Claudio Bravo

[amircule]

Many don't get the Bravo hate either. Solution to all: "Make love, not hate."

To be more accurate, I don't get the hate towards any barca player even Mathieu

 

[tacticvarium]

The decision had to be made since both Bravo and Stegen want to be a starter. They already informed the board that they have offers from other big teams and they will leave the club if not starting for the upcoming season. I believe it was expected that the club would choose Stegen since their summer plan is to buy young players around 22 y.o. I also think that it is less risky to choose the younger one because the only thing that waits Bravo is downhill in few years while Stegen can still improve. Even if Stegen does not meet expectations, he still can be sold for a good deal bcuz he would be still young.

 

[valonquar]

the rational choice ( provided that the coach opted for Stegen ) is to keep both keepers ( if the price is Under 15 M ) .. don't care if someone is happy or not .. i'm sure they were very happy when they first signed a contract that secured their futur financially .. what if we sell Bravo and Stegen gets injured .. we will become a laughing stock

You don't keep an unhappy player in the squad unless you absolutely 1000000% need to, otherwise it's just bad management.

 

[amircule]

You don't keep an unhappy player in the squad unless you absolutely 1000000% need to, otherwise it's just bad management.

It's not bad management, it's called slavery.

 

[sabby]

Just a reminder.. We won sextuple back in 2009 with Victor Valdes as GK..

Valdes is a legend and a record 5 time Zamora trophy winner while Casillas was in his prime. Show some respect !

 

[CatalinR10]

Just a reminder.. We won sextuple back in 2009 with Victor Valdes as GK..

Valdes was fucking amazing back in the days , sure he then turned to shit for around 2 seasons for some reason , then went on being amazing again in his last season untill the injury.

 

[BBZ8800]

Good job responding to the points I made. How about constructing a proper argument as answer instead of throwing unsubstatiated claims around? That's usually how you debate.

And no, MAtS isn't any more unpresictable than other goalkeepers. In fact, based on his matches here he's very reliable. Has he made some mistakes? Yes. Has Bravo made some mistakes? Yes. In fact, Bravo made the first biggest mistake against Napoli when he first got here, after which ter Stegen got injured, and Lucho had to go with Bravo. Not saying that's a reason to bench a player, but when the same thing happened to MAtS, the reaction were very different, MAtS fucked up against Athletic club in the Super Cup last season, and it was blown out of proportions with people claiming than no way should he start over Bravo, despite the German having had some amazing matches in the season before. Every one of his mistakes gets amplified, which is ridiculous. Yes, it was a friendly Bravo made his first screw up in, while MAtS made it in matches of bigger importance, but the mistakes were there - no matter the context. Now, Bravo played so good, so even though he made that huge blunder early on and seemed shaky, Lucho went with him. But MAtS also played good despite his mistakes. Both makes mistakes, and both saves our asses. MAtS is younger with potential to grow. The choice is obvious.

Mats is younger.
Mats seems like a better (long term) choice on paper.

But till now he made more blunders than Bravo, that's it.
If someone says that Mats isn't good, other guys can always reply that he won a CL, which is true.
But at the end of the day, no matter how some of you twist facts, Bravo was slightly more reliable TILL NOW.

Yes, Mats could reach his level very soon, especially with more playing time.
Maybe he'll reach that level.
Maybe he won't...

Too many of you are slightly overconfident regarding Mats, imo.
As if you have forgotten how 10s of other youngsters with huge potential ended at Barca in the last few Seasons.
Let's wish him the best and hope that he will reach the expectations from majority of you.
But (imo) things are not that simple and won't come as fast as majority of you wish for.

Also, let's see if Mats can keep his concentration for 50-60 matches in a row in one season (38 La Liga matches+13 Cl matches+supercups).
The same as with some of our fast dribblers and young players with good technique, too many of you watch mostly player's age, potential and technical skills (aka: Mats is young, huge potential, good saves, plays with feet).
Too many times you forgot about mental set of skills, which are as equally as important for Barca's level as pure technical potential.

Mats surely has an awesome technical potential and can play awesome with feet. He has convinced in that area, more or less.
Now let's see whether he can be at Barca's level on mental level.
I am still slightly scared that he is a tampered bomb mentally.

And before someone answers: he will be better mentally with more playing time.
Yes, more playing time will give you more confidence and improve your mental state, but still, some players are natural born winners/leaders and cool headed. Others are just bombs who try to act as if they are cool.
And no playing time will change someone's true mental set.

