Ivan Rakitić
- Thread starter Barcaman
- Start date
BBZ8800
Senior Member
About our midfield, in 80-90% of La Liga matches, we DON'T NEED at all players like Verratti, controllers and similar.
These 4 La liga matches showed that we are fine in midfield.
We dominated all matches.
What our team currently lacks for LA LIGA matches is some attacking power (Deulofeu is not a world class, Suarez is horrible, Denis is not too good in attack, even though he scored today, Dembele is a new kid who isn't a natural scorer either).
We are controling matches, we have lots of chances and lots of possession.
But we are lacking goals (except Messi, of course).
So, we need some magic from attacking line.
PLUS, we need some help from our midfielders, but here is a problem:
Rakitic plays 100 sideway passes per match, and is totally useless and slow in attack. And he doesn't try long range shots anymore.
He can't run, he can't dribble, he can't play 1-2s, he won't shot outside of a box anymore.
Iniesta hasn't scored a goal for years. And he is probably too old to even try a shot outside of a box, lol.
Busi, zero attacking threat.
I personally don't like Denis, but he at least tried lots of forward, vertical passes (unlike Rakitic).
Roberto as a midfielder can also play a lot of vertical passes and he often tries some solo runs and shots.
Lord Paulinho is currently our most lethal (and with an attacking potential) player except Messi with his late runs and lethal shots.
So, imo, in a moment when our only attacking threat in attacking line is Messi, we will struggle if we will play with Iniesta-Rakitic-Busquets since none of them can offer anything in attack.
And then, if Messi can't score, NOBODY from our team can score.
This is why we should play way more: Roberto as a Cm, Paulinho as a CM, even Denis (and Rafinha) combined with only 1 out of Iniesta-Rakitic.
Iniesta-Rakitic are just too sterile.
They will keep the ball for 80% of a match, but we rely only on Messi then.
If we want to take off a burden from Messi's shoulders, we will need more attacking power BOTH from our attacking line and from 2 CMs (and Semedo).
This is about 80-90% of La liga matches.
About a CL knockout phase, that is a different story.
We could use Verratti or better players there (or just more pace and muscles).
But my point was, for La liga, we don't need better midfielders at all, it seems.
Also, regarding Seri rumours.
What would he do tonight?
We don't need a controller.
We need some shots from outside of a box, we need late runs (Paulinho), we need some 1-2s at the edge of a box, we need some solo actions (Roberto, Semedo).
We absolutely DON'T need more slow and sterile midfielders who will pass the ball sideways for 90 minutes.
These 4 La liga matches showed that we are fine in midfield.
We dominated all matches.
What our team currently lacks for LA LIGA matches is some attacking power (Deulofeu is not a world class, Suarez is horrible, Denis is not too good in attack, even though he scored today, Dembele is a new kid who isn't a natural scorer either).
We are controling matches, we have lots of chances and lots of possession.
But we are lacking goals (except Messi, of course).
So, we need some magic from attacking line.
PLUS, we need some help from our midfielders, but here is a problem:
Rakitic plays 100 sideway passes per match, and is totally useless and slow in attack. And he doesn't try long range shots anymore.
He can't run, he can't dribble, he can't play 1-2s, he won't shot outside of a box anymore.
Iniesta hasn't scored a goal for years. And he is probably too old to even try a shot outside of a box, lol.
Busi, zero attacking threat.
I personally don't like Denis, but he at least tried lots of forward, vertical passes (unlike Rakitic).
Roberto as a midfielder can also play a lot of vertical passes and he often tries some solo runs and shots.
Lord Paulinho is currently our most lethal (and with an attacking potential) player except Messi with his late runs and lethal shots.
So, imo, in a moment when our only attacking threat in attacking line is Messi, we will struggle if we will play with Iniesta-Rakitic-Busquets since none of them can offer anything in attack.
And then, if Messi can't score, NOBODY from our team can score.
This is why we should play way more: Roberto as a Cm, Paulinho as a CM, even Denis (and Rafinha) combined with only 1 out of Iniesta-Rakitic.
Iniesta-Rakitic are just too sterile.
They will keep the ball for 80% of a match, but we rely only on Messi then.
If we want to take off a burden from Messi's shoulders, we will need more attacking power BOTH from our attacking line and from 2 CMs (and Semedo).
This is about 80-90% of La liga matches.
About a CL knockout phase, that is a different story.
We could use Verratti or better players there (or just more pace and muscles).
But my point was, for La liga, we don't need better midfielders at all, it seems.
Also, regarding Seri rumours.
What would he do tonight?
We don't need a controller.
We need some shots from outside of a box, we need late runs (Paulinho), we need some 1-2s at the edge of a box, we need some solo actions (Roberto, Semedo).
We absolutely DON'T need more slow and sterile midfielders who will pass the ball sideways for 90 minutes.
Last edited:
Albo
New member
Only one of those players is slow and that is Kroos, but his slowness is nothing compared to the slowness of Raki or Busi.
DonAK
President of FC Barcelona
Yeah, and we need those kind of players.
Kroos might be slow, but he knows where to position himself and pass the ball. Rakitic is slow and passes the ball sideways all the time instead.
BBZ8800
Senior Member
All of those above:
1. are technically better than Rakitic
2. are faster, more agile
3. try way more forward passes
So, I agree, it is NOT only about pace and muscles.
But our current midfield trio (Iniesta-Rkitic-Busi) seems happy (or thy can't offer anything else) than: pass the ball left, right and back, or play some little tricks and nice passes 40 meters from the goal and that's it.
As said above, current midfield is good enough WHEN Messi is saving their asses.
But when Messi can't score, we will need some different options.
Those could be some ranged shots from midfielders, some crosses and headers, late runs etc.
Real has:
1. possession game
2. crosses and headers when needed
3. tons of outside of a box shots and goals by Kroos and now Asensio
4. corners and headers
What did we have till today?
1. possession game. The end. Nothing more.
Crosses? No, since all players are short.
Corners? No, since all players are short.
Shots from outside of a box? Zero attempts for Months from Iniesta-Rakitic-Busi.
Late runs into a box? Zero before Paulinho (ok, Roberto offered some of those).
One of the ways to improve a team is to offer a few different options to attack when things aren't going well.
Again, we are spoiled by Pep's era, where our TikiTaka was enough.
But that was working only in a short period of time.
And always before that, our teams had a few different options.
Van Gaal's Barca had possession, crosses and headers due to tall strikers (Rivaldo, Kluivert, Lucho), we had corners and headers and tons of long range shots (Lucho, Figo, Rivaldo, Cocu).
We didn't rely ONLY on possession like today.
In Rijkaard's Barca, the same.
We had Joga Bonita and possession.
But we also had crazy Larsson for corners and crosses.
We had Deco and Van Bommel for crazy long range goals etc.
Pep "killed" all other options since TikiTaka was perfect back then.
But TikiTaka is dead and we need to build a team around 2-3-4 different attacking options.
Real has at least 3-4 attacking options currently.
This is why I am saying that buying the same type of slower, physically weaker, but technically good midfielder over and over won't improve us.
(This is about Seri, for example).
Last edited:
JamDav1982
Senior Member
Worst part is that he keeps trying to knock the fucking ball past players and try to go round them only to be too slow and dive. Done it load of times this season.
Zuti
New member
Yep, noticed this too. I just don't see anything he could possibly provide atm for this team to warrant him a starting spot.
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