Ilkay Gundogan - 2018/19 performances

[Saddleworth2]

within a couple of minutes of coming on he made something like 6 passes. He really glued the team together more effectively than any other midfielder today.

 

[Dazzle84]

Maybe we have to adjust our judgement on him? He's no Kev, but literally who is?

Great continuity player, good set pieces and has a goal in him. Find a better "1st reserve"

 

[Churchlawtonblue]

Did ok in his cameo today.

 

[Blue Hefner]

We missed him in the first 11. He would have helped us keep the ball better

 

[Craig]

We missed him in the first 11. He would have helped us keep the ball better

Agreed but the whilw shape of the team was wrong anyway to start with.

 

[OB1]

I'm sorry @Dax777 but I just can't see why you're championing so hard for Gundogan. I know people get annoyed with the statistical shit I throw out but I always watch our matches multiple times. Ilkay adds nothing significant or game changing at all. He's the LB delph of free 8's. He doesn't take any risks at all offensively and rarely creates big chances. His defensive numbers are wank. I don't want to hear any bullshit about his positioning either because it doesn't correlate to anything tangible from a results standpoint defensively. He's not even good at retaining possession.

Possession Per 90 minutes.
Unsuccessful Touches / Disposed
Fern: 1 / 0.66 /
Dave: 1.2 / 1.1 /
KDB: 1.9 / 1.8 /
Gundo: 2 / 1.2

Believe it or not I actually have my opinions and then look up the numbers to see if they can tell me more to the story. I have no bias in this at all. He's just a bang average player. He's ok as a squad player but we're trying to build a squad where the 'squad' player is almost as good as the starters. I don't care if he stays until his contract runs out, leaves, or extends but I do know that his whole tactical assignment is to pass it as quick as he possibly can to somebody else and drop back. You shouldn't be having a 91-93% pass succession rate. That's wayyyy to passive. I mean I get it though. It's smart because he's the worst player out there and that's not his fault so you have to try to keep the ball out of his feet as much as possible.


Edit: Trying to devils advocate myself here and figure out something that I'm missing here to add big value to what he does and the only thing that I can come up with is that if you're executing your assignment effectively then you aren't making mistakes. If his job is to run around the entire match and make himself available for easy passes and then make easy ones himself without being intercepted then he's acing it.

I rewatched the Wolves can paying particular attention to Gundogan and I thought his pass selection was correct most of the time. I also thought his positioning was deliberate and sensible. I've said before that maybe he could take more risks but there's a place for a player who keeps things ticking over. I've no doubt that's why Pep brought him on when he did yesterday.

 

[Silva2021]

Great set piece delivery today

 

[City_Sean]

He was very good yesterday. Came on and shored up the midfield, neat and tidy on the ball.

 

[Neville Kneville]

When him & Bernardo came on, it was almost like we had an extra player in midfield.

 

[oldius]

When him & Bernardo came on, it was almost like we had an extra player in midfield.

Droll.