Now, let's see how will this gamble finish in the end.
I think it will not be as dreamy and nice as majority predict.

 

[Topolino]

I have no doubt in Marcs ability whatsoever and think he'll be one of the best goalkeepers this club has seen.

Hasn't shown any weaknesses in his mentality. Made some blunders and always came back stronger.

 

[Professor Chaos]

Bravo bought for - 12M, sell at best - 20M (16+4), D. Alves - 10M. 20-12-10 = -2M

 

[BBZ8800]

I took some time and checked something.
Our Gks in the last 20 years:
1995: Busquets (Busi's dad)
= ended as an average for Barca's level
1996: we are buying a 27 years old, Portuguese NT Gk Vitor Baia

-- he looks awesome on paper and he is experienced
-- he failed
1997, 1998: we are buying a 32 years old Dutch Ruud Hesp (Van Gaal's wish)

-- he plays awesome for 2 Seasons and we are winning 2 La Ligas with him
1999: Van Gaal gets the idea (lol, this will sound familiar) to share minutes between the 34 years old Hesp (who brought 2 titles) with a new, young Gk, hyped to be our future keeper for years (sounds familiar?), 24-years old Francesc Arnau who was La Masia product and had bright future infront of him
-- both players share minutes 50:50
-- Barca changed their starting (winning, proven) Gk Hesp, and in that season we lost a title when we played Hesp/Arnau
2000: Hesp is angry because he needs to share minutes with young Arnau and he is leaving the club
-- Barca suddenly buys 2 new, younger Gks, 28 years old French Dutruel from Celta, and promotes another La Masia Gk with bright future, 18 years old Pepe Reina

-- Dutruel and Reina share minutes
= Barca ends as 4th this time
2001: since Arnau and Dutruel didn't prove to be as reliable as the old man Hesp, we are buying yet another new Gk
-- this time an older, 31 years old Argentinian NT Gk Bonano from River Plate

-- Bonano fails the same as all other Gks after Hesp
-- Barca finishes 4th again
2002: we buy yet another new Gk, this time a 25 years old German Enke
-- he ended on loans all the time
-- Barca was so desperate after 10s of bad Gk's choices, and now we tried even the 3rd young Gk with huge potential from La Masia in 5 years (Arnau, Reina and now young 20-years old Victor Valdes)
-- Barca ended 6th with Bonano and young Valdes
2003: Barca sold Bonano and Enke and bought another one Gk, to rotate with young Valdes
-- this time we bough an experienced 30-years old Turkish NT Gk Rustu Recber

-- he failed miserably again
-- after that we relied ONLY on Valdes and finally found a good Gk who lasted for years

After him, 2014: we bought Bravo+Mats.
-- 2014, 2015: Bravo won 2 La Ligas

Anyway, in shorter, in the last 20 years we had:
-- Busquets, failed
-- Baia, failed
-- Hesp=success
-- young Arnau, failed
-- Dutruel, failed
-- young Reina, failed
-- Bonano, failed
-- Enke, failed
-- Rustu, failed
-- Victor Valdes=success
-- Bravo=success

So, from our last 11 Gks, 3 were a success (Hesp, Valdes, Bravo) and 8 guys failed, even though some of them were bright La Masia prospects (Arnau and Reina) and some of them were proven NT Gks (Baia, Bonano, Rustu) and some were just regular La Liga Gks (Busquets, Dutruel, Enke)

Imo, it is quite interesting how people are too often forgetting the past and statistical odds for a young player to reach Barca's level and to stay here for years.

For now, I still think that too many of you are still too optimistic about Mats.
And letting go of Bravo could be "the new Hesp's episode" like in 1999.

Younger fans will say: but Mats is much better than Arnau, Reina, Bonano, Dutruel, Rustu and other guys back then.
Yes, in hindsight, all players who failed in the past were worse than current players with bright potential whoa re yet to make it or fail...

 

[valonquar]

So, from our last 11 Gks, 3 were a success (Hesp, Valdes, Bravo) and 8 guys failed, even though some of them were bright La Masia prospects (Arnau and Reina) and some of them were proven NT Gks (Baia, Bonano, Rustu) and some were just regular La Liga Gks (Busquets, Dutruel, Enke)

Imo, it is quite interesting how people are too often forgetting the past and statistical odds for a young player to reach Barca's level and to stay here for years.

