I think at this stage we have to assume he's not coming back. Obviously it'll be a huge bonus if he does, but we need to build the team around the assumption that Kompany won't be available. Stones is a talented young player, but let's make no mistake, he was our third choice in the summer after Bonucci and Laporte. He was never intended to come in and turn our defence into a rock solid unit by himself. He's a kid who needs to be playing alongside a world class centre back to learn, but we only have one of those, and he's constantly injured. And they're not exactly easy to find. Tbh, I'm trying to think of a single one in the Premier League other than Kompany. Terry back in the day of course. Alderweireld, possibly?
Personally, I'd be all over Van Dijk, but given how much we've spent on CBs recently, I can see why they'd be reluctant to try and put it right by throwing yet more money at the problem, especially for someone who's not proven world class.
Most defensive errors from an outfield player leading directly to a goal in the premier league...Just like he had last season too
Quality signing
This is the thing...he wasn't signed to defend. Just like Bravo. If you want to cast blame cast it on Pep.
Since Mancini left we must have spent about 130 million on defenders and we are still an absolute shambles at the back unless Kompany is on the pitch. It's terrible really. Stones doesn't look like a particularly good defender to me, I do think he is good on the ball but for me he's even worse than Mangala when it comes to defending. Wouldn't put the blame on him though, he's a kid trying his best in a system that is never going to help him and with nobody near him on the pitch able to guide him. We can either keep throwing money at central defenders ad infinitum or we can give the likes of Stones a system that doesn't mean they're constantly playing under the constant mental strain of knowing they have virtually no protection at all and nobody behind them who can ever bail them out.
Indeed he wasn't too bad, was certainly decent against big strong forwards. Don't think Costa would have scored that equaliser against us and doubt Lukaku would have been taking the piss out of us, bringing down those hoofs up field and holding it up virtually unchallenged. Question is does the whole thing need a bit of a rethink? Does defending need to be the most important part of our defenders' game, does saving shots need to be the most important part of our keeper's game, do we need to set up to not leave our defenders and keeper quite so exposed? I'm sure I'm just a luddite but after a few years of seeing us happily accept being the dope in Ali's rope a dope tactics, I'd like to see us get back to valuing the basics and putting winning above pretty much everything else. I wouldn't say Mangala wasn't a footballer because being a footballer can mean all sorts of things and being able to defend isn't something to be sniffed at.Mangala was good at defending, wasn't a footballer though.
His passing is fairly limited too..How often have you seen him play long balls a la what Kolarov does every game? How often have you seen him rasp one in to a forward player to set an attack off like Otamendi does. What have we played 47mil for? Because he is comfortable with a football at his feet? Adept at shielding the ball in and around our box?
Does Pep still call him over all the time to give him instructions etc?
His passing is fairly limited too..How often have you seen him play long balls a la what Kolarov does every game? How often have you seen him rasp one in to a forward player to set an attack off like Otamendi does. What have we played 47mil for? Because he is comfortable with a football at his feet? Adept at shielding the ball in and around our box?
Does Pep still call him over all the time to give him instructions etc?