4 - Ronald Araújo

I am not too optimistic about him.
He has the physical profile, and he has the determination too but his positioning leaves a lot to be desired tbh.
Still fairly young and could improve in this area.
One more thing, please stop raising your hand begging for offside call when chasing an attacker, very bad habit

Defenders usually need to be a bit older to fully develop in the positioning department.
He does have issues with it, but paired with a veteran he could actually be a better option than 2 veterans (who are really slow) together.

Shame, he was having a decent game.

My biggest concern is that he is heavy footed. Very fast centreback but starts heavy/flat footed so attackers can game half a yard on him.

It's fine over a sprint where he can make it up but in the box it will cost chances.

Positioning is OK (not Yerry Mina, Todibo bad) and will improve. On the ball average but again will get better.

But being naturally heavy on the feet will be the big one.

He's good and will be important, but I doubt he'll surpass someone like Lenglet. Level wise he might become the same, but with different traits and strengths.

khaled_a_d said:

I am not too optimistic about him.
He has the physical profile, and he has the determination too but his positioning leaves a lot to be desired tbh.
Still fairly young and could improve in this area.
One more thing, please stop raising your hand begging for offside call when chasing an attacker, very bad habit

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+1

On the other hand he can improve for sure. In contrast, Garcia has much better footballing skills and positioning but he lacks strength. IMHO we should have patience with him regardless of the fact that we will sign Garcia. Even with both of them here we will probably need to sign another strong and fast CB next summer.

khaled_a_d said:

I am not too optimistic about him.
He has the physical profile, and he has the determination too but his positioning leaves a lot to be desired tbh.
Still fairly young and could improve in this area.
One more thing, please stop raising your hand begging for offside call when chasing an attacker, very bad habit

Click to expand...

Being optimistic or not about him really depends on what expectations people have about Araujo. If someone expects him to be our longterm starter then I agree with you I'm not too optimistic about his chances to become that. But if we lower our expectations a bit I'm more optimistic he can become a solid squad/rotational CB for a few years (until we find someone better) at least. And if we can get that out of him and then sell him for a solid money I'd be more than happy. He was one of the many cheap CB signings we've made over the last 4-5 years and he's made the biggest impact so far. He also has (physical) attributes our other current CBs lack so that's another positive.

OTOH he has only played around 500 total minutes in La Liga/CL combined so he's still very raw and has a lot to learn but it's still too early to tell what his celling is. CB is one of the most demanding positions in football where every mistake can be crucial and experience is even more important. You've mentioned his positioning. I believe this should and will improve with him playing more games against better opponents regularly. He'll make mistakes here and there but I'm willing to give him time. He's just one of many younger players in a rebuilding team and each and every one them will have up and downs while they're still adapting to the level they've never played before consistently.

Being a young CB at a huge club is tough since it's very hard to get minutes due to the little need of rotations.

I think he'd benefit a lot by playing next to a general. Varane had that with Ramos, and Pique with Puyol.
But the downside to this seems to be that Varane and Pique tend to be undisciplined when the other CB isn't a leader.

Koeman mustn't be afraid to rotate the CB's at this moment. Lenglet and Pique are better than Araujo but the difference isn't huge as in say when Masche and Pique were in front of Bartra. In the long run we'll benefit from playing Araujo, short term we won't lose that much.

Apparently, he started the game with a small tear in his hamstring but still played to try and help the team.

xXKonan said:

Apparently, he started the game with a small tear in his hamstring but still played to try and help the team.

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Damn. Hopefully he won't be injured for long.

That's where the squad planning bit us in the ass.

He is out for 3-4 weeks apparently

bruh

We have 3 games and then it's international break, he might be back after that, so not really that bad.

Messi983 said:

We have 3 games and then it's international break, he might be back after that, so not really that bad.

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Just in time for another red card from Lenglet.