#3 | Rúben Dias - 2020/21 Performances

[OB1]

He wasn't our first choice, every knows we wanted Koulibaly and didn't make any secret about it, and we made an offer for Koundé. Dias wouldnt be here if De Laurentis had been reasonable or if Benfica had beaten PAOK in the CL qualifier.

And that's great. His arrival here and changing our fortunes is serendipitous.

Really!? Seems our Chief of Football Operations may not have known:

Omar Berrada: "Ruben Dias? We looked at multiple candidates, top centre-back in Europe, and this was by far the best valuation once you consider age, experience, current talent and future potential. He's not overprived. He was by far our number one target in that sense..."

Speaking about any possible deal for Napoli's Kalidou Koulibaly he (Omar B) said:

“The truth is we never were in negotiations with his club. It was very interesting to see the amount of noise that was coming out from certain media outlets and social media…”

Rúben Dias was on our list for a long time. We followed his evolution in previous seasons and that of the termination clause, I think it was around 88 million euros,'

We went back for Dias because Benfica suddenly had to do business.

 

[domalino]

Really!? Seems our Chief of Football Operations may not have known:

Omar Berrada: "Ruben Dias? We looked at multiple candidates, top centre-back in Europe, and this was by far the best valuation once you consider age, experience, current talent and future potential. He's not overprived. He was by far our number one target in that sense..."

Speaking about any possible deal for Napoli's Kalidou Koulibaly he (Omar B) said:

“The truth is we never were in negotiations with his club. It was very interesting to see the amount of noise that was coming out from certain media outlets and social media…”

Rúben Dias was on our list for a long time. We followed his evolution in previous seasons and that of the termination clause, I think it was around 88 million euros,'

We went back for Dias because Benfica suddenly had to do business.

"He was our number one target in that sense". So not in the sense of being our actual number one target, but being our number 1 target when his price got cut in half.

We already know that the club refused to negotiate with Napoli directly after Jorginho and were doing all negotiations through Koulibaly's agent as a 3rd party. I know you were in the transfer threads every day, so you know that.

We went back for Dias because Benfica suddenly had to do business.

Yes, because our attempts to sign other CB's failed, and he unexpectedly came on the market 10 days before the window shut.

I don't think for one minute you seriously believe the club rested it's entire CB buying strategy on waiting until late September to see if Benfica had a shock result and Dias became affordable. They were trying to buy other players.

I'm not sure why some people are trying to pretend this was a masterfully planned transfer where we identified one player who suited us and went out and got him and he fitted straight away. It wasn't like that at all, it was messy and a bit lucky and now we get to enjoy that bit of good fortune for hopefully 10+ years.


He's a world class player, you don't have to create a myth around how he got here.

 

[BlueAnorak]

Ruben Dias is a monster. His defending against Villa tonight was sublime. How he made that clearance is beyond me. Lucky? No he's done it 3 times now deflecting the ball up past the chest but below the head of the attacker

 

[Sir Joe Aguero]

We've got 4 great CB's all 26 and under, a back 4 as strong as any in football, and a future captain. Unbelievable signing.

Sounds weird but if we signed Haaland, can see us playing like 04/5 Chelsea. Once we score, we ain't conceding, so it's a matter of by how many.

 

[Alan Harper's Tash]

hes sliding before the cross comes in, his inteligence as a defender is whats really incredible.

His anticipation is so good that it must be clairvoyance.

He’d have been burnt at the stake if he did that in the 15th Century.

 

[mccity]

So help me out here. Was it the club looked at Dias, decided he was great but too expensive and then moved on? And then got lucky with Benfica getting knocked out of the CL and having not signed another CB, gladly took the opportunity to sign him?


Also it begs the question, who was the 1st choice if neither him nor Koulibaly? Koundé? Carlos? Soyuncu? Someone else?

 

[mccity]

We've got 4 great CB's all 26 and under, a back 4 as strong as any in football, and a future captain. Unbelievable signing.

Sounds weird but if we signed Haaland, can see us playing like 04/5 Chelsea. Once we score, we ain't conceding, so it's a matter of by how many.

If we signed Haaland we'd probably be more like 18/19 City. Score a tonne and never concede either.

 

[ninjamonkey]

If we had another sub tonight and brought gundogan off I believe he would have been next in line for the armband tonight, only a matter of time before it's his IMO, made to be captain Pep should just hand it him once Fernandinho hngs up his boots, kdb gets too heated to be captain and nobody else stands out as a better candidate.

 

[cjn]

Really!? Seems our Chief of Football Operations may not have known:

Omar Berrada: "Ruben Dias? We looked at multiple candidates, top centre-back in Europe, and this was by far the best valuation once you consider age, experience, current talent and future potential. He's not overprived. He was by far our number one target in that sense..."

Speaking about any possible deal for Napoli's Kalidou Koulibaly he (Omar B) said:

“The truth is we never were in negotiations with his club. It was very interesting to see the amount of noise that was coming out from certain media outlets and social media…”

Rúben Dias was on our list for a long time. We followed his evolution in previous seasons and that of the termination clause, I think it was around 88 million euros,'

We went back for Dias because Benfica suddenly had to do business.

Dias is a fucking amazing player and Txiki and team deserve all the credit in the world for signing him, but he obviously wasn't the first choice. We spent months negotiating with Napoli for Koulibaly - per literally every single person connected to the club, from Mullock and that crew, to Tolmie, to everyone. I dont know why we need to pretend otherwise, who cares?

 

[IBlue]

I think there's an argument he's the best actual defender on the planet.

He's not as complete an all-round CB as Van Dijk - his passing isn't as strong and he lacks the blistering pace - but as an actual defender I don't think there's anyone better. De Ligt has been incredible at that kind of stuff for a while at Juventus and Chiellini was exceptional before his injury but that was 15 months ago and he's not come back properly.

Other than those I don't think anyone is even close. Sule at Bayern had a spell when he had that inpenetrable wall aura, but he fell off. Gimenez at Atletico used to but his injuries have tarnished it a bit.

He's just the best at defending. Marking, tackling, blocking, organising, no body is better.

He reminds me more of Godin when he was at his best for Atletico, no blistering pace just a knack of always being in the right place, and the pure joy of making the tackle