Smith Rowe

[alfie]

ESR a bit of an enigma for me.  Just not sure how good this player really is.  Thought he had fairly good games v Villa and Liverpool.  This game v Arsenal, just not very impressive.  As others have pointed out, not sure what his role is or is supposed to be.  I do know this, dribbling forward, he has to be one of the slowest players on the pitch.  Seems his value will only be in final third, making quick short passes with teammates until someone can present themselves as being open for that goal scoring opportunity.  Just not sure this team is really set up to do that, at least on a somewhat regular basis.  Right now, his only value seems to be more on defending, which, to his credit, he has contributed.

You have made the point, we are not set up to play fast short range passing, but that is not ESR's fault, it's how Silva wants to play.

[bahay18]

When he first arrived the play down the left with iwobi/nelson and Robinson was excellent. We don't seem to play like that anymore .

I think he tries hard but that's not what he was bought to do . He needs to do more with the ball . Now this can be because we don't have anyone making forward runs beyond the striker , hence no goals from midfield . But there are many times he plays the ball first time backwards when in acres of space , maybe he doesn't get a call but he should be aware . When he is presented with one on one with a full back he has to take him more , that's what he is there for . All our wingers with the exception of maybe Kevin are guilty of this .

I'm sure there is a player in there and would love to see the one that at times has threatened to break out .

[fulhamfan]

I can't remember anything that ESR had done in a game since we signed him

[Coastwalker]

The Ovation he gets from Arsenal Fans tells me we are not getting the player they've seen at the Emirates Stadium.For what reason I don't know.

Of course we're not.
Last season at the Cottage he had a chance to score inside the box but passed it to a marked player,didn't want to score against them.
They are his love,and he still wants to be at theirs,it's obvious.

[Deeping_white]

There's a thread on a different offensively minded player every week at the moment, and at this point I think we really ought to park them all until October when we've likely had chance to see what a team under a new manager will do with fresh ideas, because at this point it looks like Silva is leaving. Our forward play has fallen off a cliff into parkerball territory and the players are following the managers tactics, which seem to be more about containment than actually taking the game to other teams. Our creativity is through the floor and we don't play particularly penetrative football so I don't know how you can fairly judge any of our attacking players when they're getting no help from the system or one another.

If you watch any other PL team, they get themselves into positions to shoot from open play, whereas with us it seems to be 80% of the time we recycle sideways and put in a cross with the other 20% being the odd occasion we actually break at pace and manufacture a decent oppportunity