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Conor Hourihane


dont_do_it_doug.

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He scored a set piece, which is great of course, but he is only starting week in week out for me if you can guarantee goals most games because his general play doesn't offer enough. Saying a player is a certain starter because he  scored from a dead ball I always find a strange reason. He might deserve his chance to reclaim his spot because of it but it wouldn't change my mind much about him playing every week.

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I have mixed feelings on him.....love his goals, but have reservations about the mundane aspects of a game......doesn't win enough ball for me.....i know he's not a "ball winner" but players have to chip in with the ugly stuff.

Dack is not a ball winner, but displays a defiance on the ball and mixes it with the opposition.....I would like to see Conor do more of that.

He needs to seize the initiative more.......We have too many players leaving it to someone else, instead of seizing the initiative.

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36 minutes ago, Reivax_Villa said:

Hourihane is a natural deep lying playmaker he has had to change his style since he has joined us to become a box to box midfielder.

For me he is one of our most effective players. 

Hourihane playing under a head coach we would really see him excel.

He has played that deep lying playmaker quite a bit for Villa really. That was an excuse about why he only had 2 assists last season. He does an ok job, but I don't know in what sense he could be one of our most effective players. He'd actually be a very good player if he had more pace but he gets caught out so much because he's a treacle runner, like most of our midfield tbh.

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2 hours ago, Reivax_Villa said:

Hourihane is a natural deep lying playmaker he has had to change his style since he has joined us to become a box to box midfielder.

For me he is one of our most effective players. 

Hourihane playing under a head coach we would really see him excel.

Disagree entirely. He is best running into the box getting shots away. More of an attacking midfielder than a cm. Don’t think he is good as a deep lying at all. His long range passing isn’t great, and his positional play is poor. Before he came here I’m pretty sure he was playing an attacking role.

The problem we have is that Jack should be playing the attacking role (Bruce gets him to be more of a dm, but that for another thread), so Conor has to play deeper if he wants to be in the team.

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7 hours ago, Trickster said:

He scored a set piece, which is great of course, but he is only starting week in week out for me if you can guarantee goals most games because his general play doesn't offer enough. Saying a player is a certain starter because he  scored from a dead ball I always find a strange reason. He might deserve his chance to reclaim his spot because of it but it wouldn't change my mind much about him playing every week.

he has the most assists in the Championship in the last 2 seasons and probably has the most goals from a midfielder in that time as well

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26 minutes ago, Zatman said:

he has the most assists in the Championship in the last 2 seasons and probably has the most goals from a midfielder in that time as well

A lot of those assists were for Barnsley. I'm not knocking him as a player but I don't think his performances make him a certain starter. He has played in a whole lot of our dire games where our midfield have been wafer thin where we have been murdered and ran through with ease. He gets the plaudits when he scores, but quite a few of those goals was from average to poor performances. Stats can elevate poor performances too high imo.

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8 hours ago, Trickster said:

He scored a set piece, which is great of course, but he is only starting week in week out for me if you can guarantee goals most games because his general play doesn't offer enough. Saying a player is a certain starter because he  scored from a dead ball I always find a strange reason. He might deserve his chance to reclaim his spot because of it but it wouldn't change my mind much about him playing every week.

He averaged about 1 in 4 last season, of which a lot of the time he was asked to play deeper. And Villa last year were hardly a  free flowing side.  No Villa midfield  player since Milner has scored as many goals in a season than Conor last year. I am not sure what you are on about.

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22 minutes ago, The Fun Factory said:

He averaged about 1 in 4 last season, of which a lot of the time he was asked to play deeper. And Villa last year were hardly a  free flowing side.  No Villa midfield  player since Milner has scored as many goals in a season than Conor last year. I am not sure what you are on about.

That stat about not since Milner is fair enough, he had a good goalscoring season last year. It has to be said in a poorer league though of course, it's only slightly comparable considering the shocking centre mids we've had since that time. I'd just rather midfielders play very well in midfield rather than needing goals to bump up their performance in a slightly false way. Saying that there'll be no complaints from me if he keeps scoring and gets 10-15 this season. I just think the games when he doesn't score tells more overall.

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28 minutes ago, Trickster said:

That stat about not since Milner is fair enough, he had a good goalscoring season last year. It has to be said in a poorer league though of course, it's only slightly comparable considering the shocking centre mids we've had since that time. I'd just rather midfielders play very well in midfield rather than needing goals to bump up their performance in a slightly false way. Saying that there'll be no complaints from me if he keeps scoring and gets 10-15 this season. I just think the games when he doesn't score tells more overall.

different leagues but last season performance from Hourihane was more than we got from Delph, Westwood, Gardner and few others in the entire Villa career

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7 hours ago, TRO said:

His goals are a real asset.....and he does get them with reasonable regularity.

someone has to be really at it.....to keep him out.

i don't think anyone really is right now.

Was he our second or third highest scorer last season? I agree TRO, until someone's knocking them in regularly from centre midfield he needs to be playing all the time. 

 

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If Hourihane is only good for set pieces, then why does McGinn start over him? McGinn's assists have been from dead ball situations. I'd argue both McGinn and Hourihane are quality at crossing in balls off set pieces, but other than that, what has McGinn done to justify benching Conor? 

McGinn doesn't create chances from open play. He doesn't get into scoring opportunities, and he isn't great defensively. Other than being a high energy player, what does McGinn bring?

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I still don't really understand the furore around him being "dropped".

I like Hourihane, but he plays as a part of 2 man attacking midfield (assuming we always have 1 DM). The other attacking midfielder is Grealish who I'm pretty sure we all agree should play.

So there's only one position to play for. 

We signed McGinn in the summer who also plays that position and seems to be pretty **** good.
So McGinn has gone into that position and Hourihane starting on the bench. But he's still got plenty of minutes, is performing well off the bench (competition helping perhaps) and I'm sure if he outperforms McGinn he'll be starting games again.

It's not like he's been bombed out and never used. He's not been shipped off on loan.

That's what having money (relatively speaking)is all about. You buy players for positions that you've already got players in (the discussion about we should have spent money on the defence is for another thread)

I'd like to see Hourihane getting a few more starts again if he keeps performing like this. But I don't see why it's such a big deal that he hasn't been starting.

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