Rafael Leao

[Pubteam Lomas]

My only question is, would he do the same as Grealish? Cut back and play the simple pass?
I know what he does at AC but would he be allowed to do it here? Same with Kvaratskhelia.
Villa's Grealish would have given Patterson as torrid time but we check back and keep the ball.

 

[Delphinho]

Whether we play Grealish, Leao or Kavaratskhelia won’t matter as long as we play with an inverted LB like Cancelo. All of them are suited to coming inside, but wouldn’t be allowed without signing a new LB. They’d all be forced to stay wide and eventually just pass it backwards. Pep seems to be having both Foden and Grealish on a leash. Both of them are capable of gliding past 2-3 players with their eyes closed, but it seems Pep has told them to play it simple. Once every 3 games or so, you’ll see Foden going on a solo run beating 3-4 players, succeeding pretty much every time. Same thing happened weekly in the academy. Got to be asking why he doesn’t do that every single week? Seems to me like Pep has told them to play it simple, restricting their ability. In the current setup Leao or Kvaratskhelia wouldn’t improve us, if we don’t sign a LB and don’t give them the freedom they have at AC Milan and Napoli

 

[birchwoodgingerste]

Whether we play Grealish, Leao or Kavaratskhelia won’t matter as long as we play with an inverted LB like Cancelo. All of them are suited to coming inside, but wouldn’t be allowed without signing a new LB. They’d all be forced to stay wide and eventually just pass it backwards. Pep seems to be having both Foden and Grealish on a leash. Both of them are capable of gliding past 2-3 players with their eyes closed, but it seems Pep has told them to play it simple. Once every 3 games or so, you’ll see Foden going on a solo run beating 3-4 players, succeeding pretty much every time. Same thing happened weekly in the academy. Got to be asking why he doesn’t do that every single week? Seems to me like Pep has told them to play it simple, restricting their ability. In the current setup Leao or Kvaratskhelia wouldn’t improve us, if we don’t sign a LB and don’t give them the freedom they have at AC Milan and Napoli

Yep agree with that.

 

[Deleted member 77198]

Whether we play Grealish, Leao or Kavaratskhelia won’t matter as long as we play with an inverted LB like Cancelo. All of them are suited to coming inside, but wouldn’t be allowed without signing a new LB. They’d all be forced to stay wide and eventually just pass it backwards. Pep seems to be having both Foden and Grealish on a leash. Both of them are capable of gliding past 2-3 players with their eyes closed, but it seems Pep has told them to play it simple. Once every 3 games or so, you’ll see Foden going on a solo run beating 3-4 players, succeeding pretty much every time. Same thing happened weekly in the academy. Got to be asking why he doesn’t do that every single week? Seems to me like Pep has told them to play it simple, restricting their ability. In the current setup Leao or Kvaratskhelia wouldn’t improve us, if we don’t sign a LB and don’t give them the freedom they have at AC Milan and Napoli

We played Delph, Danilo and Zinchenko as inverted left backs in title winning seasons with Sané, Sterling, Foden and even at times Bernardo (8-0 v Watford he played there) on the left wing being direct and scoring and creating goals.

Grealish isn’t on a leash, he was never that great at Villa, he just had more of the ball in counter-attacking situations where he had some open field to attack when he was there. At City he has less of that and is showing his lack of skill set when faced with deeper lying defences so he goes backwards, boring the pants off anyone watching.

 

[Delphinho]

he was never that great at Villa

Yes he was. He was fantastic in his last season at Villa. POTS contender before the injury. If he wasn’t that great we wouldn’t be interested, nevermind spend 100m on him

 

[Gus Fring]

Yes he was. He was fantastic in his last season at Villa. POTS contender before the injury. If he wasn’t that great we wouldn’t be interested, nevermind spend 100m on him

He was okay but the reality is he wasn’t/isn’t good enough for us and certainly wasn’t worth £100m (granted that part wasn’t his fault)

In his best season he got 14 ‘contributions’ 8 goals and 6 assists I believe, good but not fantastic if a City attacking player posted that over a season it would rightly be labelled as well below par by fans, let alone the dross he’s churning out weekly for us now.

Really like the lad, great off the pitch but it’ll never work here and in reality was never going to eitherz

 

[Delphinho]

He was okay but the reality is he wasn’t/isn’t good enough for us and certainly wasn’t worth £100m (granted that part wasn’t his fault)

In his best season he got 14 ‘contributions’ 8 goals and 6 assists I believe, good but not fantastic if a City attacking player posted that over a season it would rightly be labelled as well below par by fans, let alone the dross he’s churning out weekly for us now.

Really like the lad, great off the pitch but it’ll never work here and in reality was never going to eitherz

He’s a 50-60m player, but because he’s English it was 100m. Maguire was 80m, Drinkwater was probably 50m in todays money

 

[Kamaro011]

Whether we play Grealish, Leao or Kavaratskhelia won’t matter as long as we play with an inverted LB like Cancelo. All of them are suited to coming inside, but wouldn’t be allowed without signing a new LB. They’d all be forced to stay wide and eventually just pass it backwards. Pep seems to be having both Foden and Grealish on a leash. Both of them are capable of gliding past 2-3 players with their eyes closed, but it seems Pep has told them to play it simple. Once every 3 games or so, you’ll see Foden going on a solo run beating 3-4 players, succeeding pretty much every time. Same thing happened weekly in the academy. Got to be asking why he doesn’t do that every single week? Seems to me like Pep has told them to play it simple, restricting their ability. In the current setup Leao or Kvaratskhelia wouldn’t improve us, if we don’t sign a LB and don’t give them the freedom they have at AC Milan and Napoli

The current LB option in the world that immediately improves our squad that i can think of is very few and sadly they can be impossible to lure to join us. I'm talking about Theo Hernandez and Alphose Davies, both great player and can make instant impact immediately after joining us but sadly off limit at the moment.

 

[Delphinho]

The current LB option in the world that immediately improves our squad that i can think of is very few and sadly they can be impossible to lure to join us. I'm talking about Theo Hernandez and Alphose Davies, both great player and can make instant impact immediately after joining us but sadly off limit at the moment.

Yeah, those are the 2 names for me as well, but they’re both off limits. If Barca come calling for Bernardo again, I’d ask for Alejandro Balde. Pretty certain he’s gonna be top 3 LBs in the world in 2-3 years. We’ve been interested in Raphael Guerreiro in the past, only has 6 months left on his contract, could potentially see us make another move for him. Would be an upgrade on what we currently have but nowhere near the level of Theo or Davies

 

[Kamaro011]

Yeah, those are the 2 names for me as well, but they’re both off limits. If Barca come calling for Bernardo again, I’d ask for Alejandro Balde. Pretty certain he’s gonna be top 3 LBs in the world in 2-3 years. We’ve been interested in Raphael Guerreiro in the past, only has 6 months left on his contract, could potentially see us make another move for him. Would be an upgrade on what we currently have but nowhere near the level of Theo or Davies

He is product of Barcelona Academy isn't he?, doubt we can lure him to join us especially if Barca can give him opportunity in first team squad. Those academy graduates in top club like Barcelona tend to be loyal to club that raises them.

Why we not go Guerreiro when last summer transfer open then?, I doubt the price difference will be great whether his contract is on one year to 6 month left. We opted to buy Sergio Gomez a makeshift midfielder converted to LB instead him a genuine LB, that's really tell me that the club didn't rated Guerreiro highly.