Barca 2016 summer signings

Bojan said:

Stumbled upon piece on Sport which said that of 6 Barca signings this summer only Denis and Umtiti impressed so far.

Would you agree?

Imo. Umtiti, Denis and Digne are doing well not exactly impressing (5/5). While Gomes, Paco and Jasper have been flops so far.

Click to expand...

3 months since that post. What changed?

Umtiti - improved. From good to great.
Denis - made a step back. Still ok imo.
Digne - still good
Gomes - still flop
Paco - still flop
Jasper - improved. Good signing.

Umtiti is a great signing. Jasper too.

Digne is ok, nothing special but can give Alba some rest.

Denis, Gomes and Paco are all underwhelming to me. I'd sell them all in the summer.

But, but, when we signed Jasper many people said he is a bad keeper. Now he's not a bad keeper anymore? He has improved? It's more plausible that he was a good keeper all along and some just talked shit before even seeing him in action. Like it happens with a lot of players.

Anyway.

Umtiti - great & improving
Gomes - good & improving
Jaspeer - good
Denis and Paco - okay & improving
Digne - good back-up, nothing more, nothing less

Most of our new signings are on the way up. Improving and getting better. Cillessen being man of the match against Atletico and saving our asses proves people are experts at talking shit about players they don't know and don't rate.

All of them are balancing from okay to niiiiice in my book apart from Gomes, Paco & Denis Suarez who are below expectations.

FlaFCB said:

Umtiti is a great signing. Jasper too.

Digne is ok, nothing special but can give Alba some rest.

Denis, Gomes and Paco are all underwhelming to me. I'd sell them all in the summer.

Click to expand...

Agree with every one.


The chance of the board doing that after a year is nearly impossible which is frustrating. I'd maybe keep Denis as a sub.. and use funds from the other two for a world class starting midfielder.

I'd even keep Arda for the bench and probably sell Rakitic.. but it's not football manager

serghei said:

But, but, when we signed Jasper many people said he is a bad keeper. Now he's not a bad keeper anymore? He has improved? It's more plausible that he was a good keeper all along and some just talked shit before even seeing him in action. Like it happens with a lot of players.

Click to expand...

Or de la Fuente is very good at his job. Bravo going downhill at city, Jasper improving, could be a sign of that. I saw Jasper twice live during the 2014 wc. Just 2 matches, but he didn't impress me. while Keylor Navas did.

Both Bravo and Jasper are good keepers. I also saw Bravo at the World Cup, and said he is a very good keeper. Turned out he was, and even captained his team to a double Copa America win. I also said that Cillessen is a good keeper, and now he is begining to show he has qualities. Being Man of the Match in a game where your defence failed you, and doing that in a decisive game vs Atletico, that is called being a good keeper.

And everybody's going downhill at City, because Pep is implementing a style without the right material.

Umtiti great signing.

Digne is ok, should improve his defending especially in one vs. one situations but as a backup to Alb is fine for the moment.

Jasper also ok though he didn't got enough minutes as to fully show what is capable of.

Denis started well but lost momentum, an ok singing given the little amount spent on him but still he didn't convince me so this is hot and cold.

Gomes flop even if he imrpoved a bit lately.

Paco flop.

serghei said:

Both Bravo and Jasper are good keepers. I also saw Bravo at the World Cup, and said he is a very good keeper. Turned out he was, and even captained his team to a double Copa America win. I also said that Cillessen is a good keeper, and now he is begining to show he has qualities. Being Man of the Match in a game where your defence failed you, and doing that in a decisive game vs Atletico, that is called being a good keeper.

And everybody's going downhill at City, because Pep is implementing a style without the right material.

Click to expand...

Pep's bad implementation or not doesn't stop Bravo from making saves. Any save at all actually.

I didn't see you attributing ter Stegen's bad performances to our defensive frailties compared to previous seasons.

DonAK said:

Pep's bad implementation or not doesn't stop Bravo from making saves. Any save at all.

I didn't see you attributing ter Stegen's bad performances to our defensive fragilities compared to previous seasons.

