Dani Alves

[Neville Kneville]

I doubt you made them up, you're just jumping to conclusions based on 5 minutes of highlights.

Watch the game back. We were playing well, comfortable, then Zabaleta came, we dropped about 15 yards, Ronaldo tore him to shreds and we conceded 3 goals in 15 minutes.

Look, again it's the wrong thread & I was just making the point re Alves, Real Madrid is no barometer of a player's worthiness.

I have a recording of the game somewhere & was making the point, at the time, I thought we were fucking shite defensively. We were much worse than the highlights..

Real, imo should have been 4, 5, 6 up by half time but finished like wankers. Some of those instances, are there, for you to see, on the video. Top players, missing from a few yards. Others are not on it.

When that happens, imo, it's not 'comfortable' it's dead lucky.

Real had about 20 odd 30 shots & about half on target, as well as the situations they fucked up. eventually, some went in. It should have happened earlier.

imo, Alves, as he is today, would not weaken that defence on that day, which was my point, in replying to someone who was using his difficulties v Real Madrid, last season, as an indication he might struggle now.

It's not a fair situation to judge him imo, you have to look at a bunch of games.

 

[Divino da Guia]

So, i went crazy or some here apparently believe that WALKER can bench Dani Alves????????????
Really? We're gonna pretend that starting the season with Walker instead of Dani Alves in the XI is a safer option?
This is perpostous!

Stop lying to yourself with this "pace of the league" thing.
Don want to hurt the feelings of people here but Walker is an option only if you're desperate, like Barcelona, but not if you can sign a actual top full back.
Walker would not be considered a top full back by the French or the Brazilians, for example, if he were from some of those countries with a history of top RBs/LBs.

Oh, bu bu but Pep maybe will sign him.
I would not be surpised. I'm pretty sure Pep is smart enough to know he needs to sign some "local" players; but City is a GLOBAL club now, and people should realize this fact.

"Oh, Lord, my team will play a huge game tomorrow and i dont know if i'll pick Dani Alves or Walker for the starting XI"...

 

[Marvin]

So, i went crazy or some here apparently believe that WALKER can bench Dani Alves????????????
Really? We're gonna pretend that starting the season with Walker instead of Dani Alves in the XI is a safer option?
This is perpostous!

Stop lying to yourself with this "pace of the league" thing.
Don want to hurt the feelings of people here but Walker is an option only if you're desperate, like Barcelona, but not if you can sign a actual top full back.
Walker would not be considered a top full back by the French or the Brazilians, for example, if he were from some of those countries with a history of top RBs/LBs.

Oh, bu bu but Pep maybe will sign him.
I would not be surpised. I'm pretty sure Pep is smart enough to know he needs to sign some "local" players; but City is a GLOBAL club now, and people should realize this fact.

"Oh, Lord, my team will play a huge game tomorrow and i dont know if i'll pick Dani Alves or Walker for the starting XI"...

Yes I would go for Alves tomorrow, but we have to take it season by season with him. Could be his last. Walker is better than you think.

The pace of the Premier league is real. Juve, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern have easy fixtures most weeks. In the Premier league they are all Cup Finals. The quality of the top clubs is way below Real madrid, bayern etc, but the clubs who are mid-table all have top players. Stoke who are one of the smallest clubs in the Premier League have some really top players. They are nearly all like that.

teams like WBA, Everton, Leicester etc fight like mad to stay in the Premier league and those games are tougher than Champions League games when top seed plays bottom seed.

 

[Jalfraag]

So, i went crazy or some here apparently believe that WALKER can bench Dani Alves????????????
Really? We're gonna pretend that starting the season with Walker instead of Dani Alves in the XI is a safer option?
This is perpostous!

Stop lying to yourself with this "pace of the league" thing.
Don want to hurt the feelings of people here but Walker is an option only if you're desperate, like Barcelona, but not if you can sign a actual top full back.
Walker would not be considered a top full back by the French or the Brazilians, for example, if he were from some of those countries with a history of top RBs/LBs.

Oh, bu bu but Pep maybe will sign him.
I would not be surpised. I'm pretty sure Pep is smart enough to know he needs to sign some "local" players; but City is a GLOBAL club now, and people should realize this fact.

"Oh, Lord, my team will play a huge game tomorrow and i dont know if i'll pick Dani Alves or Walker for the starting XI"...

The only reason Walker is a target is because we're losing Clichy who is accociation trained.
Unless Alves' form falls off a cliff, no one thinks Walker is better.

 

[pbueno16]

Walker is the best option. What other choice do we have?
Carvajal? Good luck even with a 100m bid.
Azpilicueta? Why would he leave at the beginning of his prime to a rival when he's just won the league for the second time in 3 years?
Bellerin? Not totally convinced he's going to be the top RB, and we'd have to compete with Barca for him.
Clyne? Probably has bought into what Klopp is doing at Liverpool.

