Ashley Young free kicks - why?

[darren woolley]

I would like us to vary our takers and the way in which we take them it would make our opponents think twice about what we going to do which is a good thing.

[ozzjim]

I thought away in the cup at Sheffield he had a poor afternoon, but since he has played well in all the games he has been in. If that shot had dropped an inch and gone in at United he would be a genius again. The free kick thing - he has scored from free kicks this season for all the bad ones, not many have even managed that in the league.

[TonyD]

AY has recently shown a great deal of passion and effort.  But for all his time on the ball he produces very little and he freekick are terrible.   

[Chris Smith]

AY has recently shown a great deal of passion and effort.  But for all his time on the ball he produces very little and he freekick are terrible.   

As pointed out elsewhere he was involved in goals against Man City, Wigan and Manu, that's a pretty good return.

[Linus]

And I seem to remember at least a dozen goals from free-kicks...

[Villa'Zawg]

He's currently in the top 10 for goal assists in the PL this season, as he has been every season since he joined the club. I would guess that he has been one of the top 3 for assists over his 3 complete seasons.

He is an exceptional footballer.

[BannedUserIAT]

Of course he's in the top 10. He tries to do it all himself. I think if he gave the ball up a lot more, he'd still be high on the assist-list, but we'd be scoring a lot more freely from other avenues.

[ktvillan]

His dead ball delivery has been poor for a long time now, apart from his pens which seem to have improved considerably from a couple of feeble efforts he had saved a while ago.

He's a bit of a paradox to me, he annoys the hell out of me by repeatedly taking the wrong options or going to ground, and wasting good possession.  Yet he still makes more happen for us than pretty much any other player, I just wish he'd do it more often and more consistently, use his brain a bit more.  He could learn a lot from the likes of Giggs or Nani at ManYoo.  Annoying as he is you do often really notice it when he isn't playing, that there seems to be some spark of invention missing.

[fredm]

His great ability is running at people with the ball at pace.  To cause the most harm to the opposition he needs to be doing this at their defenders.  To be in a position to do this he must start further up the field not in the middle of the park.

IMO he needs to be told to play as a front man with licence to roam across the field, not stick to the touchline, to collect through balls and run at the defence and then either shoot himself, as per Man City, or cross for the other forwards.

If he does this and sets his stall out, he could be our "Ronaldo".

[glasses]

I suppose this goes against popular opinion, but Id like to point out on here that his free kicks were good today.

[Holtenderinthesky]

And I seem to remember at least a dozen goals from free-kicks...

Against?