Walsall 0 Wolves 4
By Tom Bason
July 21 2010
Last night Wolves beat Walsall 4-0, with Sam Vokes scoring twice in addition to goals from Ashley Hemmings and Sylvan Ebanks-Blake
Carl Ikeme: very little to do, but looked confident and assured in what he did.
Richard Stearman: bit of a headless chicken at times, including a sliding lunge in the first half that would probably have resulted in a caution in a competitive match.
Danny Batth: looked relatively untroubled defensively, strong in the air and composed on the ball. A couple of times he tried difficult passes that better teams would have cut out.
George Elokobi: I have nightmares at the thought of George playing centre-back, but he actually looked decent and appeared to enjoy the responsibility of being the senior defender.
Scott Malone: grew into the role of leftback, and provided the cross for Sam Vokes' first. Wasn't helped by a lack of experience directly in front of him. Took a succession of good inswinging corners in the second half.
Greg Halford: stuck out wide, in a position he clearly isn't fond of, and as a result he found himself drifting inside. Always looked to attack his fullback when he got the chance, but a lack of confidence led to him turning down a decent shooting opportunity in the second half.
Kevin Foley: busy and tidy as ever, I'm not sure I can remember him giving the ball away once. He still struggles to really impact the game from the centre of midfield. Captain for the night.
Dave Edwards: worked tirelessly as normal, up and down the pitch. Maybe didn't get beyond the strikers as much as would have liked, and his final ball was poor, both from open play and set pieces.
Ashley Hemmings: some awesome finishing in the warm-up, took his goal neatly and that was about it. Struggled to make any sort of impact whatsoever and he will be thoroughly disappointed not to have made more of this chance
Sylvan Ebanks-Blake: looked leaner than last season, and worked hard. He drifted in and out of the game, but showed flashes of excellence and showed his old predatory instinct to shrug off a defender and lash home beyond the keeper.
Sam Vokes: bit of a mixed bag- his hold-up play was poor at times, but took his goals well (unusually for him, both were with his feet). Worked hard upfront when out of possession, but wasn't really involved with the game.
None of the subs really had time to make that much of an impact, so I won't go into detail. Aaron McCarey came for one cross well, but was otherwise untroubled. Jody Craddock and Christophe Berra were as solid as you'd expect them to be, while John Dunleavy and Jelle Van Damme both looked to push forward. Van Damme is perhaps one of the only people in the world I'd back in a scrap with Elokobi. He looks tough as nails. The easiest way to some up Karl Henry's performance is to say that he played just like Karl Henry does, while David Jones was busy in midfield and was always looking to be on the ball. On one flank, Sam Winnall looked bright and inventive, although his final ball needs work while Matt Jarvis was direct and dangerous. Upfront, Stephen Fletcher was lively, while Kevin Doyle was so desperate to score he was bordering on being downright selfish.
The tactical view
I'm only going to assess the tactics before the mass substitution. We played a fairly simple 4-4-2 system with a reasonably high back line, meaning space was behind it. However, our quick pressing combined with Walsall's poor passing and lack of pace upfront meant that Batth and Elokobi especially were completely untroubled. Malone was an orthodox leftback. His forays’ forward were limited though, as Hemmings tended to hug the touchline, closing up the space that Malone looked to get into. On the other side however, Stearman attempted to get forward at every possible opportunity. This was possible as Halford drifted inside to the centre of the pitch, opening up the space for Stearman to stride into. At other times, Halford was perfectly happy to drop back into the rightback spot, showing a good sense of positioning.
In midfield, Foley generally sat deeper while Edwards attempted to get forward. Given the limited ability of the opposition, Edwards will be disappointed he didn't break beyond the strikers to get nearer to goal. Upfront, Ebanks-Blake and Vokes seemed to have a decent understanding- they very rarely played on the same line with one often dropping deep while the other looked to stretch the opposition defence. Unfortunately, this understanding without the ball didn't extend to when they had the ball, and there was very little linkup between them.
Given the distinct lack of experience down the left flank, it was no surprise that the majority of our attacking threat came through the foraging Stearman down the right or the neat and tidy passing of Foley and Edwards.
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