Aurier, Sidibe, Semedo and Danilo would be good targets, but we have to keep the English player count with Clichy gone like @Jalfraag mentioned

and yes, the PL is different. What other league plays 3/4 league matches in the span of 2 weeks? Their cup competitions are played more sparingly vs the English cups. AND their FAs don't screw them with match scheduling around CL matches.

 

[LittleEgg]

Walker is the best option. What other choice do we have?
Carvajal? Good luck even with a 100m bid.
Azpilicueta? Why would he leave at the beginning of his prime to a rival when he's just won the league for the second time in 3 years?
Bellerin? Not totally convinced he's going to be the top RB, and we'd have to compete with Barca for him.
Clyne? Probably has bought into what Klopp is doing at Liverpool.

Aurier, Sidibe, Semedo and Danilo would be good targets, but we have to keep the English player count with Clichy gone like @Jalfraag mentioned

and yes, the PL is different. What other league plays 3/4 league matches in the span of 2 weeks? Their cup competitions are played more sparingly vs the English cups. AND their FAs don't screw them with match scheduling around CL matches.

How many homegrown outgoings are there?

I count hart, clichy, kelechi but keep thinking i'm missing someone...

Surely roberts has the potential to take one of the spots in the main squad. How many players are actually classed as homegrown that are likely to be in the city squad next year?

Sterling, Roberts(if he stays), Tosin, Garcia, and...who else am i missing?

 

[pbueno16]

How many homegrown outgoings are there?

I count hart and clichy but keep thinking i'm missing someone...

Surely roberts has the potential to take one of the spots in the main squad, leaving the possibility of moving for semedo or someone slightly better(even if primarily just down to age) than walker.

Keeping Roberts is one reason why I don't want Mbappe because I really want to see if he can earn a spot with us to become an academy success and homegrown talent. My only worry is that signing Sanchez/Mbappe will create a logjam of the front 3 and Roberts may be cut loose because I don't really think he stacks up against Sane and Sterling yet.

You may very well be right that it's only Hart and Clichy, but I'm starting to assume Delph may be sold for some reason (that's just me being paranoid). If that happens, we'd need to sign another CM/DM to backup Fernandinho/Yaya/Fernando and depending on where the replacement's from may need to be english, or we may very well need Walker/Bertrand.

 

[bluesteel]

Walker is the best option. What other choice do we have?
Carvajal? Good luck even with a 100m bid.
Azpilicueta? Why would he leave at the beginning of his prime to a rival when he's just won the league for the second time in 3 years?
Bellerin? Not totally convinced he's going to be the top RB, and we'd have to compete with Barca for him.
Clyne? Probably has bought into what Klopp is doing at Liverpool.

Aurier, Sidibe, Semedo and Danilo would be good targets, but we have to keep the English player count with Clichy gone like @Jalfraag mentioned

and yes, the PL is different. What other league plays 3/4 league matches in the span of 2 weeks? Their cup competitions are played more sparingly vs the English cups. AND their FAs don't screw them with match scheduling around CL matches.

Walker is not the best option, this is the way I see it...

5 have left from last years squad.

Willy = Ederson
Sagna = Alaves (potentially)
Navas = B.Silva
Zaba = ???
Clichy = ???

So far they all look like improvements to me.

In regards to each of the full back positions we are likely to replace, it appears we are going to need to buy home grown to fill the quota? Unless, we ship Bravo out and either keep Hart as no.2 (unlikely) or bring in another homegrown keeper. Then we're free to not get ripped off by Spurs for a slightly better than average full back (as far as top 8 teams in CL are concerned). There are no good enough home grown full backs available, if we keep Bravo as no.2 we will have to buy Walker/Bertrand, I'd prefer Bertrand but it really doesn't make sense to go down that route, I would try persuading Hart to stay for FA Cup, League Cup games and home league games against the bottom 8 teams... If that fails a home grown no.2 would be preferable to Walker/Bertrand as first choice.

 

[bluesteel]

Keeping Roberts is one reason why I don't want Mbappe because I really want to see if he can earn a spot with us to become an academy success and homegrown talent. My only worry is that signing Sanchez/Mbappe will create a logjam of the front 3 and Roberts may be cut loose because I don't really think he stacks up against Sane and Sterling yet.

You may very well be right that it's only Hart and Clichy, but I'm starting to assume Delph may be sold for some reason (that's just me being paranoid). If that happens, we'd need to sign another CM/DM to backup Fernandinho/Yaya/Fernando and depending on where the replacement's from may need to be english, or we may very well need Walker/Bertrand.

Shancez in and Nolito out would be nice. Roberts is just a player we can register for free, I'd like to see Pep take a closer look and decide on August 31st.

