Player Topic: Aleks Kolarov 2015/16

[Gabriel]

Kolarov's standing off the man is as much a flaw as Zabaleta's natural impetuosity, which will often see him get too close to the attacker (and conversely too far away from his central defender) and expose the defence. These are tight margins, and Kolarov (Clichy does this too) is often playing the margins, hoping that the cross will go forward and that the central defenders will hold the line so that any onrushing attacker is caught offside; evidently it is a risky ploy, one that also depends on the judgement of the lines-person.

Fullbacks play in the most demanding of positions, and in recent years i cannot think of one who has not been unfairly baited and berated by our own fans. If there really were so many "good enough for us" players out there, I would imagine the management team would have already identified and attracted them. The fact that we have four extremely good and dependable players suggests the people in charge trust the incumbents.

 

[RichardDunneOwnGoal]

Re the whole Kolarov having a go at Sergio moment. I'm not fussed about that, to be honest. Just a minor quip when we were a goal down and people were getting frustrated.

Sterling was right on the shoulder and if Sergio had played him in he would've been one v one, so Kolarov was right really. That said, Sterling doesn't look like he could score in a brothel so that might have been in Serg's mind, plus he was looking for a goal to end his dry streak.

Serg looked surprised, and a bit annoyed, but after he opened the scoring Kolarov made a point of running up to him and embraced him. That was that, no hard feelings.

Serg didn't push him off as the other fella said.

From my perspective, in the first tier, looked like that was that, no hard feelings.

Funny how people can get totally different interpretations of the witnessing the same thing.

 

[Tim of the Oak]

Re the whole Kolarov having a go at Sergio moment. I'm not fussed about that, to be honest. Just a minor quip when we were a goal down and people were getting frustrated.

Sterling was right on the shoulder and if Sergio had played him in he would've been one v one, so Kolarov was right really. That said, Sterling doesn't look like he could score in a brothel so that might have been in Serg's mind, plus he was looking for a goal to end his dry streak.

Serg looked surprised, and a bit annoyed, but after he opened the scoring Kolarov made a point of running up to him and embraced him. That was that, no hard feelings.

Serg didn't push him off as the other fella said.

From my perspective, in the first tier, looked like that was that, no hard feelings.

Funny how people can get totally different interpretations of the witnessing the same thing.

Haha! I was careful not to claim that Sterling would have scored! Aleks was doing the decent thing though.

It will be interesting to see if Sterling starts the next games given Navas has rediscovered how to put a dangerous cross in

 

[NQCitizen]

Re the whole Kolarov having a go at Sergio moment. I'm not fussed about that, to be honest. Just a minor quip when we were a goal down and people were getting frustrated.

Sterling was right on the shoulder and if Sergio had played him in he would've been one v one, so Kolarov was right really. That said, Sterling doesn't look like he could score in a brothel so that might have been in Serg's mind, plus he was looking for a goal to end his dry streak.

Serg looked surprised, and a bit annoyed, but after he opened the scoring Kolarov made a point of running up to him and embraced him. That was that, no hard feelings.

Serg didn't push him off as the other fella said.

From my perspective, in the first tier, looked like that was that, no hard feelings.

Funny how people can get totally different interpretations of the witnessing the same thing.

Yeah exactly what I saw. Aguero and Kolarov made it a point to hug after Aguero scored. The rest of the team seem to love Kolarov.

Kolarov is obviously a great attacking full back. If you think 'his job is to defend' then you're likely to be disappointed.

The real irony is Zabaleta presents mostly the same weaknesses as Kolarov but tends to have the better CB next to him and it's easier not to get stick for getting drawn in than it is standing off.

Teams historically attacked down our left also because it's where Silva was playing and on our right we had Milner or Navas, much more industrious, solid players.

 

[prof-taf]

Can you elaborate on the 'Disharmony' caused please.

Of course, bony brought in, big pals with yaya, caused jovetik to lose champions league slot. Thereafter we have our slide, yaya plays shit, nasty plays shit, bony did nothing, kola rob plays shit, Erin plays shit, jovetik rarely played and did nothing. 2 camps in that lot, and I'm sure created a problem. We stopped playing in jan for 3 months. Just my view, it may be rubbish of course

 

[Phil1]

Of course, bony brought in, big pals with yaya, caused jovetik to lose champions league slot. Thereafter we have our slide, yaya plays shit, nasty plays shit, bony did nothing, kola rob plays shit, Erin plays shit, jovetik rarely played and did nothing. 2 camps in that lot, and I'm sure created a problem. We stopped playing in jan for 3 months. Just my view, it may be rubbish of course

Some huge assumptions made there mate.
I don't agree with much of it but who knows.

