Ernesto Valverde - V1

maldhowayanr said:

I believe this is exactly what EV was thinking. It could be insanity, but I like to call it bravery. It is a matter of perspective. I saw subbing off Dembele as an invitation. I could, sort of, understand that sub if it were 1-0, but not 1-1.

What is so scary about risking not losing 3 points in a competition that we won last season and we will have a chance of winning it every season?

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Fair enough, like you said, it looks like we have a totally different view and perspective of the game and therefore everyone finds his opinion the correct one.

I personally would never leave a team with two midfielders and three forwards with ten men (two of which would be a huge liability when we need to press and defend)... I just cannot see how this is going to work at all.

Also, when you have players with such individual quality, you know you will always get your chances (chances that we certainly had and could have easily won that match) so I do not think at all that Valverde played it safe subbing off Dembele, that was just the only option in my eyes...

Cule4life said:

But he has to show more balls in benching under performing senior players like Pique.

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Bench them for whom? I've been saying this for sometimes but our bench isn't half good as people claiming it to be.
Who can replace Pique? injury prone Vermaelen? elbow man Lenglet?
Suarez? well may be Malcom could prove to be replacement but he is a winger who is more of a playmaker too , Messi kept saying 199 times he need a striker like Suarez to open things for him. And tbf Suarez has been doing well lately.
Raki and Busquets still looks like our best midifelders unfortunately, Vidal and Arthur might provide room for rest but won't bench them anytime soon

^ I understand.

I would like to get something off. In football, one side attacks the other defends. It is either you or they.

Why are we defending 1 lead lately? SFC almost got us because of it. Same with Real Valladolid and EV's conservative"it has a few other names too" football is what ruined our last season against Roma.

Do you remember what happened between Madrid and PSG in their first leg? It was 1-1 and the 79 ZZ did not decide to defend and have a better chance in the second leg, he instead took off Casimiro for Vaz. A RW for a CDM when the score was 1-1. See? While UE took off Cavani for a RB.

I do not really care much about our draw because it is too early. The issue is that EV decided to play safely in such a game. If we are not attacking GFC at our stadium, what makes you think we will attack against better opponents?

EV lineups and style of football are a bit, I would say, too conservative to go far in the CL. He never learned from Roma game because he did not understand what went wrong and this is what bothers me. He did not get it and has shown that multiple times. He will do that again. It is just the way he is. I find it sad, it really is.

We didn't win yesterday because of the red card and that's clear. IMHO The draw against Girona is not a problem, this things happen and Real will also for sure lose some points elsewhere but there are certain things I really don't like and we will have troubles if we don't solve them out soon.

1. We don't have a backup for Alba and as things stand right now Miranda is definitely not ready to step up. We might be forced to go shopping in January or we might get into a trouble.
2. We have a big problem on the right side. Messi is drifting towards the center of the field which would not be a problem if we had a RB like Dani Alves but we have hybrid RB Roberto and an average RB Semedo. None of those two can cover a huge gap on the right side. Semedo is bad in attack while Roberto is bad in defense. Stronger opponents will for sure use that against us AGAIN!
3. We don't have a clear system, the formation we are playing is not a proper 4-3-3 because of two reasons, we basically don't have a RW and on the other side we have Coutinho + Dembele + Alba. All those three players are much stronger in attack than defense. 90% of the time Rakitic and Busi are playing double pivots while Coutinho is playing some kind of attacking midfielder with no defending duties. I don't understand why are we so reluctant to try out 4-2-3-1 formation?
4. We have a clear problem with our centre backs. I am not saying they are not good but all of them have some blackout moments and that needs to be fixed ASAP.
5. There is also one more thing which I don't like. Our fullbacks go to attack way to often and that creates acres of space on the back. That tactic is maybe OK on the left side but on the right where we don't have a proper RW this could be suicidal against stronger teams. We are basically forced to defend with 2 players against counter attacks. IMHO the way we are using our fullbacks could cost us many points this season. That being said Pique also needs to stop going forward all of the time. We have too many talented midfielders and attackers in the squad so I really don't see any need for Pique going to the opponents penalty box all of the time.

Those are some observations from my side which I really find problematic for now.

Yeah it's very clear the team is very lopsided and results in very ineffective attacking options. I still dont see how lumping Dembele and Coutinho and Alba in one side will be a good idea.

Red card or not, these problems are clear every week and are yet to be rectified. Now it's even clear the defence is also a major issue but we are still sticking with the old guards like Pique.

The bench doesnt seem that developed as well. Seeing more Vidal every other week than the others. Vidal is supposed to be a small role considering his age but again old guards.

Not too optimistic about the upcoming games. Gonna be a tough week.

khaled_a_d said:

Bench them for whom? I've been saying this for sometimes but our bench isn't half good as people claiming it to be.
Who can replace Pique? injury prone Vermaelen? elbow man Lenglet?
Suarez? well may be Malcom could prove to be replacement but he is a winger who is more of a playmaker too

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It's one game accident happens let's not pretend he's worse. Also it's not about benching them permanently it's about sending a message.

khaled_a_d said:

Bench them for whom? I've been saying this for sometimes but our bench isn't half good as people claiming it to be.
Who can replace Pique? injury prone Vermaelen? elbow man Lenglet?
Suarez? well may be Malcom could prove to be replacement but he is a winger who is more of a playmaker too , Messi kept saying 199 times he need a striker like Suarez to open things for him. And tbf Suarez has been doing well lately.
Raki and Busquets still looks like our best midifelders unfortunately, Vidal and Arthur might provide room for rest but won't bench them anytime soon

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Injury prone Vermaelen and elbow man Lenglet are probably better than Piqué. Not hard to be so with the way he's been playing.

The pass map from yesterday is quite something.

Doesn't tell us that much really.

Joan Laporta said:

Doesn't tell us that much really.

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Complete opposite what We normally have, no?

The weird part I find is how active the right side is in terms of passing and how shoved up Pique was compared to Lenglet was.

It's like all three of the Midfielders gradually moved towards the right side while the left side is like kinda alone going by the passing map. I wonder how much of that passing map is actually screwed up with Lenglet's sending off in the first half.

Joan Laporta said:

Doesn't tell us that much really.

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It certainly does.

henias said:

It certainly does.

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Not sure if it does. Umtiti's action doesn't seem included and maybe means the action that followed up is excluded as well.
Also only shows action up until 70th minute. So left side could've looked more involved if it was up until 90th minute.

I generally tend to look at these pass maps cum grano salis. Especially this one. 1) Lenglet sent off in 34th minute, didn't play for 36 minutes 2) Dembele there, didn't play for 25 minutes 3) Umtiti not there, played for 25 minutes 4) Couts not there, played for 13 minutes (in the given span). 4 players who are not represented well - played on the left side. Whoscored says (not the same stat, I know) 23% of attacks went through left side, 43 through right. Furthermore, positions (and shape) of some performers is influenced by the team being down on ten men and us chasing the result. Of course you can draw some conclusions, but not much there.

xXKonan said:

The pass map from yesterday is quite something.

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quite something indeed.. shows that dembele is not a part of the collective system