#2 | Kyle Walker - 2020/21 Performances

[bluesclues123]

Great game tonight

 

[FantasyIreland]

As ever,awesome athletically,but so one dimensional and predictable in his approach,his technical ability limits our play enormously.

 

[EdersonsSmiley]

Showed Thuram within 2 minutes of coming on that he will not get any joy trying to dribble past him.

Must be so demoralising as a winger trying to take him on for the first time and just getting bullied by his pace and strength.

Touch wood he hasn't had any brainfarts recently and will keep it up for the rest of the season.

 

[Tugay One Cup]

As ever,awesome athletically,but so one dimensional and predictable in his approach,his technical ability limits our play enormously.

He's got eight trophies in three seasons with us so far, playing over 40 games each time. He was also one of our best players this time around until he picked up an injury.

I think you go pretty over the top with your criticisms of our players.

I'd say he has been an absolutely huge part of our transformation since the oldies left after Pep's first season and the fact that he's one of the very best one on one defenders on the planet means that whoever is playing on the wing in front of him has more attacking freedom.

 

[decmancity]

Suffering massively because Cancelo has finally got to grips with things and is so technically advanced it makes Walker look like a pub player.

He is still the same, very dependable and physical monster of a RB that most of Europe has no answer to. He might come unstuck every so often but every player makes mistakes, no better pair of RBs in the world than Cancelo and Walker. End of.

 

[St.Pauli support]

Showed Thuram within 2 minutes of coming on that he will not get any joy trying to dribble past him.

Must be so demoralising as a winger trying to take him on for the first time and just getting bullied by his pace and strength.

Touch wood he hasn't had any brainfarts recently and will keep it up for the rest of the season.

I thought exactly the same. Thuram was unseen after that! :)

In my book Walker's technical standards are not good enough - BUT, I think he has adapted his game in the way that he minimizes his weaknesses:
he releases the ball quickly to our great mid distributors,
he plays as simple as possible to avoid stupid mistakes
and some runs down the flank without end product are still good enough to give the opponent some more threats to deal with.

In comparison Raheem doesn't improve neither his poor ball control nor his super slow decision making and as a consequence his confidence seems to be quite down.

Kyle has accepted he isn't the best baller but that he's able to offer enormous physical and psychological strenghts.

Wish Raheem would take a similar route by releasing the ball quicker and using his outstanding pace to attack the near and far post more aggressively to put in easy balls.

 

[Trevor Morley's Tache]

As an out and out defender he's brilliant. Going forward, not the best, but he can run the ball out of defence which helps us transition. He's also very good at recovering when our forward play breaks down, and his positional play was outstanding last night.

The only downside to his performance last night was the couple of times he over ran the ball and ended putting us on the back foot. If he could just work on his close control going forward, he'd be a world beater.

 

[Sir peace frog]

walker is fucking brilliant, when we need a proper rb walker is the best in the prem imo, when we need a kinky, ali b, type rb cancelo is the man, perfect mixture

 

[Coljj]

walker is fucking brilliant, when we need a proper rb walker is the best in the prem imo, when we need a kinky, ali b, type rb cancelo is the man, perfect mixture

Something you could never imagine saying 20 years ago.

 

[WallyA]

I think the comparisons to Cancelo are a little odd because Pep has rightly noticed their different qualities and has them play different roles.

Walker's role is actually more similar to Zinchenko, and while Zinchenko has definitely improved, Walker is the better defender. Yes, Zinchenko is the better passer, but that's the tradeoff, each brings something to that defensive fullback position.

 

[remember arthur mann]

Suffering massively because Cancelo has finally got to grips with things and is so technically advanced it makes Walker look like a pub player.

 

[1.618034]

I think the comparisons to Cancelo are a little odd because Pep has rightly noticed their different qualities and has them play different roles.

Walker's role is actually more similar to Zinchenko, and while Zinchenko has definitely improved, Walker is the better defender. Yes, Zinchenko is the better passer, but that's the tradeoff, each brings something to that defensive fullback position.

So many great options, but which is best...?

A- Walker RB/Cancelo "LB"

B- Cancelo "RB"/Zinchenko LB

C- Cancelo "RB"/Laporte LB


Although, I wouldn't mind seeing Stones/Dias/Laporte/Cancelo.

 

[mccity]

So many great options, but which is best...?

A- Walker RB/Cancelo "LB"

B- Cancelo "RB"/Zinchenko LB

C- Cancelo "RB"/Laporte LB


Although, I wouldn't mind seeing Stones/Dias/Laporte/Cancelo.

I don't think we'd see C barring emergencies. Aké will be the stand in, good in the air LB I reckon once he's fit and firing.

With regards to which is best, I suppose the beauty is that it depends on the situation and who else is available. Probably any version with Cancelo in atm. Don't rule out the Walker/Zinchenko partnership too.

