I remember when Tony Pulis was in charge he used to count Boro's crosses almost as pseudo shots on goal and proof of his team's attacking prowess. Though in the end what is cross but a pass from out wide - it should be judged on whether it was ultimately an accurate pass to player or simply a wayward punt in the general direction of goal.

Perhaps the concept of crossing is different now because there are very few old-fashioned selfish centre-forwards whose raison d'etre (not a phrase they would have used I guess) was challenging in the six-yard box. These days centre-forwards tend to hold the ball up or go wide in order to bring others into play.

Thanks Martin, this was a typically excellent piece by one of the best football writer we have at the moment.

Whilst there are excellent crossers like de Bruyne, Andy Robertson, Alexander-Arnold etc, my objection to Pulis's tactics was that he counted the number of crosses made as a measure of our creativity and attacking intent.  He was continually complaining that we were unlucky, that the ball never ran for us etc. when in fact we were satisfied  with throwing or punting the ball 'into the mix' and hoping that something might turn up.

I was a little disappointed when NW said something similar recently, counting the number of crosses we were putting in as though this were a satisfactory metric of our inventiveness rather than our attacking limitations.

@len

Reece James at Chelsea is the best crosser of a ball I’ve seen this season