 

[Cityfan]

You may very well be right that it's only Hart and Clichy, but I'm starting to assume Delph may be sold for some reason (that's just me being paranoid). If that happens, we'd need to sign another CM/DM to backup Fernandinho/Yaya/Fernando and depending on where the replacement's from may need to be english, or we may very well need Walker/Bertrand.

Personally I'm assuming Delph and Fernanado are being sold , there have been rumours of both going, neither played much and we need space in the squad.
There don't seem to be too many rumours of replacements I think Pep may be happy with Yaya Fern and Gundogan.

 

[pbueno16]

Walker is not the best option, this is the way I see it...

5 have left from last years squad.

Willy = Ederson
Sagna = Alaves (potentially)
Navas = B.Silva
Zaba = ???
Clichy = ???

So far they all look like improvements to me.

In regards to each of the full back positions we are likely to replace, it appears we are going to need to buy home grown to fill the quota? Unless, we ship Bravo out and either keep Hart as no.2 (unlikely) or bring in another homegrown keeper. Then we're free to not get ripped off by Spurs for a slightly better than average full back (as far as top 8 teams in CL are concerned). There are no good enough home grown full backs available, if we keep Bravo as no.2 we will have to buy Walker/Bertrand, I'd prefer Bertrand but it really doesn't make sense to go down that route, I would try persuading Hart to stay for FA Cup, League Cup games and home league games against the bottom 8 teams... If that fails a home grown no.2 would be preferable to Walker Bertrand as first choice.

Definitely improvements on all fronts. I would like to try a homegrown keeper (Hart or whomever is deemed good enough) as no.2, but hasn't Bravo been confirmed to stay on? If Bravo's still here, who would be ok with playing 3rd option just to keep the homegrown quota? Gunn out on loan also makes it a bit of an awkward situation.

If Bravo goes and we keep Hart or sign an English second keeper, wouldn't we still need to get another homegrown fullback?

 

[Shaelumstash]

Look, again it's the wrong thread & I was just making the point re Alves, Real Madrid is no barometer of a player's worthiness.

I have a recording of the game somewhere & was making the point, at the time, I thought we were fucking shite defensively. We were much worse than the highlights..

Real, imo should have been 4, 5, 6 up by half time but finished like wankers. Some of those instances, are there, for you to see, on the video. Top players, missing from a few yards. Others are not on it.

When that happens, imo, it's not 'comfortable' it's dead lucky.

Real had about 20 odd 30 shots & about half on target, as well as the situations they fucked up. eventually, some went in. It should have happened earlier.

imo, Alves, as he is today, would not weaken that defence on that day, which was my point, in replying to someone who was using his difficulties v Real Madrid, last season, as an indication he might struggle now.

It's not a fair situation to judge him imo, you have to look at a bunch of games.

Your broader point about Alves, I totally agree. He tore Monaco to shreds twice, and didn't concede a goal against Barca who probably have the best forward line in history. He wasn't brilliant in the CL final, but it's ridiculous to judge him on one game. I think he'll be a brilliant addition.

Your point about the Madrid vs City game in 2012, I've got a different view. They had chances, but we were holding our own in the game and I remember Yaya having a brilliant chance to put us 2-0 up which he normally would have buried.

When Zabba came on, at the game you could see we noticeably dropped 15 yards deeper and were just trying to defend our lead. It was a big mistake because Madrid just piled everything at us and Ronaldo essentially went and played left wing and tore Zabaleta to shreds. He wasn't doing that earlier on because we were playing higher up and Maicon could match him for pace and physicality, whereas against Zabba it was a complete mismatch. I don't know whether Zaba dropped that deep because he was scared of getting isolated 1 on 1, or whether it was a tactical instruction. I think it was probably the latter, but either way, that substitution changed the game, no doubt about it.

 

[bluesteel]

Personally I'm assuming Delph and Fernanado are being sold , there have been rumours of both going, neither played much and we need space in the squad.
There don't seem to be too many rumours of replacements I think Pep may be happy with Yaya Fern and Gundogan.

I'm assuming Delph is going nowhere unless he pushes for a move, again, we'd need a home grown replacement, no better out there in a like for like position.

Can't see Fernando going either, not that I rate him, just don't think Pep will use that type of player too often and anyone significantly better isn't going to be happy with a squad role.

 

[pbueno16]

Personally I'm assuming Delph and Fernanado are being sold , there have been rumours of both going, neither played much and we need space in the squad.
There don't seem to be too many rumours of replacements I think Pep may be happy with Yaya Fern and Gundogan.

I would be ok with both going only if we can get a solid DM to start over Fernandinho or rotate with him. Only issue with Delph leaving is the potential need to find a homegrown player at the same or other position.

