Hugo Viana | Director of Football

Blue Mist said:
Why ? No offence but we played without a left back for years.
Pep has very strange views on how a team sets up. When it works it's brilliant, when it doesn't.......
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I’m convinced that a left footed player at left back can be enough more often than not because they aren’t as many quality right wingers so they don’t get tested to the same level defensively.

Unfortunately there are lots of very good left wingers which means a right back needs to be able to defend. Unfortunately neither of ours can.
 
dadnlad said:
Good player but not world class when bought just turned into world class. I think yaya was only world class players bought and question marks against him at time
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Agree. We don’t have a Ya Ya, Silva, KDB, Sergio, Kompany, at the moment except for Rodri. And that’s the level we need. Hard to find though.
 
supercity88 said:
It's not easy when you make no effort to replace them and allow them to age or decline due to injuries without bringing replacements through. We've always been very good in ensuring we continue to improve the scheme. That changed up to and after the treble. Subsequently we've seen what appears to be a desperate attempt to change things but rather than buy the players for Pep to continue our general style of play, we've brought in players that don't look capable of doing it. The possession-dominance we had from so many solid technical players has been lost and we now have a group who look like they can barely pass the ball to one another, run it into trouble time and time again and leave us completely exposed.

We will need time to gel, time we haven't had. And I'm certain we've got a very good squad of players. But the glaring issues we should have resolved simply haven't been.
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Agreed. But I don’t think we are far away. One player can change it all. I thought our left side looked solid yesterday for the first time in years with Ait Nouri and Kusanov. The right was a disaster and Brighton exploited it. We also don’t know the impact on stamina from the CWC yet.
 
Prophet of Doom said:
But we’ve spent £350m this year - bargain basement is the poor quality not the fees we are paying.

Not one player we have bought would have got anywhere near our team 3 years ago.
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This, bought very poorly in January ( not sure if he had any input) and not addressed RB or the lack of G/A from our wingers. Miles behind Dippers and Arsenal at present.
 
bobbyowenquiff said:
Agreed. But I don’t think we are far away. One player can change it all. I thought our left side looked solid yesterday for the first time in years with Ait Nouri and Kusanov. The right was a disaster and Brighton exploited it. We also don’t know the impact on stamina from the CWC yet.
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There's clearly a need for patience. We haven't had a pre-season and whilst we were pretty poor for the whole second half, we fell apart over the final 20 minutes or so, which could be fatigue. We probably should have been more proactive in changing things ourselves, but it's not ideal to be missing Savinho, Foden and Cherki. Gvardiol out as well and makes a big difference.

But the transfer strategy has been a bit bizarre. Even with the situation we see with the goalkeeper now. We seem to be letting players decide if they want to stay or go!

In time things should improve as players gel, our tactical systems are embedded etc. The damage was done in the summer of the treble and it was never going to be easily rectified. Rather than add quality and improve from a position of strength, as Liverpool have done this window, we let good players leave and didn't bring enough quality in.

Unless we buy a RB, which isn't going to happen now, you can't give Viana a thumbs up because it remains a glaring issue in our squad that needed sorting as a priority.
 
WTF is going on with recruitment/Pep?

Our system has been high press, win the ball back quickly to aid both our offense and defense. And because of this we need players gifted on the ball, able to press and without ego - able to put in a shift, trying their 100% best each game.

Instead... and forgive me because I like Haaland...

We for some reason signed Haaland - an awesome, world class, very best striker in the world, who is a liability when we need to press. We can cover one such player - but still... in our system we need high press, ball control, deft passing... Haaland is a misfit.

Lately we've signed Ait Nouri - as a for example - great going forward, iffy on pressing, and a complete liability on defense.

And Cherki - extremely gifted, arrogant, slow, a liability when needing to press, doesn't at all fit the win the ball back within 5 to 10 seconds mould.

And now... we've apparently signed Donnarumma - who, as of late, is a beast at shot stopping, but who is not great on the ball. PSG coped with him by having excellent fullbacks/CBs on the ball and when building out from the back relied on them instead on Donnarumma. Instead we have Ait Nouri and Dias who aren't great on the ball... and Lewis too, who, under pressure isn't great.

