Vinicius Junior

Joan

Well-known member
By itself or in the context of that post, this is nonsense man. We need better narrative than this, because when you go to his pure skill you will always find flaws in the game. He is an 18 year old who already is integral to the way of how this team attacks without any other offensive leader. He is 4x more important to Madrid at his age than Messi was for Barcelona. For different reasons of course. But this is the important bit and the lens we should look through at these performances.
Possibly shouldn't have quoted that post. I still think the same, he's a player whose game looks aesthetically impressive, more so than his influence. Which is not a bad thing.
 

El Gato

Villarato!
Possibly shouldn't have quoted that post. I still think the same, he's a player whose game looks aesthetically impressive, more so than his influence. Which is not a bad thing.

What do you mean by influence? He's become a go-to-guy at 18 as everyone else is shedding responsibility. Is that not attesting to his growing influence? If not, what is?
 

FCBarca

Mike the Knife
Possibly shouldn't have quoted that post. I still think the same, he's a player whose game looks aesthetically impressive, more so than his influence. Which is not a bad thing.

Unclear what sort of maturity or footballing IQ he has but clear there is talent at 18. You'd hope that his diving will subside but when referees are already giving him the whistle at this stage, seems unlikely
 

Leo_Messi

New member
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Vilarrubi

New member
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Vilarrubi

New member
His 'end product' isn't meant to be dominantly goals. He just happens to be getting some of the best chances.

Don’t get me wrong, his dribbling and speed is crazy. And the fact he’s getting in those positions says a lot, but his decision making and shots were really poor.
 

El Gato

Villarato!
And the fact he’s getting in those positions says a lot, but his decision making and shots were really poor.

Decision making is largely very good with him man. It's the reason he gets so much praise and game time overall instead of likes of Asensio whose decisions are shit most of the time.

They were poorer last night, but mostly in 2nd half where he was visibly battered along with Regui and fresh Vidal just snuffed him out. Takes the toll when you get the ball all the time and you're being asked to express yourself i.e. sprint up and down for 90 mins every match. He's still 18. Can't carry the ball 80% of the time.

Look at the chances he's had and what he didn't put away or what happens with the others. We can do it by video (since people actually compile them well because of how many times he's involved), I'll only elaborate on main ones.

Copa game:

0:23 - spots Lucas as he is beating Semedo. nearly perfect. good decision
0:55 - gives up the ball and instantly goes in the gap as Semedo and Pique break the offisde line, penalty non-call
1:24 - great decision to turn and shoot as Pique covers Benzema's run, very poor shot but also great spot by Lenglet to try and block low
1:44 - leaves it to Benz and speeds up the run once he notices Benzema is able to cross. poor delivery by Benz and then very difficult to convert anything once it's up in the air behind him.
2:29 - possibly bad decision, could have stopped and kept going to the byline instead of cutting in
2:33 - excellent run, excellent ball from Casemiro, terrible 2nd touch with his weak foot that kills the chance, recovers, does very well to quickly get it to Benz who has no time to line up the shot and it's very poor in the end
3:00 - does OK to stretch the defenders away from Reguilon on the wing who tries to cross low but it ends up going behind Vinicius who needs to take a step back to reach it. maybe could have done better, but marginally, and it's on his weak foot.
3:31 - doesn't expect Ramos to leave the pass to him. takes Semedo on while he probably could have laid it off to Benzema for a first time shot on his left foot. but we all know Benzema wouldn't have taken it anyway. Semedo does well.
4:08 - does well to not force the run past Semedo. good decision
4:12 - tries a great pass and spots the lane, but Benzema is snuffed out by Lenglet-Pique
4:20 - if he had eyes in the back of his head he could have let Reguilon through with a backheel. still does the right thing to lay it off to Kroos.
4:34 - rinses Pique for pace, takes a poor touch close to 5-yard box that lets Pique make the tackle
4:46 - Semedo reads him well here and Vini still recovers
5:06 - receives the ball very deep with a marker on his back, Alena(dunno who the 5 is?) reads well
5:10 - best chance of the game. rinses Semedo and delivers a great ball with his weak foot to Reguilon. good decision to not pass to Vazquez there who would have probably stepped offside.
5:42 - here he has 2 choices - either go long (which he does and overhits) or lay it back off to Kroos. his decision is good here IMO since bringing it to the middle leads to no chances at all. Vini's game is about taking openings as soon as they appear. risk-reward.
5:59 - considering Reguilon is out of his field of view here, he does this excellent run, makes Pique and Semedo look like fools. poor shot to finish it. couldn't do much else as Semedo was closing the passing lane to Benzema. nothing wrong here
6:30-6:40 - you can tell he's tired here. poor touches and apprehension.

overall, what, 3 bad decision in his 20-30 odd runs?