I may be wrong in my assessment of Gundogan, but I feel like he's more effective and does what he's best at when he's just ahead of a DM and behind a no. 10 like KdB and D. Silva. Those are the main reasons why I think we should be after a DM after all this fullback business is over with. But then there's the CB dilemma...

 

[bluesteel]

Definitely improvements on all fronts. I would like to try a homegrown keeper (Hart or whomever is deemed good enough) as no.2, but hasn't Bravo been confirmed to stay on? If Bravo's still here, who would be ok with playing 3rd option just to keep the homegrown quota? Gunn out on loan also makes it a bit of an awkward situation.

If Bravo goes and we keep Hart or sign an English second keeper, wouldn't we still need to get another homegrown fullback?

Not according to my maths. Clichy (HG) would just be switched for Willy (No.2 non HG) for a HG number 2 (assuming Ederson has replaced Bravo as no.1 and Bravo leaves).

 

[Paulmcfc2703]

I'm assuming Delph is going nowhere unless he pushes for a move, again, we'd need a home grown replacement, no better out there in a like for like position.

Can't see Fernando going either, not that I rate him, just don't think Pep will use that type of player too often and anyone significantly better isn't going to be happy with a squad role.

If we get Walker and Bertrand to go with Sterling & Stones we would get rid of Delph

 

[Cityfan]

I'm assuming Delph is going nowhere unless he pushes for a move, again, we'd need a home grown replacement, no better out there in a like for like position.

Can't see Fernando going either, not that I rate him, just don't think Pep will use that type of player too often and anyone significantly better isn't going to be happy with a squad role.

You don't need the homegrown in a like for like position, if we get Bertrand and Walker thats our home grown quota maxed.
I just think we will junk some central midfielders where we were overloaded in inexperienced and poorer quality or injured ones last year. We need to lose more players if the rumoured arrivals are coming and I expect Nolito, Fernando and Delph to be out.

 

[pbueno16]

Not according to my maths. Clichy (HG) would just be switched for Willy (No.2 non HG) for a HG number 2 (assuming Ederson has replaced Bravo as no.1 and Bravo leaves).

Ahh ok i sadly forgot about Willy. I agree that having Bravo at no.2 might be a shady decision. He struggled to adapt in his first season and I'm not entirely confident that he'll get enough playing time to turn it around with Ederson coming in. Just to be on the safe side and play devil's advocate: what if Ederson struggles to adapt as well and we're forced to rely on Bravo? I'm not confident in Bravo to step in and play week in and week out, so I think we should be on the safe side and get an English no.2 keeper.

 

[Neville Kneville]

Your broader point about Alves, I totally agree. He tore Monaco to shreds twice, and didn't concede a goal against Barca who probably have the best forward line in history. He wasn't brilliant in the CL final, but it's ridiculous to judge him on one game. I think he'll be a brilliant addition.

Your point about the Madrid vs City game in 2012, I've got a different view. They had chances, but we were holding our own in the game and I remember Yaya having a brilliant chance to put us 2-0 up which he normally would have buried.

When Zabba came on, at the game you could see we noticeably dropped 15 yards deeper and were just trying to defend our lead. It was a big mistake because Madrid just piled everything at us and Ronaldo essentially went and played left wing and tore Zabaleta to shreds. He wasn't doing that earlier on because we were playing higher up and Maicon could match him for pace and physicality, whereas against Zabba it was a complete mismatch. I don't know whether Zaba dropped that deep because he was scared of getting isolated 1 on 1, or whether it was a tactical instruction. I think it was probably the latter, but either way, that substitution changed the game, no doubt about it.

We had chances absolutely, no problem with that side of it, & we had decent possession, but Real would normally score the ones they had & the game would have been over, before we scored.

I have never been one to call it a good performance when we concede chances, just because they don't go in. If you look at the ones first half on that short vid, most of the defence are not closing down anything, just Vinny. It's actually worse than our defeniding in those situations now, or last season. A longer look at it just makes it more noticable imo.

Imo someone like Alves though, would be trying to do what Vinny was trying to do, get out to the ball & stop stuff from happening rather than standing still watching..

I have always looked on that game as an example of a team using shooting power to break down a parked bus & how we should play v deep defences. If you keep buying a ticket, you win the raffle & the oppo doesn't know whether to stick or twist..

 

[domalino]

I'm assuming Delph is going nowhere unless he pushes for a move, again, we'd need a home grown replacement, no better out there in a like for like position.

Can't see Fernando going either, not that I rate him, just don't think Pep will use that type of player too often and anyone significantly better isn't going to be happy with a squad role.

If we sign Bertrand and Walker as predicted we have maxed out our association trained HG players and for the sake of European games (which is the standard we have to build or squad to), Delph would take up one of the 17 foreign player spots , which no one wants.

He will be free to go and I reckon quite a few clubs will take a punt on his fitness.