I think that Donnarumma is going to start if/when he comes into our side... and we're going to be far worse as a consequence... attempting to play a ball control, build from the back game, with a keeper who isn't fit for this purpose, and with numerous players in our side that don't fit this system (Haaland, Ait Nouri, Lewis, Cheriki) or are in decline and no longer fit this system (Silva for sure), and new players that I think will adapt given time but aren't yet up to speed (Reijnders).

We've enough talent in this side and Pep will eventually realize this mess - that I think we'll finish in the neighborhood of 4th through 6th or so... but for me - that's our potential this season.
 
BlueMoonAcrossThePond said:
WTF is going on with recruitment/Pep?

Our system has been high press, win the ball back quickly to aid both our offense and defense. And because of this we need players gifted on the ball, able to press and without ego - able to put in a shift, trying their 100% best each game.

Instead... and forgive me because I like Haaland...

We for some reason signed Haaland - an awesome, world class, very best striker in the world, who is a liability when we need to press. We can cover one such player - but still... in our system we need high press, ball control, deft passing... Haaland is a misfit.

Lately we've signed Ait Nouri - as a for example - great going forward, iffy on pressing, and a complete liability on defense.

And Cherki - extremely gifted, arrogant, slow, a liability when needing to press, doesn't at all fit the win the ball back within 5 to 10 seconds mould.

And now... we've apparently signed Donnarumma - who, as of late, is a beast at shot stopping, but who is not great on the ball. PSG coped with him by having excellent fullbacks/CBs on the ball and when building out from the back relied on them instead on Donnarumma. Instead we have Ait Nouri and Dias who aren't great on the ball... and Lewis too, who, under pressure isn't great.

I think that Donnarumma is going to start if/when he comes into our side... and we're going to be far worse as a consequence... attempting to play a ball control, build from the back game, with a keeper who isn't fit for this purpose, and with numerous players in our side that don't fit this system (Haaland, Ait Nouri, Lewis, Cheriki) or are in decline and no longer fit this system (Silva for sure), and new players that I think will adapt given time but aren't yet up to speed (Reijnders).

We've enough talent in this side and Pep will eventually realize this mess - that I think we'll finish in the neighborhood of 4th through 6th or so... but for me - that's our potential this season.
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I mused similar in the Donnarumma thread but only about him specifically. Enrique is almost certainly after the same profile of keeper as Pep, and is getting rid of him for someone who's a better fit. Why would that put us in pole position to sign him? Doesn't make any sense. Did we really waste so much time going after Costa to no avail? We then sign Trafford for...? Really hope this keeper situation is a transitional error and not a sign of things to come.

Will also add that I think missing out on Wirtz is going to haunt us for pretty much the peak of his career. He's going to be as important for the dippers as KDB was for us. He was *the* continuity signing we couldn't afford to fumble, having notice years in advance, his rise coinciding perfectly with KDBs decline, and we fucked it. Flies in the face of everything we've been told (and demonstrated) since the takeover of smooth forward planning.
 
The most over rated job ever


If I am the owner of the club and I pay the manager +20 Million Pound per year, I would ask the manager to tell me what does he need to improve the team, a list of players and their alternatives.

The job of DOF is to recruit for the academy and try to discover talents in lower & unpopular leagues.

In addition to hold the negotiations when the manager himself has decide which player he wants to sign.
 
adrianr said:
I mused similar in the Donnarumma thread but only about him specifically. Enrique is almost certainly after the same profile of keeper as Pep, and is getting rid of him for someone who's a better fit. Why would that put us in pole position to sign him? Doesn't make any sense. Did we really waste so much time going after Costa to no avail? We then sign Trafford for...? Really hope this keeper situation is a transitional error and not a sign of things to come.

Will also add that I think missing out on Wirtz is going to haunt us for pretty much the peak of his career. He's going to be as important for the dippers as KDB was for us. He was *the* continuity signing we couldn't afford to fumble, having notice years in advance, his rise coinciding perfectly with KDBs decline, and we fucked it. Flies in the face of everything we've been told (and demonstrated) since the takeover of smooth forward planning.
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Couldn't agree more.

I'm not sure that Wirtz ever seriously considered us though... it seems to me that he expressed interest us just as a negotiating tactic. When he did visit us... it's extremely puzzling why Pep wasn't there in person to great him.
 
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