Liga game:

1:10 - good spot of the lane Benzema enters, poor pass to lead him in there
1:38 - GREAT spot of Bale. overhits the pass.
2:02 - Benzema gets in the way and tries to double the overlap like a fucking idiot. Vinicius pass to trailing Benzema who lays it off to Modrić is a great choice as no options for back post
2:20 - could have let Reguilon through on overlap. chooses to send it to Carvajal. probably good considering Reguilon would have done the same and strikers didn't time their runs
2:30 - tries a cross back in from FK. rather poorly done
2:44 - spots the space, attacks it, Luka tries to give it to him, comes off Lenglet's legs
3:21 - notice how he's COMPLETELY surrounded and on his own. Barca catching up to RM dumbass tactics of overusing Vini
3:30 - Benzema does the dumbest diagonal run I've seen him do recently leaving Vini on his own. Bale attacks a space behind two CBs who are cutting him off.... fucking idiot forwards
3:53 - could have laid it off to Casemiro here.
4:00 - same but to Kroos
4:10 - look at the STATE of Benzema here :lol: nothing Vini can do about this.
4:26 - chooses correctly to not cross. Kroos is slow AF and doesn't attack the ball
4:35 - good choice to pull it back here. slightly crap that it's gone on Regui's wrong foot who could have taken it first time
4:40 - could have let Regui through. BUT NOBODY IN THE BOX IS TIMING THEIR FUCKING RUNS
4:48 - HE'S LITERALLY ON HIS OWN HERE, LOOK AT THE REST
4:56 - WTF is Benzema doing here?! fucking come close for a first time left-foot shot you retard
5:20 - Bale is literally the reason we didn't score here. If not for him taking a step in, Lenglet wouldn't have been there for the block. Vini does GREAT
5:32 - spots a decent run but he has a man to beat and is tired
6:15 - good decision. poor execution
6:33 - good decision to take them on, difficult to get anything from it

overall at least 4 obviously bad ones. For the same amount of runs he's asked to do.

But anyway. Look how wholly telegraphed this is. Barca CBs had to the same thing over and over. No danger of this sort from the right side at all. Asensio? Not adding anything at all.

There was nothing largely wrong with Vini's decisions or effort even in the liga game. Some poor touches, crosses and shots. Not what he actually chooses to do. He's dynamic and has absolutely no counterweight on the other side. If he was allowed to do more of his runs off the ball and didn't face a deep block all the time (enforced by the defensive shitshow we're putting on) we'd be much better off. But our RWs are useless with the ball at their feet. So EVERYTHING is going through Vini.

Useless long-term strategy. Barca don't need a manager to kill this.
 
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serghei

Senior Member
Vinicius is a good talent imo. An average manager and some lazy stars who aren't showing up anymore means too much is down to him to make happen, and it's just unfair for an 18 year old player who's in his first season. Completely unacceptable at a club like Madrid with so many great players in their squad.

No player outside Messi, Neymar, Suarez and Cristiano Ronaldo is good enough to decide clasicos on his own like that. Rubbish to expect an output like that from Vinicius. Hell, Madrid are giving him the ball more than we did with peak Neymar.

His diving is Neymar levels though. Embarassing.
 
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Leo_Messi

New member
Vinicius is a good talent imo. An average manager and some lazy stars who aren't showing up anymore means too much is down to him to make happen, and it's just unfair for an 18 year old player who's in his first season. Completely unacceptable at a club like Madrid with so many great players in their squad.

No player outside Messi, Neymar, Suarez and Cristiano Ronaldo is good enough to decide clasicos on his own like that. Rubbish to expect an output like that from Vinicius. Hell, Madrid are giving him the ball more than we did with peak Neymar.

His diving is Neymar levels though. Embarassing.

His protagonism is only the result of how awful Bale, Carvajal, Asensio, Marcelo and Benzema have been recently. It is not like they have any choice. Isco (one of their few creative options) being frozen out by Solari is not helping either. Bale is a donkey nowadays and a 31 year old Benzema is what he is. Not much of a threat against a focused defense like ours and a team like ours. What is there otherwise? Lucas Vázquez? The guy that is better defensively than offensively.:lol:

However you can rightly expect a much, much better output and shots to goal ratio. It's awful. One of the worst that I have seen from any youngster. 100 shots (almost) and 3 goals? That's not a coincidence. His greatest strengths are his pace and acceleration. Age while a factor, we have to have in mind that Vinicius is not your typical Brazilian talent. He started way early. He almost has 2 years of professional football in him.

Sure he is a promising talent but he might very well turn into another Robinho or Quaresma. He is not certain to make it at all. Learning to score on a consistent basis is what puts the very best players apart from the rest. By far. So the most difficult job is in front of him. There are many players out there with a great pace, acceleration, decent technical skill and an eye for a pass. Take a look at Adama Traoré who is arguably better on all 3 departments expect for the final pass, lol.

However I like the attitude of this kid and the fact that he is trying despite numerous hopeless shots and decisions. He has character for sure but on the other hand he has nothing to loose and he has the trust of Solari who basically "invented" him this season. Hard to know what will happen should Solari be replaced with another manager that is less patient and has more to loss and who would prefer a finished article over an Vinicius who to date has an awfully little impact in terms of goals. What will happen should Hazard move to RM or another attacker? Where does Rodrygo (plays on the same position) fit in? What about Asensio who less than 1 year ago was labelled as the new cool thing on the block? Certainly not enough to be the vocal point of attack as seen recently. I mean how many attacks did he start? 30? Of course he is bound to create some danger.

I think a lot of his recent performances are down to having nothing to lose and that carefree attitude and having the confidence of the manager and continuous playing time. He has been having some momentum for a while in other words.

Too soon to tell anything but hard not to laugh at the media hype (Messi comparisons) from certain RM-based circles in Spain and what not.:lol:
 
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