Keep reading and hearing that under Mark we are so much better away from home and the performances will/have got us better results.
Having watched almost all the away games(live/TV/Web) its clear we are more expansive in our play and gone is the ridged defensive unit we had, and yes even with that we have conceded less goals than last season away from home. But the facts/stats do not show Hughes is doing better.
Away records for both Managers:
Roy Pld 47 W 7 D 18 L 22 F-33 A-59 Pts 39. Avg pts over a season would be 15/16 pts.
Mark Pld 17 W 1 D 9 L 7 F-14 A-20 Pts 12. Avg pts over a season would be 13/14 pts.
Not miles apart, but still clear that over time Roy was not the disaster away from home some Roy revisionists would make out, and results wise Mark still has a little bit to do.
Here are our positions in the past lge table just for away games:
In brackets is where we were in the home lge table.
10-11 16th (10)
09-10 15th (8)
08-09 9th (6)
07-08 12th (19)
06-07 17th (14)
05-06 20th (7)
04-05 14th (13)
03-04 9th (8)
02-03 17th (7)
01-02 14th (11)
I would go with Mark. At least he attacks and try's to win the game.
Our away record had been poor for a long time now and under quite a few managers i.e. Coleman, Sanchez, Hodgson and now Sparky. O.K, I'd admit that Sparky is trying to get us to play more attacking football away from home and actually try's to win games but again, I can only see us only pulling off 1 away win again this season. Don't get me wrong, I trust in Sparky being the man to sort this out next season and I honestly think we'll see 5-6 away wins next season but this has been let to become some kind of hoodoo now at Fulham and it needs breaking!! Even Woy has got West Brom winning away and pulling off draws at Tottenham so we can't blame him.
Mark Hughes because under Hughes we go for it more.
However if Roy could play away with us like he is with West Brom, then that's a frightening thought. Champions League places could have been beckoning.
Are we better? I think we could argue that we are better to watch away from home. Hughes makes attacking subs when Roy didn't. Hughes clearly goes for it when Roy settled for a point. Roy stuck to a rigid game plan that on the whole worked. Roys type of game plan was ideal fro European games. But we were caught out late in games. So far under Hughes we haven't. But stats are a bit awkward when we a comparing Roy with Hughes (less than a season)
So the bottom line is. Hughes is our manager now and I like to watch his team. Under Roy we were successful but were at times dull to watch.
But were we better away? Better to look at is as far as I am willing to go.
Two strange stats are that only 6 teams have lost fewer away games and two teams conceded fewer goals.
Of course we draw too many but we're not a soft touch away. We need to score more obviously but are clearly trying to do that. We're not going away looking for 0-0.