 

[Deleted member 58678]

I thought Aleks was right to have a go at Kun for not playing in Sterling (although Kun probably thought "no va a la mierda puntuación desde allí" so didn't square it to him, haha!) because Sterling was completely free. After a bit of a moan at each other Kun put his thumb up to Kolarov anyway as to acknowledge he was right. Plus later on they were celebrating together for a goal anyway:

 

[RichardDunneOwnGoal]

Yeah exactly what I saw. Aguero and Kolarov made it a point to hug after Aguero scored. The rest of the team seem to love Kolarov.

Kolarov is obviously a great attacking full back. If you think 'his job is to defend' then you're likely to be disappointed.

The real irony is Zabaleta presents mostly the same weaknesses as Kolarov but tends to have the better CB next to him and it's easier not to get stick for getting drawn in than it is standing off.

Teams historically attacked down our left also because it's where Silva was playing and on our right we had Milner or Navas, much more industrious, solid players.

Kolarov's job is to defend, he's a fullback. All fullbacks have to have the basics of defensive competence. Kolarov doesn't.

His attacking contributions do not gloss over his defensive flaws. They just don't.

And I'm sorry mate, but I totally reject the notion that Zabaleta has the same flaws Kolarov does. Zabaleta is the much more competent defender, Sagna even more so.

Kolarov is the worst fullback from a defensive perspective in the entire squad.

I don't accept the whole 'lack of cover' argument either, as Kolarov has shown all the same flaws with Sterling covering him well. Although Sterling has certainly helped Kolarov in many respects, his flaws remain.

He's just defensively very poor, I'm not sure why some of you are so determined to gloss over this.

I'm not going to tell things how I don't see them, so I'm not going to parrot things like the above where the other bloke said Kolarov caused a major spat which simmered on, because I didn't see it like that, and I'm not going to endorse that because I don't hold anything against him personally or have an agenda to undermine him at any opportunity.

I'm just telling it how I see it, and I think Kolarov is a shit defender. And I'd like us to prioritise a top draw left back as a matter of urgency next summer.

 

[grim up north]

Kolarov's job is to defend, he's a fullback. All fullbacks have to have the basics of defensive competence. Kolarov doesn't.

His attacking contributions do not gloss over his defensive flaws. They just don't.

And I'm sorry mate, but I totally reject the notion that Zabaleta has the same flaws Kolarov does. Zabaleta is the much more competent defender, Sagna even more so.

Kolarov is the worst fullback from a defensive perspective in the entire squad.

I don't accept the whole 'lack of cover' argument either, as Kolarov has shown all the same flaws with Sterling covering him well. Although Sterling has certainly helped Kolarov in many respects, his flaws remain.

He's just defensively very poor, I'm not sure why some of you are so determined to gloss over this.

I'm not going to tell things how I don't see them, so I'm not going to parrot things like the above where the other bloke said Kolarov caused a major spat which simmered on, because I didn't see it like that, and I'm not going to endorse that because I don't hold anything against him personally or have an agenda to undermine him at any opportunity.

I'm just telling it how I see it, and I think Kolarov is a shit defender. And I'd like us to prioritise a top draw left back as a matter of urgency next summer.

.

 

[NQCitizen]

Kolarov's job is to defend, he's a fullback. All fullbacks have to have the basics of defensive competence. Kolarov doesn't.

His attacking contributions do not gloss over his defensive flaws. They just don't.

And I'm sorry mate, but I totally reject the notion that Zabaleta has the same flaws Kolarov does. Zabaleta is the much more competent defender, Sagna even more so.

Kolarov is the worst fullback from a defensive perspective in the entire squad.

I don't accept the whole 'lack of cover' argument either, as Kolarov has shown all the same flaws with Sterling covering him well. Although Sterling has certainly helped Kolarov in many respects, his flaws remain.

He's just defensively very poor, I'm not sure why some of you are so determined to gloss over this.

I'm not going to tell things how I don't see them, so I'm not going to parrot things like the above where the other bloke said Kolarov caused a major spat which simmered on, because I didn't see it like that, and I'm not going to endorse that because I don't hold anything against him personally or have an agenda to undermine him at any opportunity.

I'm just telling it how I see it, and I think Kolarov is a shit defender. And I'd like us to prioritise a top draw left back as a matter of urgency next summer.

We could sign most of the top left backs - alba, Marcelo, coentrao - or a promising one - kurzawa, willems - and you'd see exactly the same attacking prowess and defensive fragility.

Most games we attack predominantly down the left because of Kolarov's play.

It's going to be very hard to improve on both the defensive and attacking play of Kolarov in a new defender so naturally people will take the two poles of 'defend first and foremost' and 'Kolarov is the best attacking full back in the league - we don't want to lose that'.