/footbal...-crystal-palace-protection-diving-accusations

Paul Doyle's use of statistics in this article is laughable. He argues that a stat that shows that Zaha wins more fouls than anyone except Hazard proves that he does not dive, never pausing to consider that someone who was successful at simulating being fouled, would be likely to have a record of being fouled more than other players. It is a circular argument that proves nothing.

If he was to look deeper: https://en.as.com/resultados/futbol/inglaterra/2018_2019/ranking/jugadores/ he could see that Hazard and Zaha are also top of the stats for most dribbles, suggesting that they are two of the players in the league who are likely to be tackled most often. If you are tackled more often than other players and the percentage of tackles that are given as a foul is fairly constant, you would be fouled more often than most players. This does not mean that you are being targeted, just that you are fouled more, because you are tackled more.

Doyle could have then looked closer at stats like crosses into the box, good crosses, shots on target or dangerous passes and seen that Zaha is nowhere near the top of the list for any of these. This fact, allied with Milivojevic being top on penalties scored and direct free kicks on target could point to the possibility that Palace get more success from Zaha winning fouls than from what he can do when he is not fouled. This could suggest that Palace are using Zaha to win fouls.

It would seem to me that, more often than most players, Zaha wants to draw defenders into a challenge. If he can get a contact he is going to go down. This is not necessarily diving, but it is playing for the foul. Supporters are not mugs and recognise this when it happens. We at Brighton spent years watching Kazenga do it. We also see Glenn Murray do it regularly. The difference between Murray and Zaha is that Murray takes the hit that he has drawn the defender into, gets up and carries on, pleased that he has won his team an advantage. Zaha draws defenders into fouls and then complains to the ref or the media that he has been fouled and should be protected.

Fans may be partisan, but they are not the utterly dishonest herd that Doyle represents them as. They are not booing Zaha for diving whilst secretly knowing that he has been fouled, they are booing him because they have watched enough football to know that he wanted to be fouled, but is not honest enough to admit it.

He is also not helped by the Palace fans. We cheered every time Lua Lua relieved pressure on our defence close to the end of a game by drawing the tackle and going over the defender's leg. Zaha's fans instead join him in fake indignation that he has been cruelly cut down by evil defenders, wringing their hands for the plight of the artist in a game full of agriculturalists, all the while thinking to themselves 'Come on Luka, now's our chance.'
 



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