Click to expand...

No. Low confidence and poor form do that. However, a bad patch, and overall bad quality are two things that often get confused around here. Bravo showed his quality with Barca and Chile for years, not for a few weeks. His quality has been demonstrated. Now it's only a question of him showing it. At the moment he is not showing it with City, partly because of his own fault, partly because the whole defence of that team is a mess.

Most of the guys here say X player is shit because he plays badly some games, then say he is great when he plays well. But the player is the same, his quality was there 6 months ago like it is there today. Like Cillessen. He was as good 6 months ago as he is now. That didn't change. What is starting to change is fans reactions to him, because of one solid performance. They started saying he is shit (a lot from here), now they are saying he is actually pretty good. This is not right, the fans perspective of a player's quality to change so quickly. It means the initial assessment was faulty to being with.

I defended Stegen several times as well. Like when I said it was not his fault vs Betis, and that he was fouled. But the comparison for Stegen is not Bravo from City, it is Bravo from Barcelona, and he didn't do as many mistakes as Stegen does, granted the german is getting back to a good level. Plus, what a keeper does at a new team in his first year in a new league is not that relevant to what Stegen does in his 3rd year at Barcelona.

Awesome:
Umtiti 9/10

Ok:
Cillessen 7/10
Gomes 6/10
Digne 6/10

Poor:
Denis 3/10
Paco 0,1/10

Unexpected surprise from out of nowhere: Vidal

Right now:
Denis: it was basically a player called from loan,he is always a good addition for the money. worst case would get more than we paid. Think he will be very useful squad player for years to go.
Gomes: The weird one,he can look good,bad,gr8,awful during the same game. he doesn't fit the system but he is young talented player. Think he is one to hold judgement till next year.
Paco: flop,stilll think there is hope for him but right now can't call him otherwise

Cillessen : Gr8 addition for Barca GK
Umtiti : Very good signing
Digne : Very good back up LB for the money,good signing

Umtiti = Awesomesauce. Great signing.

Jasper + Digne = Decent enough for backups. Good signings.

Denis = I'm not sure. I don't think he has a defined role in the team just yet. Undecided.

Paco + Gomes = Mega floppity flop! Money down the drain.

This review is better done after season ends. Good thing is that all of them are young players and time is on their side. Paco has been worse, but in recent games looked better, so maybe some more game time would do miracles. Rest have all performed as i expected them to perform in their first season. Very positively surprised about Umtiti and Digne.

khaled_a_d said:

Right now:
Denis: it was basically a player called from loan,he is always a good addition for the money. worst case would get more than we paid. Think he will be very useful squad player for years to go.
Gomes: The weird one,he can look good,bad,gr8,awful during the same game. he doesn't fit the system but he is young talented player. Think he is one to hold judgement till next year.
Paco: flop,stilll think there is hope for him but right now can't call him otherwise

Cillessen : Gr8 addition for Barca GK
Umtiti : Very good signing
Digne : Very good back up LB for the money,good signing

Click to expand...

I'm curious what makes you say Paco is a flop after 6 months? Do you think he is a bad player incapable of helping the team in the future, or do you think he is a good player, but he will not be able to show it at Barca? I think he is a good player, who hasn't had the chance to show it yet. Very few games, and most in which he featured where games in which a lot of important players were rested. So I would not call him a flop, because being a flop means having many chances and failing. Paco hasn't had many chances to prove himself so far. Not enough to call him a flop anyway for me.

Do you think he has had enough chances to show he is good and didn't show it? I don't think he has. IIRC, he has played only one time as a starter with Messi and Neymar next to him and he scored an important goal.

I consider all players except Digne to be of better quality than what we are seeing so far, and it is almost inevitable for them to perform better if we trust them. I think Digne is as good as we're seeing , while the rest of the players have more ability in them than people realise. Especially Paco and Gomes.

I would not be surprised one bit to see Paco score again today if he plays. If we don't play a B team, in which case it becomes harder for him, because the service is of lower quality.