For now, I still think that too many of you are still too optimistic about Mats.
And letting go of Bravo could be "the new Hesp's episode" like in 1999.

Younger fans will say: but Mats is much better than Arnau, Reina, Bonano, Dutruel, Rustu and other guys back then.
Yes, in hindsight, all players who failed in the past were worse than current players with bright potential whoa re yet to make it or fail...

Eh except that all the keepers brought in after Hesp and before Valdes were a failure immediately

Mats has been here for 2 years and has won 1 CL and 2 Copa with us, if anything your post indicates that Mats has a pretty good odd over the mentioned failed keepers

 

[opjeoff]

20m is very good for a player who was going to be our backup keeper. We are also buying another backup for 9m, we keep the harmony in the squad as Bravo has done alot for us and he wants to leave for actual footballing reasons which makes sense. He isnt leaving for money, hes leaving because he wants to play regularly and i respect that.

good luck bravo, i just hope you have ur brainfarts against barca in UCL

 

[Messi983]

[MENTION=16942]BBZ8800[/MENTION]: You like history and statistic way too much for my liking. History doesn't always repeat itself and as my former statistics teacher said there are three lies in the world - small lie, big lie and statistic.

Anyway, I don't really see why there is such a division between Bravo and MAtS fans. I can understand that people prefer one or another but don't get why some feel the need to diminish one to prove their favourite GK is the one we should keep. I like them both and think we were spoiled to have both for the last two seasons. But we all know time to make decision about the future will come sooner or later. If not this summer then the next one. No club could keep two WC goalkeepers happy for more than 2-3 seasons.

Here are three options we have.

A.) Keep both Bravo and MAtS and possibly change their roles. This would be by far my prefered option and I think club wanted to do that as well but they both want to play as much as possible which is understandable so we have to choose between them.

B.) Keep MAtS, sell Bravo. If you can't execute option A this is second best option IMO based on age and longterm potential of both. This has nothing to do with Bravo who was nothing but a great servant since he came to the club. I will miss him but have full faith in MAtS. Yes, he can still fail to meet expectations but I think he's shown enough so far in his part-time role to make a longterm commitment to him over 9 years older GK. Age and longterm potential are the biggest and best arguments in MAtS favour. I think in pure footbalistic way they are both very similar quality right now with Bravo being better in some aspects and MAtS in others. But Bravo is at his peak right now and could decline in 2-3 years. On the other hand MAtS can still improve a lot and I think he'll do that with more playing time. If anything works out as we hope he can be our GK for the next 10-15 years. If not, we can still sell him and find someone better.

C.) Keep Bravo, sell MAtS. This could be seen as a good option for the next 2-3 seasons but after that, who knows? Let's say we keep Bravo and sell MAtS. Will we find a good GK in 2-3 years when we need him? We don't know what will be available at that time or at what prices. That's why I think choosing younger GK is the right decision for the club, maybe not short term (for the next season or two) but certainly longterm. It shouldn't be that hard to understand that decision of the club even if you are in "Bravo camp".

We've made moves this summer that shows we are finally starting to think longterm with all our signings so far being 22/23 years old (so they are all still young but on the other hand they already have some years of experience playing at good clubs like Lyon, Roma, Villarreal, Valencia,..) and keeping MAtS over Bravo is in line with that thinking. Only time will tell if we'll make the right decision keeping MAtS but I'm fairly confident we will. Yes, he needs to improve in certain aspects of his game but he's still young for a GK. There are some very good young GKs around his age out there right now but usually most GKs are at their best when they are close to 28-30 so MAtS can still improve a lot over the next 5 years or so. But there is no doubt in my mind that he's already good and mature enough to be our #1GK choice right now.

Yes, he'll make mistakes down the road but every GK make them. Field players can have 10 or 20 bad passes during the game but most people won't blame them as much as when GK make one crucial mistake that results in a condeded goal. It's the most difficult position to play, especially at club like Barça with the way we play. Our GKs often have more passes than the best outfield passer of opponents. So some mistakes will be made no matter who GK is. But I think MAtS is mentally strong enough to move from them quickly. Once you made a mistake it's done, you can't get that back, you can only forget it and look forward. I actually think he has some of that arrogance that Valdes had and that was one of the reasons he stayed here for so long even after all the mistakes he made during his first seasons. Of course it helped him that he was La Masia product and he had his fair share of critics but without strong personality he'd be gone long before as most of the keepers between Zubi and him were. That's one of the reasons why I believe MAtS can and will also be successfull for a long time and why keeping him over Bravo (if we have to choose one which is obviously the case here) is the right decision.

