82 | Rico Lewis - 2024/25

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ninjamonkey said:
We all know what he can offer but he's got to seriously sharpen up his defensive game. No excuse for their goal, that's just piss poor defending, has to be busting a gut to get back in line with the defensive unit, he had plenty of time to do so.

That's not the major problem though, it's his complete disregard for shape at all times. He needs to quickly learn it's only appropriate to go roaming into a number 10 role when he knows he's got defensive cover. Doing it every time, regardless of cover just leaves us wide ope. He's completely out of the game most of the time we don't have the ball. We've already been exploited by the gaps a couple of times this season and it's only going to continue. It's not strictly on him, the system isn't good enough but there's plenty of work that he can do.
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Why is Lewis being blamed for the goal when it was Stones who went walkabout and lost his man?
 
SebastianBlue said:
How much do you think a 19 year-old elite level player that can cover RB/CDM/CM/RM/RW/AM (in one game) would cost in today’s market?

What about a 21 year-old?

How much would Kimmich in his prime cost right now?
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I don’t know the answers to any of those questions.

If he’s a “cover” player then ok, my based on what I see, I only see a squad player at best. Absolutely he is versatile and gives his all whenever he plays, but he looks like our Phil Neville at best.

I also think his age isn’t relevant here. If we are saying he’s doing ok for his age and will get better then fine, loan him out until he is, or sell him with a buy back.
But for some of the weaknesses I see in him now, I’m not convinced he will dramatically improve over the next few years. If I’m wrong, then brilliant, honestly. But for example, his sometime lack of positional awareness when defending or his often lack of finishing ability, I think are a part of him as a player.
 
chesterbells said:
I don’t know the answers to any of those questions.

If he’s a “cover” player then ok, my based on what I see, I only see a squad player at best. Absolutely he is versatile and gives his all whenever he plays, but he looks like our Phil Neville at best.

I also think his age isn’t relevant here. If we are saying he’s doing ok for his age and will get better then fine, loan him out until he is, or sell him with a buy back.
But for some of the weaknesses I see in him now, I’m not convinced he will dramatically improve over the next few years. If I’m wrong, then brilliant, honestly. But for example, his sometime lack of positional awareness when defending or his often lack of finishing ability, I think are a part of him as a player.
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My point was that Lewis is already performing at a very high level, has been one of our most consistent and reliable players, and I think he will get better over the next few years.

We would have to spend an exorbitant amount of money to get an “elite level” player that can do what he does in our system, whether his same age or a few years older.

So I suppose I am asking you and others: are you advocating for us to drop £100+ million on a player that can cover all the positions Lewis can, just at a higher level right now?

Or should we develop him in to that player, whilst still doing an incredibly important job, and continuing to help us win silverware?
 
ninjamonkey said:
It was definitely on Lewis. When the ball goes out to our left, everybody shifts over, gvardiol goes out, dias covers thr channel, stones goes over to cover behind dias as he should, Rico has to get in line and tuck in, he didn't.
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Rico was further forward per instructions, and tried to get back. Stones is meant to stay wider and have a look over his left shoulder to see if there is a runner on the far post, specifically because Lewis will often not be able to get back to cover fast enough (he can’t be in two places at once, despite the expectations of some blues on here). He can easily run to close the man in the middle of the box from that wider position, if needed—and Dias will cut any ball to the middle runner, if he can. If he can’t, Stones isn’t going to be able to do it, so Stones is there to close, not cut out, and tucking closer to the middle runner is entirely unnecessary. It means we have two CBs covering the same runner, with only one actually being able to stop a ball from getting to him.

The goal was mostly down to Stones taking a poor line and thus ceding the great position for a tap in to the Wolves player, as Lewis scrambled back from his more forward position, which Pep has told him to take up in certain possession situations.

I genuinely don’t understand that of all the players this season, Lewis is one being singled out for being not good enough. In my opinion, on average, he is in our top three best players for the season thus far.
 
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ninjamonkey said:
It was definitely on Lewis. When the ball goes out to our left, everybody shifts over, gvardiol goes out, dias covers thr channel, stones goes over to cover behind dias as he should, Rico has to get in line and tuck in, he didn't.
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Exactly. People see what they want to see.
 
SebastianBlue said:
Rico was further forward per instructions, and tried to get back. Stones is meant to stay wider and have a look over his left shoulder to see if there is a runner on the far post, specifically because Lewis will often not be able to get back to cover fast enough (he can’t be in two places at once, despite the expectations of some blues on here). He can easily run to close the man in the middle of the box from that wider position, if needed—and Dias will cut any ball to the middle runner, if he can. If he can’t, Stones isn’t going to be able to do it, so Stones is there to close, not cut out, and tucking closer to the middle runner is entirely unnecessary. It means we have two CBs covering the same runner, with only one actually being able to stop a ball from getting to him.

