Sooner or later earlier this season, when he saw the variety of long throws and dangerous inswinging corners per game ticking up across the league, Sean Dyche should have began licking his lips.
The previous Burnley and Everton manager has long been criticised by certain opposition managers and fans for a defensive and structured variety of play that isn’t easy on the attention.
Nonetheless, he has all the time stuck to his guns, insisting that whether it’s long balls or short balls, he’s only curious about effective balls.
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So for Dyche to be out of a job back in August, when it quickly became clear that this is able to be a season filled with set pieces, direct passing and physical midfield battles, was a serious case of bad timing.
Thank the football gods in that case for Ange Postecoglou. The Aussie gave Nottingham Forest players a collective bout of whiplash during his short time in charge, completely changing the variety of play away from what brought them such success last season – prompting Forest to show back to the tried and tested.
Dyche has dismissed the concept that he was ahead of the curve during his time at Burnley. ‘I’ve all the time just viewed football through what I feel is correct,’ he said during an early press conference as Forest boss.
‘I’ve had enough experiences to come to a decision what I feel is way of operating. May not be the easiest way in everyone’s eyes – that’s as much as them to come to a decision, but I do know the way to operate within the Premier League and I do know what it takes to operate within the Premier League.
‘I do know the stats, the facts, the demands, the passing lanes, the passing lines, the quantity of passes that might be effective. They’re the things it’s good to know and so they’re the things I’m attempting to imprint on the players.’
He’s delivering thus far. Forest hadn’t won a game of football in near two months by the point Dyche rocked up on the City Ground in late October.
Since then, they’ve won seven out of 12 matches, beat Tottenham and Liverpool comfortably, put themselves in position to qualify for the knockout stages of the Europa League and are actually looking up on the gap to the highest half as a substitute of over their shoulder towards the relegation zone. Not bad going for a manager who was bundled out of the Goodison Park door back in January.
The brand new manager bounce is sure to wear off at some stage, but there’s hope for Forest fans that – within the short term, a minimum of – Dyche is likely to be the proper man for the job in an ideal season for him.
Forest’s set piece record needs to enhance
The irony is that since Dyche took over Forest haven’t overly relied on set pieces as a source of goals. Of the 21 they’ve scored in all competitions under the brand new manager, three have come from penalties and three from dead ball situations.
Because the start of the season only Liverpool, Brentford, Burnley and Wolves have scored less from set pieces, while just Bournemouth and West Ham have conceded greater than their 11 – perhaps a results of Postecoglou’s disdain for practicing corners on the training pitch.
Improving that record will go a great distance towards Dyche being a hit on the City Ground.
Goals scored from set pieces within the Premier League
10 – Arsenal, Manchester United
9 – Chelsea
8 – Aston Villa, Leeds
7 – Crystal Palace, Newcastle, Tottenham
6 – Brighton, Bournemouth, Fulham, Sunderland, West Ham
5 – Everton, Manchester City
4 – Nottingham Forest
3 – Brentford, Burnley, Liverpool
2 – Wolves
Nonetheless he gets there, Dyche will should be an unmitigated success sooner reasonably than later, considering the Forest owner Evangelos Marinakis’ approach to his team appears to be ‘if it ain’t broke, fix it’.
The Greek businessman wants Champions League football seemingly in any respect costs. Can Dyche deliver it? His first focus has been to regular the ship but with players of the standard of Morgan Gibbs-White and Elliot Anderson in his side – arguably significantly better than anyone he could call on at Burnley and even Everton – there’s no reason he can’t achieve that by the top of this season with a Europa League win.
Other sides across the league will likely be watching on with interest. If Dyche is a hit, what’s to stop Sam Allardyce doing the identical at Fulham, or Tony Pulis being brought back in from the cold to save lots of Burnley’s season? Fanciful pondering, perhaps, but stranger things have happened.
And, if it does all end in tears, the inevitable face off between Dyche and his boss on the pitch will likely be essential viewing.
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