Ilkay Gundogan - 2018/19 performances

[oldius]

I think he is a superb player. He has superb movement off the ball so he is always in space. He is also adept at receiving the ball in tight areas on the half turn and spinning away to create forward movement. I have no understanding whatsoever of those who have him as a whipping boy. Thankfully, Pep rates him highly.

 

[Thaksinssoldier]

It's not coincidence our results are poorer with him in the side than when he is not in there.

Last season was terrible. Liverpool certainly comes to mind but the lad was afraid to commit to a tackle at times and just jogged around the pitch.

He needs to step up. We've had 2 seasons of unfulfilled potential from him other than a run of about 6 games before his injury, if he doesn't do it this season he never will.

 

[balotelli's back pocket]

It's not coincidence our results are poorer with him in the side than when he is not in there.

Last season was terrible. Liverpool certainly comes to mind but the lad was afraid to commit to a tackle at times and just jogged around the pitch.

He needs to step up. We've had 2 seasons of unfulfilled potential from him other than a run of about 6 games before his injury, if he doesn't do it this season he never will.

Jesus. Maybe because he only really played last season when Silva wasn't available? Arsenal away, spurs away, Chelsea at home. Played deeper, we dominated.

 

[Adamb95]

That's how it was reported back in the day at least. Maybe you remember the euro figures.

Yeah most likely. Either way, happy days.

 

[Thaksinssoldier]

Jesus. Maybe because he only really played last season when Silva wasn't available? Arsenal away, spurs away, Chelsea at home. Played deeper, we dominated.

I don't get your logic. Silva doesn't play, therefore it's okay if results aren't as good? That's the whole point of having a player of his supposed calibre in the squad.

I would agree, I think his future lies deeper, but listening to Pep and watching him play, I don't think that's the case for them.

I certainly have Bernardo and Foden ahead of him for further upfield.

 

[TonyM]

Did he have a nose job done?

 

[handsofstone]

He's a great option for us, he genuinely is class

But he isn't KDB or Silva and he cannot play the fernandinho role

 

[mccity]

I don’t understand why people underate him so much.

As an AM he is pure class. Vision and can finish.

Write him off at your peril.

Someone has to be rated poorly by the fans, it's human nature. Especially when we let emotions take over.

Can't be any of the regular starters of last season for obvious reasons, and Bravo's not in any immediate danger of making our first team either so that rules him out. Bernardo gets a pass because of his high production value in the 2nd half of the season plus his super sexy bubblegum foot too.

Which leaves Danilo, Zinchenko, Gundogan and Jesus. Zinchenko gets a minor pass though, because I think most people had a low bar for him originally so they don't hold him up to a higher standard.

So that leaves three players who haven't been here too long, were in and out of the side, some often playing different roles, some playing with styles that too many of us won't admit to not understanding, some with injury problems affecting their form, and in fairness each not being quite of the quality of the players ahead of them, makes them easy targets.

Plenty of people in all walks of life have a habit of honing in on anything they find negative and bringing it up. It's human nature as I said, we almost all do it with something (if not football).

If Gundogan has an excellent season this year (which he might), then the negativity will just move on to the next player. Even if we have another great season, they'll be some player to slip up at some point that will give the more over-reactionary a form of ammo. Be wary of a poor season for Sterling and see the reaction then.

Nobody's immune from the hate either. Silva, Aguero, and VK have all been quite harshly treated at times on these boards. Mendy was getting a bit of harsh stick off a small minority for his social media activity.


At the same time I should be clear, all of these players SHOULD be open to questioning and criticism, as should any player. What I'm referring to is negative labelling and overall unnecessary poor judgement of character and ability. Quickly writing a player off is a very lazy approach to analysis in my opinion.

Also we need to be careful not to swing it too much the other way either (which we do plenty of, myself absolutely included). That is, unnecessary praise of a player in the face of a clear problem/deficiency.



ALSO, in all honesty, writing an objective (and often somewhat long) two sided point about a player can be time consuming to both think about and type (and can definitely be a pain to type on a mobile too). Which as they say, "Ain't nobody got time for that".

ps in posts like these I always like to point out that there are a huge number of posters on these forums who don't underrate the likes of Gundogan unnecessarily, it's just we don't tend to notice their posts for similar reasons to why they may underrate him. We lock onto negativity.

 

[Clercqs]

Did he have a nose job done?

Yeah looks like it

 

[billfromthehill]

Someone has to be rated poorly by the fans, it's human nature. Especially when we let emotions take over.

Can't be any of the regular starters of last season for obvious reasons, and Bravo's not in any immediate danger of making our first team either so that rules him out. Bernardo gets a pass because of his high production value in the 2nd half of the season plus his super sexy bubblegum foot too.

Which leaves Danilo, Zinchenko, Gundogan and Jesus. Zinchenko gets a minor pass though, because I think most people had a low bar for him originally so they don't hold him up to a higher standard.

So that leaves three players who haven't been here too long, were in and out of the side, some often playing different roles, some playing with styles that too many of us won't admit to not understanding, some with injury problems affecting their form, and in fairness each not being quite of the quality of the players ahead of them, makes them easy targets.

Plenty of people in all walks of life have a habit of honing in on anything they find negative and bringing it up. It's human nature as I said, we almost all do it with something (if not football).

If Gundogan has an excellent season this year (which he might), then the negativity will just move on to the next player. Even if we have another great season, they'll be some player to slip up at some point that will give the more over-reactionary a form of ammo. Be wary of a poor season for Sterling and see the reaction then.

Nobody's immune from the hate either. Silva, Aguero, and VK have all been quite harshly treated at times on these boards. Mendy was getting a bit of harsh stick off a small minority for his social media activity.


At the same time I should be clear, all of these players SHOULD be open to questioning and criticism, as should any player. What I'm referring to is negative labelling and overall unnecessary poor judgement of character and ability. Quickly writing a player off is a very lazy approach to analysis in my opinion.

Also we need to be careful not to swing it too much the other way either (which we do plenty of, myself absolutely included). That is, unnecessary praise of a player in the face of a clear problem/deficiency.



ALSO, in all honesty, writing an objective (and often somewhat long) two sided point about a player can be time consuming to both think about and type (and can definitely be a pain to type on a mobile too). Which as they say, "Ain't nobody got time for that".

ps in posts like these I always like to point out that there are a huge number of posters on these forums who don't underrate the likes of Gundogan unnecessarily, it's just we don't tend to notice their posts for similar reasons to why they may underrate him. We lock onto negativity.

Yeh lad keep it short