John Stones

[bluesince76]

Stones V Fulham

Stones v Chelsea

Pay attention to how hard both Chelsea and Fulham find it to press against a defense with Stones in it.

Watch how aggressively Fulham attempts the press early, and pay attention to how it slowly dissipates as they get no fruit.

Pay attention to him pocketting the Nut job Chelsea striker. And making mince meat of their pressure.

Watch Barry multiple times point to Stones when the ball is with another defender or player under pressure. Stones is almost ever available for a pass.

On the Chelaea breakaway that Stones blocks, watch how he calmly tells his goalie to cover the near post before he attacks the striker from a fantastic angle, giving him only the near post poor option.

This is what he does constantly game in game out. Confident, comfortable, always organizing men with years of experience over him. On multiple occasions you can see him pointing correctly to where the teammates need to be to break the press.

And when it comes to defending, he is as strong into the tackle as anyone else.

I for the life of me don't know how anyone can conclude after actually watching him, that he is shit or poor. Barry and Jageilka differ to him constantly. It's not coz they are stupid.

He is bloody Intelligent. His footballing IQ is beyond that of most of his teammates. Watch him over a series of games and this jumps out at you.

Curling together a series of team errors from 30 games and adding one or two ( yes, admittedly horrendous mistakes) and then concluding that a player is shit, is fucking asinine. I could put together a Kompany collage of errors from 11-12 when he was in fact the best defender in the world.

This reputation of Stones does my head in :?

Everyone knows he's good on the ball, although the yellow card against Chelsea was due to him over complicating things, which often happens, although hopefully something he'd grow out of.

What neither video shows is much of him regaining possession, through interceptions or tackles. That may have just been those games where he didn't have the need to, but there is an ongoing concern that the defensive side of his game isn't his strong point and he's been a major part of an awful Everton defence this season. How much of that is down to Martinez's tactics, how much is down to the players next to him and how much is down to him is the big question, but it's one hell of a gamble at £45m

 

[warpig]

Looks like Pep doesn't fancy Mangala

as do most of the 51,000 city fans
Who watch him week in week out.

 

[Pokes28]

Personally, I wouldn't take the gamble. I watched a lot of Everton (I watch every City match, but I also follow the teams that have an American playing) and Stones looks like that guy that "should" be very good, you see flashes of being very good, but there is always something keeping him from being consistently good. I have no idea if it is his age, Martinez, those around him, etc. But even the season before last which had Chelsea trying to open their wallet wide enough to pry him away, I didn't see greatness. I saw a guy that at his best was pretty good. His calmness on the ball is there, but he's slow, for being so tall, he isn't a force on the other end during set pieces, etc. If he wasn't English, were would he rate? I'd guess he's more in the 10 million pound range. The English premium is very expensive.

 

[TonyM]

Stones V Fulham

Stones v Chelsea

Pay attention to how hard both Chelsea and Fulham find it to press against a defense with Stones in it.

Watch how aggressively Fulham attempts the press early, and pay attention to how it slowly dissipates as they get no fruit.

Pay attention to him pocketting the Nut job Chelsea striker. And making mince meat of their pressure.

Watch Barry multiple times point to Stones when the ball is with another defender or player under pressure. Stones is almost ever available for a pass.

On the Chelaea breakaway that Stones blocks, watch how he calmly tells his goalie to cover the near post before he attacks the striker from a fantastic angle, giving him only the near post poor option.

This is what he does constantly game in game out. Confident, comfortable, always organizing men with years of experience over him. On multiple occasions you can see him pointing correctly to where the teammates need to be to break the press.

And when it comes to defending, he is as strong into the tackle as anyone else.

I for the life of me don't know how anyone can conclude after actually watching him, that he is shit or poor. Barry and Jageilka differ to him constantly. It's not coz they are stupid.

He is bloody Intelligent. His footballing IQ is beyond that of most of his teammates. Watch him over a series of games and this jumps out at you.

Curling together a series of team errors from 30 games and adding one or two ( yes, admittedly horrendous mistakes) and then concluding that a player is shit, is fucking asinine. I could put together a Kompany collage of errors from 11-12 when he was in fact the best defender in the world.

