For the love of God, keep Messi out of the midfield. Every game he comes high up in the midfield to get the ball. His passes out there are fuckng shit. Just easily gobbled up, shit passes to no one as he runs head-on into a defender. His passing in the final third is still wonderful as witnessed by his collection of assists during his few game scoring draught. Our possession game should not, and apparently can not rely on Messi coming high and getting the ball. He was doing it earlier under Valverde and Quique has let it continue.
I mean, I strongly disagree with this. But it in the last few games his been trying to do entirely too much. He looked awful against Napoli because he’d run headlong into like three defenders trying to pull off his blistering dribbles of yesteryear. it’s annoying that qique is utilizing Vidal so much; he should only be brought on to fuck shit up in the last 20 minutes. Semedo melting down in the second half after a brilliant first was disappointing. The only player that looked great today was Pique; dude looked years younger. His OG was unfair to him, as he and MATS were the only reason this wasn’t a blowout. And great saves aside, he had some real head-scratchers today in distribution. I’d like to see Braithwaite start up front next game.
Completely agree about Vidal. His energy when coming on as a sub in the last 20-30 mins was so good. Starting him as the 9 today, wtf!? Also agree with Braithwaite. Hope he can fill some of the Saurez hole.
Bartomeu has to go this summer. Bring Laporta or Font in immediately. Let Xavi take over and get the Club back to being what we're used to.
There is just so much wasted money on this god damn team it’s ridiculous. Neymar really fucked us leaving as did Dembeles injuries and coutinho mixing like oil and water. Couple that with now seemingly selling as low as possible with Rakitic and potentially Arthur and I just don’t get it. I don’t get an Arthur/Pjanic swap, I don’t get the rumored Semedo swap. Semedo has much more a future at rb than Sergi as much as I love him. I don’t mind offloading Umtiti as he can’t seem to stay healthy but who is the replacement?
I agree, Neymar leaving fucked is in unimaginable ways. I love Dembele and I hope he can stay healthy but that doesn't seem to be the case. A competent President and Board wouldn't let Semedo or Arthur go unless it was in a Neymar swap. But Bartomeu and his band of idiots are destroying the Club more and more. We definitely need Laporta or Font to become the next President and restore order. This fucking Club have wasted too many of Messi's prime years with bad signings and mediocre coaches.
Ansu 8 starts, 5 goals (so far) And Firpo absolutely leveled that dude to clear some space for his assist.
Just terrible game management from Qique. How do you only use 3 of 5 available subs after coming off a game on Tuesday? Inexcusable.
Oh midfield is so bad right now. Today's lineup sucks ass. (I know Frenkie's out rn) Busquets still has vision and incredible game sense but has lost more than one step. Can cover for it still with great passing. Without getting into today's rumors, Arthur just hasn't shown it these two years. He's slow. His positioning is not great. His passing is mostly just ok. He's shown flashes but not enough Vidal doesn't fit right. He makes runs and is aggressive, which would be better if we had two other strong mids to feed him. But we don't have the mids to really feed our actual forwards! I love Vidal as a 60' or 70' sub. Idk. Just frustrated and ranting
Yes. That was a high energy 30 minutes. Puig, Frenkie, Busquets is maybe the best we've got in the right now. An established stud midfielder should be out target in the next window
Puig was amazing. Not sure he should be starting but needs to be on the field way more than he has been.
Messi, ter Stegen, de Jong, Puig, Semedo and Pique should start every match and play all 90 mins. Other than those 6, this team is pretty much done.
that's the default response to all of puto's posts, also you were sporting the Real crest in your 'fan of' for a while so I would hope so you asshole
That 2nd Suarez goal so nice. God I love Suarez. Anyone that thinks Griezmann can replace Suarez is braindead. They are not even close to being on the same level. This draw sucks. But there was a lot to like in our game today. We were missing Busquets and de Jong and still had good control and some quality attacks
Griezmann is just a different player. And he hasn’t found out where he fits in this team. He may not fit at all. He looked more in tune with the attack in the preseason than he does now.
Remember when soulfly used to be a fan and laugh at Real for churning through managers and seemingly have no direction? Simpler times, those.
Wasn't able to watch the Celta game, but this board is just so fucking short sighted and lost. The club needs to stop square peg-round hole-ing players like Coutinho and Greizmann among plenty of others. When's the last time the formation was changed to try something new? Clearly the shit isn't working no matter who the manager is and tiki-taka has lost a lot of it's bite.
I personally think teams have figured out how to defend it. Pep doesn't use it at City anymore. I definitely agree that outside reinforcements have been way too heavily relied upon and too little attention is paid to La Masia players, but it's a little column A, a little column B. Beating the current 4-3-3 to death and not using players that the club has spent 100s of millions on to their best ability has us firmly in a position to not win shit this year.
Pep absolutely bases City in tiki taka possession football. He's just evolved it and modified it as needed. But you watch City and it is all about passing. You see those damn triangles out there all over the field
But that's not what I'm here to argue about. I'm here to wonder wtf Pjanic for Arthur gains us other than a balanced book for the year. Jesus fuck
Well, if he hated it 6 years ago in that article it sure is taking him a long time to go away from it. Watching them these last two weeks, there sure as fuck is a lot of possession passing. Horizontal and pressing forward looking for the opening. Sure fucking looks like tiki taka at it's core
that was more a reaction to the tone not the content. I don’t watch city but a friend is a city fan and told me they don’t really play tiki taka anymore and there are a few articles I found that kinda confirmed. I’m not going to pretend that I know what has to change but we’ve been trending this direction since 2016 and it’s become even more apparent after we lost Neymar’s creativity and iniesta aged.