Nicolas Otamendi - 2016/17 performances

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As weak and shit as I think he is, I was really surprised how high up the park we played last night, leaving their whippets free to run in behind way more often than I would like to see.

Hopefully Pep Keegan will keep it a little tighter in the second leg cos I'm not sure my heart can take another game like that ffs XD
 
I've been thinking about it this morning and I believe he will be sold this summer, assuming we can find a buyer.

We will obviously go in for another CB in the summer, but I don't think Guardiola is unhappy with the numbers we have there right now.

With his obvious love of Fernandinho, but Yaya being imperious in the 3 man midfield and the fullback experiment failing completely, I think Fernandinho will pop up at CB soon and in the summer it will be 1 in 1 out, and that one will be Otamendi.

Stones is safe, Kolarov has played more minutes than any other player, he's one of Pep's favourites too. Kompany is a passenger but won't be sold this summer.

It's not just his performances, it's the fact he's not changing his style of play over the season.

Even his fans must be able to admit he's not adapting his game. He's still playing like he did on Pep's first day, and we know Pep doesn't like that because he's publicly spoken about hating when defenders go to ground.

The timing of the transfer rumour was interesting as well, it coincided with the 3 games he was dropped for with Guardiola preferring Kolarov-Stones.
 
Its a weird situation with otamendi, I actually see a player who is surprisingly strong in the air, strong in the tackle, decent passing ability, decisive in his play(which can be a good/bad depending on how you see it) and I happen to believe is a much better defender than what we've seen of him. Playing on the right-center side of the defence, I actually rate him much higher than stones and his style actually suits the front foot approach that pep wants from the team. But he is also 29 and not getting any younger and some of the mistakes he makes in his timing of tackle at times and anticipation/awareness of threat around him is not what you'd expect of such an experienced player. I hope he is given one more season with another top defender next to him as I believe him and a fit kompany would be a very good pairing and going forward this season would actually prefer a partnership of him and kolarov in the middle but I'm not sure that pep would see it like that with his age and some of the performances he's put in this season.
 
If it's true Real are interested I would be inclined to let him go. There's a decent player there in the right system and he's had some good games for us but I've never been fully convinced by him. Given his age and the fact he's still reasonably well thought of in the Spain, this would probably be the only opportunity to recoup a decent amount of what we spent on him.

It's hard to tell whether or not Stones will sort out the weaknesses in his game but I'm happy to stick with him for now as 22 is nothing for a CB and i'd like to see how he looks in a more settled defence after we recruit some new players over the summer. I think he'd fare better alongside a more steady Kompany type presence rather than someone like Otamendi who can be a little erratic at times.
 
Alan Hansen never made last ditch tackles, in fact he hardly ever made a tackle and was only ok in the air, yet he was a top class CB because positionally he was excellent and was nearly always in the right place at the right time. Positional sense and discipline is an essential quality of a top CB, even if you have electric pace it wont always get you out of trouble, Ota is simply poor in this and it shows, he's not a kid in a football sense and its not improved at all since he has been here.
 
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Paul Lake's Left Knee said:
Alan Hansen never made last ditch tackles, in fact he hardly ever made a tackle and was only ok in the air, yet he was a top class CB because positionally he was excellent and was nearly always in the right place at the right time. Positional sense and discipline is an essential quality of a top CB, even if you have electric pace it wont always get you out of trouble, Ota is simply poor in this and it shows, he's not a kid in a football sense and its not improved at all since he has been here.
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I remember Souness saying that whoever was co-commentating on whatever United game it was, was wrong about Phil Jones making these wonderful sliding tackles because he wouldn't have to make those if he was in the right position initially.

I mean there are time when a good pass takes out a defender and he has to make a sliding tackle but reading the game is a skill that should be mastered too
 
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