Just more about what defines what is regarded as good shooting technique, what generates power, just general information about striking the ball for shots and how the ball should be struck for different types of shots.
I play football on weekends and i'm always interested in learning more about pretty much everything, in terms of shooting ts good to have a better understanding of players technique and see where some go wrong. I have my own theories on Coutinhos shooting and where he's going wrong, but it would be good to know more about how the ball should actually be struck for different types of shots and have a better all round understanding of it.
Cheers for the link BabuYagu, much appreciated
All striking technique starts from the general body shape and hip position in relation to the incoming path of the ball and the outgoing path of the ball, then goes to the position of the plant foot, up through the standing leg (unless it's a bicycle kick), across the hips, up to the upper body and head position, arm position for balance, and then down through the striking leg incorporating back-lift and/or hip flexor power generation, contact area of the foot, part of the ball being struck, follow through, and landing/placement of the kicking foot after the strike.
In my opinion and observation, Coutinho's hip position is often too narrow to the target he's aiming for, and so he tends to have a smaller margin of error, and so pulls the ball wide more often than not.
If he could generate more power with less torque of the hips, he could probably get the shots more on target with a flatter contact and approach. The way he strikes the ball now though (through the centre, diagonally across the ball, above the centre line of the ball, and with a rotating follow through), he leaves himself almost no chance of "getting it right by getting it wrong" - which is actually a hallmark of Suarez's shooting. Suarez cares less for technical perfection and more for chance and luck - so he takes a huge amount of technically imperfect shots, but scores a high amount of goals because a lot of his shots are just close enough to technically perfect to go beyond the keeper's reach, but not hit in a technically perfect manner. Sturridge and Coutinho, to my mind, suffer from the same mindset in their shooting (looking for the perfect placement), although Sturridge will take more chances than Coutinho does. But nobody in the Premier League took more chances than Suarez in terms of their technical execution of a shot, and there's a lesson to be learned there. To score, "just good enough" is perfectly acceptable.