This reputation of Stones does my head in :?

How anyone can be impressed by that is beyond me. He passes the ball like any other defender does...often inaccurately. People accuse Mangala of being a poor passer but I see nothing worse than Stones. Dunno could do the same.

Can he actually defend?

 

[cucumberman]

We've all seen him play long enough. For as many positives a YouTube video can showcase him, we might be able to make a longer video on his negatives. But no one does such compilation or not that I know of. I've seen him more than enough times beaten by his man. Yes he throws good tackles but so does Otamendi. At the end of this season we are beginning to see Otamendi doing attack runs and passes and Otamendi tackles with his left and right while Stones tend to tackle more with his right and toepoke with his left. To me he has the Lescott role in the Lescott-Kompany duo, a good defender on certain days against certain setups but prone to mistakes.

 

[borassic]

Seems like people are pretty much 50-50 split. Be good to see a poll of who wants him and who doesn't. As previously stated I think he'll go onto be a superb signing a la Rio Ferdinand when he went to the rags.

 

[RandomJ]

It doesn't matter if the fans want him or not. The only person whose opinion matters is Pep. If he wants him then he will do his damn best to get him. Though I'm sure that won't stop everyone on here moaning about him before he even kicks a ball for us.

 

[Zin 'messiah' Zimmer]

It doesn't matter if the fans want him or not. The only person whose opinion matters is Pep. If he wants him then he will do his damn best to get him. Though I'm sure that won't stop everyone on here moaning about him before he even kicks a ball for us.

People are also oblivious to the need to rebuild with potential, which is inevitably youth... I'd be excited to see a core of

Stones
Laporte
Sterling
Nacho
Denayer
Sane
KDB

Average age 21, in 2/3 years they could be outstanding, virtually a new spine and that's not accounting for a few others pep will bring through..

 

[JoeMercer'sWay]

People are also oblivious to the need to rebuild with potential, which is inevitably youth... I'd be excited to see a core of

Stones
Laporte
Sterling
Nacho
Denayer
Sane
KDB

Average age 21, in 2/3 years they could be outstanding, virtually a new spine and that's not accounting for a few others pep will bring through..

I don't think that's fair. I don't think anyone's really argued the case that we should buy an experienced CB instead, certainly haven't seen any reasonably linked to us. From what I've seen people are unconvinced by the youngsters linked, which is fair enough, and I don't think it's unreasonable to say that chucking 7 of them into the first team next year is a bit much and leaves us a little over-exposed, and no that isn't a modern day Hansen. Stones & Laporte on the first day next season as the CB pairing is a little unnerving, but if you pay that level of money they'll bump Mangala out and maybe Ota too (even though I think he should be first choice).

Besides you can build with the youth and experience of Kroos (26), Gundogan (25), Thiago (25) & Isco (24). Hardly old fogeys ;).

 

[Bluearmy]

This. It shocks me to no end that he has garnered a reputation as being shit. I didn't even watch him the year folks thought he was good. ".A." Used to come here daily waxing lyrical about how we should Sign him and the other kid at Everton. How highly rated he was etc.

Then this season, I figured alright let see what this kid is all about. He has been very good, and you could easily project him being better on a possession based team. He is young, so there is a risk. And talent sometimes plateau. But nothing I've seen this season suggest he is going anywhere bit up.

Solid all round footballer. Including defending.

We're polar opposites on Stones, not wanting to go over old ground but how can you possible say he's a solid defender. Especially if you did indeed watch him this season. Responsible for a dozen goals in last 3 or 4 months.... England game at the weekend he was poor. Shocking header during the run up for first goal. Under no pressure. Nowhere near his man from the corner where the player should of scored in the 2nd half. Bad miss from their player saved him. And the penalty incident in the last few minutes, where the linesman rescued him from giving a penalty away by giving an offside when it clearly wasn't. Lucky not solid in that game. If we play him in a 2 we'll ship goals left right and centre... I'm telling you