 

[1.618034]

I don't think we'd see C barring emergencies. Aké will be the stand in, good in the air LB I reckon once he's fit and firing.

With regards to which is best, I suppose the beauty is that it depends on the situation and who else is available. Probably any version with Cancelo in atm. Don't rule out the Walker/Zinchenko partnership too.

I haven't included Aké, because he's unavailable and there'd be too many combinations to type.

Interesting you say C is last, as I see it as very strong and probably my first choice.

Oh, what riches we have!

 

[WallyA]

So many great options, but which is best...?

A- Walker RB/Cancelo "LB"

B- Cancelo "RB"/Zinchenko LB

C- Cancelo "RB"/Laporte LB


Although, I wouldn't mind seeing Stones/Dias/Laporte/Cancelo.

I'd go B, A then C, but also maybe Ake for Laporte.

But the fact that all 3 options are so viable is so great as you said.

 

[Airbags Optional]

Great defender and has given us so much over the years but the way we set up with Cancelo is night and day to when Kyle plays. I get so frustrated with him not being able to use his left foot for a pass, instead he will shamble sideways across the pitch until he can pass with his right. He is negating any attacking play down the right, I felt sorry for Mahrez today as he never got given a decent ball to allow him to isolate the fullback. For me our best back four is Zinc, Ruben, Johnny Boy and Cancelo. It gives the whole team a more attacking platform and we consequently play better.

 

[OrigamiNinja]

Great defender and has given us so much over the years but the way we set up with Cancelo is night and day to when Kyle plays. I get so frustrated with him not being able to use his left foot for a pass, instead he will shamble sideways across the pitch until he can pass with his right. He is negating any attacking play down the right, I felt sorry for Mahrez today as he never got given a decent ball to allow him to isolate the fullback. For me our best back four is Zinc, Ruben, Johnny Boy and Cancelo. It gives the whole team a more attacking platform and we consequently play better.

He is absolutely terrible on the ball, he makes Wan Bissaka look like prime Cafu. As much as his lack of ability on the ball frustrates me, I am trying as best as I can to just ignore it because nothing is going to change.

What I couldn’t ignore today, was the number of times he fell asleep, and their players just kept running off the back of him. Then that chance they had at the end, is just a complete dereliction of duty. He just watches the guy waltz in there and have a free header, like just looks at him and thinks ‘nah, I can’t be arsed’.

He has clearly been surpassed at RB by Cancelo, and there’s no shame in that, but he needs to keep his head in the game. He is still going to get a lot of game time, and he cannot just switch off the way he does.

 

[ninjamonkey]

Too many comparisons with Cancelo, they might be labelled as playing the same position but they're very very different players, we don't judge cancelo on his recovery pace so not sure why we are judging walker on his midfield play. As long as walker does what is asked of him and doesn't start thinking he can replicate cancelo he's fine, zinchenko had cancelo role today walker had a different role and did it well.

 

[OrigamiNinja]

Too many comparisons with Cancelo, they might be labelled as playing the same position but they're very very different players, we don't judge cancelo on his recovery pace so not sure why we are judging walker on his midfield play. As long as walker does what is asked of him and doesn't start thinking he can replicate cancelo he's fine, zinchenko had cancelo role today walker had a different role and did it well.

Walker is no good on the ball, I think even his most ardent fans accept this. I don’t rate him, but will accept him being fucking useless on the ball, if he performs defensively as expected. How anyone can look at that game today and say he defended well is beyond me.

Basically, if he has the opportunity to run alongside a winger and flex his muscles 1v1, he looks like the best right-sided defender in the world, I don’t remember any winger who consistently gets the better of him over 90 mins. But it’s the non 1v1 defending that’s the problem, he just falls asleep. How can he watch Diop there at the end and not smell the danger? It’s so, so poor. If Cancelo did that, everyone would be on here saying how Cancelo can’t defend, and Walker is better at the back.

 

[ninjamonkey]

Walker is no good on the ball, I think even his most ardent fans accept this. I don’t rate him, but will accept him being fucking useless on the ball, if he performs defensively as expected. How anyone can look at that game today and say he defended well is beyond me.

Basically, if he has the opportunity to run alongside a winger and flex his muscles 1v1, he looks like the best right-sided defender in the world, I don’t remember any winger who consistently gets the better of him over 90 mins. But it’s the non 1v1 defending that’s the problem, he just falls asleep. How can he watch Diop there at the end and not smell the danger? It’s so, so poor. If Cancelo did that, everyone would be on here saying how Cancelo can’t defend, and Walker is better at the back.

What did he do poorly today to say he didn't defend well? He covered the counter very well numerous times and wasn't beaten on his side, their threat was down the opposite side. The chance at the end was an overload, all the defenders were in position and had a man each I wouldn't blame anybody for it, they threw everyone forward for the last minute and that's what happens sometimes. If anybody, you can say a Rodri or fernandinho should have dropped in as an extra man.