Player Topic: Wilfried Bony (2015/16)

[Zin 'messiah' Zimmer]

It's good to have quality alternatives.

I know a fat 47 year old lad with a beer belly, yellow fingers and one leg but that doesn't mean we should give him 20 minutes against Barca.

Lol

Don't take the sleepless nights out on fellow blues (;

 

[Damocles]

Wonderful post. I disagree with the conclusion because I think you need strikers with contrasting styles to balance a squad and happen to think Bony is excellent at what he does. That's holding it up when our defence clears it whilst our midfield catch up or winning headers when it's cleared upfield and generally badgering the centre half so the ball doesn't come straight back at us. Could he be better ? Of course. Are there better strikers ? Of course ! Is he what we need ? I'd say, yes.

Just a small note on this; I'm not a big stats fan in general but a specific attribute like "winning headers" is something that is small enough that they can show. Taken either by direct numbers or by a percentage score just for forwards, Bony isn't even in the top 10 in our league for players who win aerial battles

EDIT: I'll strike that as once you take out the ones who have unfair metrics due to low number of duels, he IS in the top ten. He's about the 5th best striker in the league when it comes to aerial duels.

 

[Newman Noggs]

Just a small note on this; I'm not a big stats fan in general but a specific attribute like "winning headers" is something that is small enough that they can show. Taken either by direct numbers or by a percentage score just for forwards, Bony isn't even in the top 10 in our league for players who win aerial battles

EDIT: I'll strike that as once you take out the ones who have unfair metrics due to low number of duels, he IS in the top ten. He's about the 5th best striker in the league when it comes to aerial duels.

I agree with you about stats and that's why it's so difficult to prove the quality for "holding the ball up" that some of us are enjoying about his play. I appreciate it's a subjective opinion but one of the problems I think we have in games like Liverpool away is that when the defence clears it upfield, it simply comes straight back and keeps us under relentless pressure. My feeling is that Bony is better than Aguero in stopping that happening. Again, it's only a feeling I have, but I think he is improving the more games he gets and that the goals will follow in due course if we have patience. Time will tell.

 

[Silva_Spell]

I've always carried the "compete with your competition" mantra into signings as well. We want to compete with Barca, Bayern, and Real Madrid who represent the very top level of squads at the moment. One of the things that we should look at in our team is asking the question "will our first team starters even get in their team?". If the answer is no then they aren't good enough for us because like in FFP, you can't beat people in a race by running slower than them. When we start getting into the third and fourth choices then it becomes less important but we should have 15 players who would compete to get into the those teams.

Would Bony on his own talent, regardless of his form, get in front of Messi, Neymar or Suarez?
What about Ronaldo or Benzema?
Lewandowski or Muller?

Put those 8 names together and Bony is almost certainly the odd one out in terms of talent. Aguero fits it like a glove.


The fact is that City haven't had two quality strikers since the title winning season where both Tevez and Aguero were in the squad. Ever since then it's £30m on average rather than £50m on quality - a road Arsenal metaphorically traveled down for years and years to their detriment.

You're comparing our 2nd choice forward with the first choice forwards at the best 3 teams in the world. Non of those players are bench players. Bony is.

What sense would it make to spend 50m on a bench player? And what 50m player would stand for it even if we deemed it sensible to splash that kind of fee?

 

[I Hart Man City]

You're comparing our 2nd choice forward with the first choice forwards at the best 3 teams in the world. Non of those players are bench players. Bony is.

What sense would it make to spend 50m on a bench player? And what 50m player would stand for it even if we deemed it sensible to splash that kind of fee?

Exactly. The Barca comparison isn't really relevant as their front three is one of the best ever and if analogous to anything we have more like Aguero, Sterling and De Bruyne. Madrid are playing Ronaldo up front now but have had to rely on Adebayor and little pea when Benzema wasn't available who are no way near as good as Bony. The key is though that all the top players teams have start in the first 11 the majority of the time when available.

Tevez was on his way out and had come back from playing golf so if he got benched he was hardly going to argue, and he started anyway so the point's moot. There are no teams in the world that have two £50m+ players where they regularly bench one of them or even rotate them in one position. If we were playing with two strikers then the point of having two world class players makes sense, but (thankfully) we seem to have settled on one out and out striker on paper with another attacking player like Sterling pushing up as and when is necessary which means it's not realistic to have another player at the level of Aguero who is also competing directly for his position.

 

[Silva2021]

City have certainly the best striker in the league (Aguero) and also the best supporting team (Silva, KDB and Sterling), the obvious issue is fittness and so it is important to have back ups. We have Nacho, Navas, Nasri and Bony which to me is great strength in depth. If you watch Bony there is a player there, strength, ridicilous first touch, quick feet, can head the ball and although we're yet to see it he has got a shot on him (seems to be snatching at them at the moment).

