ginola999 said:
In which case you could argue that Silva' ball winning stats are ven worse as Madrid probably ahd far more possession and thus less opportuntiy t win the ball back. I couldn't say who is the ebtter player, but feel the attitueds to VDV are misguided. The Real madrid fans were certianly won over by him last season and given the competition he had for his place and the fact he wasn't one of Perez's Galacticos he did very well to wi his place. It's unlikely that a player who has won 83 caps for Holland and who benched Kaka last season is going to be ina significantly lower class than a player like David Silva. They are probably fairly more even matched than most posters here wish to believe. To be better than VDV you have to be in an elite group of truely world class players and surely David Silva can't be considered amongst those.
I don't know, i only saw VDV play fleetingly for Real Madrid last season, he did seem to play a slightly deeper role than Silva, who basically played liek a second striker behind Villa. Valencia tended to sit back a bit and leave Silva, Villa and Mata further up the pitch and hit on the break. So i think they played different roles, it's hard to compare them just using stats. For me, Silva is more technical, quick feet, short passing, typical Spanish style, whereas VDV is a bit more expansive, great at set-peices, plays longer passes, long distances shots etc. Different types of players really.
We'll see anyway. How long did Modric take to really start making his mark at Spurs? He's more similar to Silva than VDV is.