' Kieffer Moore's struggles '

Kieffer Moore's struggles


By Glen Williams

Monday 20th September 2021


To be clear, Kieffer Moore is unquestionably one of the very best in this division.

Big and physical, Moore has so often demonstrated a ferocious predatory instinct that allows him to seemingly conjure up goals from nothing.

Simply put. Moore is the sort of player that gets teams promoted.

And it's for precisely that reason that his apparent dip in form of late has been so concerning.

It's not for lack of effort. No one could really question his commitment to the cause.

But at the same time, he's not quite been had his usual level of influence.

Moore's mustered just two shots in as many games, and has touched the ball six times in the penalty area during that time.

Getting those numbers higher will be key to getting Moore firing again.

The reality of the situation isn't lost on Mick McCarthy, who admitted after the defeat to the Cherries that the Wales international is perhaps a little way off from firing on all cylinders.

However, perhaps given the striker's quality, there's little sign of any panic, and it's hopefully a matter of time before he finds his rhythm again.

"He had Covid so his season stalled, and he had been playing for almost two years straight before that after going to the Euros," McCarthy said.

"He missed the training, came back, went away, and had to miss training again so its been impossible for him to get back up to speed.

"He’s doing all he can, but he just needs games and training which he’s missed a lot of."

The reason he is struggling is because we don’t put any decent crosses in the box

If Giles isn’t playing we might as well not play Keiffer

He doesn't get the service he needs. He ran his bollocks off on Saturday and won a lot of headers but no City players were there to pick up the second ball.

Every restart is aimed at him, so the opposition has one in front and one behind him and squeeze him. He gets frustrated as he is practically mugged and we do nothing to offer support in the way of changing things.

Saturday we had a centre half pretending to be a wing back, at one point at a restart in the second half Brown was almost in line with Kieffer but far left and Kieffer was in the right hand channel with most of the Bournemouth team around him. Harris was in the centre circle. A ball to Brown with Harris on the same wavelength would have made them think, but no, smack it roughly in Kieffer's direction.

its not a fair fight at restarts, we can't keep hold of the ball for more than 5 passes without knocking it long, so it's sooooo easy for championship defences to marshall him.

This is a Mick problem, not a Kieffer problem.

We could have Cristiano Ronaldo up top for us his stats won't read much better, we don't put crosses into the box and we totally bypass the midfield by thumping it every time. No worried about moore at all, if the service comes then so will last seasons prolific keiffer moore

Simply put. Moore is the sort of player that gets teams promoted.

That comment by Glen is baffling, Kieffer has never been promoted from this league. But to the point of discussion…

Whilst I think Moore is a great player it’s going to be much harder for him to get as many as he did last year. He had 20 goals as our main focal point of attack last season, but we also had the likes of Wilson who interested the opposition’s defence although he was pretty poor for us. This season our attacking 3 have consisted of the likes of Harris, Collins and Bacuna. And add to that the fact we’ve become so obviously one dimensional now it’s easier for the opposition to double up on Kieffer. And we offer very little elsewhere, and like it or not his link up play/flick on’s are average at best the majority of the time. I worry that unless we change manager (or MM finally realises there’s more than one way to play football) he will continue to be nullified.

Our second ball retention this season must be as low as it’s been for years. Another problem with our one dimensional football, we’ll even see defenders drop off Moore just to mop up the second ball. We’ve simply not got enough creativity to do much else though unfortunately. Will Vaulks must be the most anti football midfielder to ever play for us. I’ve never seen a midfielder miss so many short passes. I would go as far as to say our football under Slade was more enjoyable, at least I still had the excitement to watch the games when he was managing. MM is making it more of a chore than a hobby with this current style. But I’ll still turn up regardless, at least it gets me out of Swansea for the day!!!

It's very frustrating to watch. We have one of the best strikers in the league and we don't seem to know how to use him this season. I'm not expecting the supply to be the same without Wilson's creativity, but the number of times he brought the ball down in good opposition territory on Saturday and no one was within 20 yards of him was ridiculous. He's completely isolated up there. Although I don't think Collins is the answer by any means (and 4-4-2 is old hat), at least he had some support alongside him when he came on. Keiffer thrives off receiving the ball in the box... it's a shame we don't have anyone there to put it in

Dinosaur of a manager simple as that, at least Russell Slade tried to pass the ball.....sometimes. Long throw ins and then Flint and Morrison just jog back. Shocking to watch but we have seen worse... or have we?

Kieffer Moore out on the wing...makes sense?

BOB BANK BLUEBIRD

a famous pairing upfront keegan and toshack you could' nt have got much better.

The game on Saturday left me baffled KM runs his bollocks off wins the aerial ball and no CCFC players within 25 feet of him??
Someone explain ? A child could see there was no support. He will be an asset to a club which can provide him with second touch assistance. At the moment his role is about as much use as a chocolate fireguard if he has no support. What are these people looking at ????????

I think most of us agree on the problem here.
It's the lack of quality service to him, along with support around him.
Take Giles away and with Tomlin no longer appearing to be in the running, we lack the quality of service and support required at this level.