tolmie's hairdoo
Well-Known Member
Cancelo's OK on the front foot, it's why he makes a lot of eye-catching tackles, he has the freedom to aggressively step out and meet people in midfield, but as soon as the ball is in behind him (which is quite often due to his positioning) he's atrocious and like you say, Pep avoids it at all costs.
I would take the Zinchenko-Dias-Stones-Walker backline oevey day of the week over any other. When Zinchenko is next to Dias his defending goes up a level, and he has the mentality for it, just lacks a bit of pace to be able to cover wide and tuck into midfield.
But when Cancelo is delivering goals and assists at the rate he has been, he has to play really.
I agree with all of that.
There are few better than Zinchenko, if you are wanting that happy medium of more security in defence, and still have the technical capacity up to three quarters, as was shown in the second half at Paris last season.
But nobody can make an impression like Cancelo can in the final third, be the difference maker when our opponents have already accounted for the front six.
It's high risk, high reward, but it becomes a glaring fault line when someone takes him the other way, like Luke Shaw did last year.
This season, it was token gesture tackles which allowed Salah to punish us in assisting and scoring.
Every player has his faults, it's just Pep makes them even more pronounced for some players because they are not in conventional positions.
There's no way Rodri should work as a solitary holding player in our team, but Pep just knew the solution!