The issue for me is about his ability to play the same role as Aguero and I think he lacks the movement, spacial awareness, pace, dribbling skills. Tuesday was prefect for him, his job was to get the ball to stick with lots of pace and movement around him to find the right pass, which he can do. This seems to be how we will get the best out of him and is probably good alternative if the running in behind of Aguero has not worked.

City second choice striker is a bit of a poisioned chalice as no-one compares to Aguero, but an experienced professional at peak age (albeit a couple of levels down) and a young player full of potential is ideal back up. This idea of a same level replacement is not a reality.

 

[stablemcfc]

You're comparing our 2nd choice forward with the first choice forwards at the best 3 teams in the world. Non of those players are bench players. Bony is.

What sense would it make to spend 50m on a bench player? And what 50m player would stand for it even if we deemed it sensible to splash that kind of fee?

Indeed. I agree with his general point of comparing our players to there's is a good yard stick to if we really can be competitive, but you can't compare a 2nd choice striker to a first choice striker, or first choice winger, doesn't make sense.

Here's my attempt at comparing other top teams 2nd choices to ours in Bony:

Barcelona is a tough one as they don't really have a 2nd choice striker per say, if Suarez was out you'd imagine they'd move Messi/Neymar into his place & just add another player into their front 3; of which the choices are most likely Munir el Haddadi, Sergi Roberto or Sandro Ramirez, and in my opinion Bony is closer to the level of the guy he's replacing (Aguero) than those 3 are to the guy they're replacing (Messi/Suarez/Neymar).

Real Madrid is probably going to be Jese, good player no doubt, but again not particularly close to Benzema's level, hard to compare with Bony due to contrasting styles but for his 14 appearances this season + pre-season he has 3 goals 1 assist.

Bayern I would say are the only one with the obvious advantage of 2 very good strikers in Lewandowski & Muller; albeit Muller doesn't really play there, but assume he does if Lewandowski misses out (?) with Goetze replacing him.

Chelsea have Remy/Falcao - do think Remy is decent but he seems third choice somehow, still favour Bony out of the 3 for sure.

United have... Fellaini? James Wilson? Not really worth comparing those I suppose.

Arsenal have.. Walcott I suppose? He's a winger for me, in fact I'd argue Bony is superior to both him & Giroud as a striker personally.

Liverpool could have a case for actually having the best "second striker" in the league if all their players are fit weirdly enough by having Benteke (assuming Sturridge is 1st choice under Klopp).

So for me only really Bayern with the obvious step up compared with us in a second striker department & even that isn't comparable as Muller doesn't just sit on the bench waiting to play, he starts whether it's up front or wide, or CAM; our 2nd striker will always be on the bench in the formation we play so there's no way we could have a player of Mullers quality happy to sit waiting for chances in Agueros absence.

 

[Damocles]

You're comparing our 2nd choice forward with the first choice forwards at the best 3 teams in the world. Non of those players are bench players. Bony is.

What sense would it make to spend 50m on a bench player? And what 50m player would stand for it even if we deemed it sensible to splash that kind of fee?

This is the same stupid argument wanker Arsenal and Liverpool fans made for Nasri and Sterling. "Why would he sit on the bench??!?!?!?!!?"

Bony even in terrible form will make 30 appearances this season and would make 20 even if Sergio wasn't made of glass.

There's no such thing as "a bench player" in the modern game for a club challenging on 4 fronts, and certainly doesn't apply to somebody who is the second choice striker with an often injured first choice in front of him.

Above this, there's absolutely no striker in the entire world worth £50m who wouldn't back themselves to snatch the number one spot. They aren't cowards and the reason they're worth £50m is because they both relish and succeed in competition their entire lives/

 

[geoff clipp]

This is the same stupid argument wanker Arsenal and Liverpool fans made for Nasri and Sterling. "Why would he sit on the bench??!?!?!?!!?"

Bony even in terrible form will make 30 appearances this season and would make 20 even if Sergio wasn't made of glass.

There's no such thing as "a bench player" in the modern game for a club challenging on 4 fronts, and certainly doesn't apply to somebody who is the second choice striker with an often injured first choice in front of him.

Above this, there's absolutely no striker in the entire world worth £50m who wouldn't back themselves to snatch the number one spot. They aren't cowards and the reason they're worth £50m is because they both relish and succeed in competition their entire lives/

Get what you're saying but I don't think the situation for our attacking midfielders is quite the same as for our strikers. There are more places available being shared by a number of players who can play anywhere in attacking midfield. There are more opportunities available to these players. We play one up front and when Aguero is fit, he will always play without question. Our second striker or whatever you want to call it is always second fiddle to Aguero. I think it changes how you look at things knowing it's pretty much only injury to one specific player that will see you get a game.

 

[Ray78]

If any of our current EDS strikers can show Pellegrini that they can lead the line and show that they can take bullying from any of the current Premier League central defenders and score 16 goals in the process then by all means we should sell Wilf in January.