 

[zanela]

Fuck this shit. Now if we lose the league to Real Madrid this season, I will entirely put the whole blame on MATS. He is fucking overrated..

What if D.Alves starts and we lose the Lliga?

It amazes me how much this forum dislikes Bravo. He was nearly flawless in goal for 2 seasons, won the pichichi, what more could you ask from a keeper?
.

Zamora*

There is no disrespect of Bravo. Everyone acknowledges his quality and consider him to be a fine keeper. Just because some of them concur the Board's decision to move him on, doesn't equate to hate. If anything many posters (some more vocal than the others) only talk about MAtS in disdain and contempt. I dare you to find anything remotely close in regards to Bravo in recent times. You won't.

Valdes is a legend and a record 5 time Zamora trophy winner while Casillas was in his prime. Show some respect !

Valdes was fucking amazing back in the days , sure he then turned to shit for around 2 seasons for some reason , then went on being amazing again in his last season untill the injury.

I will tell you what is overrated. It's the individual awards in a Teamsport. Zamora being a classic example of it. It depends on the nature of the team's game, tactics and the collective defense. Despite Valdes winning 5 Zamora, Casillas was still considered the better keeper. Despite winning it twice under Simeone, there is a reason Courtois conceding a goal/game @ Chelsea. If keepers played such a big part, they'd be winning these stats based awards whatever team they are in. And going by these awards, Hart must be better than DDG.

Valdes was great in his prime, no denying that. But he was still erroneous, even in our treble season (juninho fk comes to mind). However, the team dominance was such that, some of them didn't matter.

Also, let's see if Mats can keep his concentration for 50-60 matches in a row in one season (38 La Liga matches+13 Cl matches+supercups).
The same as with some of our fast dribblers and young players with good technique, too many of you watch mostly player's age, potential and technical skills (aka: Mats is young, huge potential, good saves, plays with feet).
Too many times you forgot about mental set of skills, which are as equally as important for Barca's level as pure technical potential.

Mats surely has an awesome technical potential and can play awesome with feet. He has convinced in that area, more or less.
Now let's see whether he can be at Barca's level on mental level.
I am still slightly scared that he is a tampered bomb mentally.

And before someone answers: he will be better mentally with more playing time.
Yes, more playing time will give you more confidence and improve your mental state, but still, some players are natural born winners/leaders and cool headed. Others are just bombs who try to act as if they are cool.
And no playing time will change someone's true mental set.

It's one way to look at.

But
-I'd argue that helping your team fight relegation as a teen with only a few games left requires mental strength.
-I'd argue that coming to the best club in the world, being belittled in your very first press conference because you are not the media's most coveted signing, but silencing the same press going forward requires mental strength.
-I'd argue underperforming like the rest of the team but being scapegoated in the subsequent season by everyone and their granny, yet coming back with consistent performances requires mental strength.
-I'd argue playing mainly high pressure games (CL) without any semblance of match rhythm, knowing that if you don't deliver you risk losing even your limited game time requires mental strength (something both Keylor and Ospina failed when asked the same).

In short, contrary to your assertions, I actually think MAtS' is not devoid of mental fortitude. Where he needs to work is his shot-stopping. His overeagerness at times could be attributed to his want to gain more playing time. But he will always be a bit capricious, like Neuer. It's a high risk-high reward approach that goes with territory of being sweeper keeper. And as a consequence he will commit bloopers. It's about minimizing them. For this reason, I actually think MAtS would have been a greater fit for Pep than Bravo.

Now, let's see how will this gamble finish in the end.
I think it will not be as dreamy and nice as majority predict.

No one is anticipating it to be dreamy. Merely optimistic like with Neymar. If he fails, he will be gone for a profit in 2 seasons, and a new keeper bought. Simple. And a keeper, however good he may be, won't exert as much influence as an outfield player, to ever be the difference between winning and losing over the course of 38 games. So. there. is. no. need. for. more. drama.
I'm more worried about the RB position. Losing a goat RB and club legend stand to have more implications, when there isn't even a proven replacement to come in. But I didn't see as much hue and cry about his loss.

 

[Pablo Escobar]

I'm already having nightmares with Pinto in 2014 being our starter in goal and shit.