The goal was mostly down to Stones taking a poor line and thus ceding the great position for a tap in to the Wolves player, as Lewis scrambled back from his more forward position, which Pep has told him to take up in certain possession situations.

I genuinely don’t understand that of all the players this season, Lewis is one being singled out for being not good enough. In my opinion, on average, he is in our top three best players for the season thus far.
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Rico's recovery run was shit, simple as...
 
ninjamonkey said:
It was definitely on Lewis. When the ball goes out to our left, everybody shifts over, gvardiol goes out, dias covers thr channel, stones goes over to cover behind dias as he should, Rico has to get in line and tuck in, he didn't.
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Gvardiol started to go out and then started heading back towards our box. That ball should never have got anywhere near stones or Lewis.
 
JewelZee said:
Rico's recovery run was shit, simple as...
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Whether it was shite or not, Lewis wasn’t the cause of the goal being conceeded.

I encourage everyone to watch the goal back again, especially from the tactical cam angle.

Stones was covering no one.
 
PragueBlue said:
Played a large part in it IMHO.
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I have watched it back about ten times, because I thought I must have missed something based on what people in this thread are saying about Lewis, and for me it is 40% on Gvardiol for not closing Semedo down (he ran away rather than to him), 50% on Stones for going walkabout (inexplicably covering no one or even occupying a position where he can impact play), and 10% on Lewis for perhaps not running back as fast as he could.

But, if you watch it back, I think you’ll see that Lewis probably can’t do anything about it even if he does sprint back a bit faster because the crosser was given so much space to put in a great cross and Stones didn’t take a line that would allow him to have a chance at cutting the ball out before it reached a far post runner.

It’s just bizarre to see so many throwing him, of all players, under the bus.
 
I thought rico did fairly well today. It was just too congested for any central player to really make too much of an impact, but I thought he did a lot of little things pretty well
 
SebastianBlue said:
I have watched it back about ten times, because I thought I must have missed something based on what people in this thread are saying about Lewis, and for me it is 40% on Gvardiol for not closing Semedo down (he ran away rather than to him), 50% on Stones for going walkabout (inexplicably covering no one or even occupying a position where he can impact play), and 10% on Lewis for perhaps not running back as fast as he could.

But, if you watch it back, I think you’ll see that Lewis probably can’t do anything about it even if he does sprint back a bit faster because the crosser was given so much space to put in a great cross and Stones didn’t take a line that would allow him to have a chance at cutting the ball out before it reached a far post runner.

It’s just bizarre to see so many throwing him, of all players, under the bus.
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To be honest I don’t think Lewis has the pace to get back anyway. He is very slow to get back when we lose the ball up the field. Agree that Gvardiol gave too much space but he did make up for it in the rest of the game.

Rico is good at some things though. I just think we need to play a different way to get him in the right places. I think he is a a midfield player more than a right back. Maybe it’s time to change our system a bit as I am not keen on this Gundo/Kovacic midfield duo.
 
He's always gonna be left out to dry when we cough it up, can you be on the ball in a #10 but cover DM, CM and RB while your at it. Looks outstanding when we are on it, silly passes and turnovers though, looks stupid.
 
The Stockport Iniesta said:
Footballers aren't robots, every player makes multiple mistakes every game, some small, some big.

Truth is it was a great ball in, I doubt many would be dissecting it if De Bruyne played that ball because it was that good a delivery.
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Every time I’ve seen it back, I’ve thought it was a KDB ball. Not dissimilar to the Sane goal against Stoke. Not as good, but aesthetically similar.
 
Millwallawayveteran1988 said:
To be honest I don’t think Lewis has the pace to get back anyway. He is very slow to get back when we lose the ball up the field. Agree that Gvardiol have too much space but he did make up for it in the rest of the game.
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I think Stones had a shaky first 45 but a better second before scoring the winner, Gvardiol was on balance ok before his absolutely vital stunner, and Lewis, without doing anything flashy, was on the whole the better of the three over the entire match. That’s not to say he was substantially better, but that he was just more consistent and he did everything asked of him well.

I struggle to believe Pep would be unhappy with his performance, much less agree with the various assertions in this thread that Rico “isn’t good enough for us.”

It’s like people have forgotten he’s a 19 year-old not only regularly starting for arguably the best club in the world, but in one of the most demanding roles in modern football, under one of the most demanding managers to ever grace the touchline.

I am really not sure a player people apparently want to replace him even exists. They might in the future… but that will just be Lewis, two or three years older.

If he played for Bayer, Atlético, Inter, or a lower table team, and was interested in joining us, everyone would be demanding we pay the €100 million going rate to get him before Real, Bayern, or Liverpool snap him up.
 
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