The College Dropout

Jack Colback has 200+ PL appearances. He hides from the ball. Shirks responsibility. Doesn't want the ball. Doesn't try to do anything substantial with it.

FWIW Butt looked like a talented player whose legs had completely gone by the time he came to NUFC. But he had more ability than McTominay for me.

I agree. Just trying to place where STM ranks McTominay in the homegrown Man U CM's rankings. Prime Nicky Butt was a v. good player. Terrible human being mind, been arrested more than once for domestic abuse.

There's lots of deals as good as Bruno done on a yearly basis from a finance perspective. You can name half a dozen from Brighton easily. It's known that you don't often get great value for money for PL transfers. There's greater value (and risk) from abroad and different leagues.

Conte thought he would be in the title race. 4th is not a bad position for them to be in at all.

HBA fell out with multiple managers in his career. To only blame Pardew is incredibly short sighted. TBG is one of them. He’s talking stats I’m talking talent.

Spurs players. Well the defenders can’t play that daft high line. That would be an AVB appointment imo.

Where would you rank him? Darren Fletcher level? He’s behind that imo.

Tom Cleverley won the premier league and played a fair amount. Never been a top 6 player. Ever.

In every profession people shirk responsibility. In football, it is most obvious with central midfielders. It’s obvious when they don’t want to get on the ball. Also stylistically. I don’t want us to be that type of team.

Colback definitely hid. By hide I mean he didn’t make himself available for the ball a lot of the time. He wouldn’t show for it. And when he got it, played it safe and didn’t show for it again. Tiote (RIP) always showed for the ball and tbf the opposition let him. Colback didn’t. Moussa Sissoko for all the criticism. Wanted the ball and got on it. Jenas as a player, didn’t show for the ball enough, demand to be on it and push his passing. Scott Parker never hid, he just wasn’t particularly talented. Gini was very talented but even at Liverpool he was criticised for hiding. He also didn’t demand the ball enough. For all his technical limitations Henderson never hid

Someone said Gary Neville was more talented than HBA in another thread. Can you imagine?

For all the criticism. Nagelsman has looked useless in Europe for most of his career and has struggled in the league in relative terms. But I agree witrh everything said about what Bayern has done to German football. And that whole model. Even Real and Barca realise that they need each other. It hasn't even really helped Bayern in Europe. 2 CL's in what, 16 years? I think. German club won the Conference thing. That's it.

Hell on Earth or Infamous though?

I said if Isak hit the ground running and had a bit of a purple patch we could do it. And it looks to be happening. Need to get back to clean sheets mind.

You think Paul Dummett could fashion a career as a winger if he had the right mentality? ASM could fashion a career as a fullback if he had the right mentality,

Good enough on the ball to become an all-time midfielder? Sweeper / Libero days - aye. And even those, were converted central midfielders - they became Sweepers as that became the most important role in the team. Today that player is Rodri and would primarily play in midfield.

Yes. In warfare, defending a position is significantly easier than making ground and seizing a target. The hardest thing is seizing the target. Generally attacking is harder than defending in football. Breaking down the different aspects of attacking in difficulty is.. difficult. Because aspects of attacking are difficult in different ways. I don't think Lewandowski is a more talented footballer than Benzema for example. But Lewa is a better goalscorer. A lot of that is down to mentality. Benzema is more talented and a better overall player imo. But to play along. Hard / diffiicult = diminished chances of success and the greater skill required to succeed. Scoring 20 PL goals a season, is more difficult than spotting a pass that cuts out 3 players 20 times a season. The great thing about football is that it's a team sport with a wide variety of active roles that require different talents, skills and expertise. And therefore requires different types of people. Pep's football requires not only a lot of footballing ability but also requires a certain personality profile and aptitude to change. Talented but pliable unless so talented Pep will work around you (Haaland & Ribery for example). I think the best Rafa team would require less talent but arguably equally as pliable a personality type. Carlo could deal with more talent and less pliable than them both.

Yes defenders win most of the battles because defending is easier. Overall I would say scoring is the hardest thing to do because a lot of it is mental. The best strikers, keep making the same runs again, again, again and again. You need to keep going. You can make the run 7 times, 6 times the ball doesn't even come. 7th time you miss the chance. The best strikers go again and don't let the miss dishearten them. It's like being good at cold sales. Even the best cold salesman misses with 92 of his 100 daily calls. The best ones will make 120 calls a day and have the skill to convert 13 into genuine leads. That's why scoring is the hardest thing. Someone like Harry Kane is technically A1. Can do difficult finishes. BUt also has that killer instinct to keep making his runs. Keep making those moves. Being more aware than defenders. All that mental stuff. Technically - agree dribbling is the most difficult. At the highest level, it's fairly rare to be beaten by pace alone. Haaland has a lot of pace but he rarely dribbles past players.

We are talking about talent. Talent 1. natural aptitude or skill. If you have to learn it after 12 years as a professional. Well done. That's a skill you've developed. But that's not one of your talents. "The term talent refers to an inborn and the special ability of a person to do something. A skill is an expertise, which is acquired by the person by learning. Talent is God gifted ability, whereas Skill is an ability in which you put your time and efforts to develop." Trippier is a more skilled RB than ASM is a winger. Agree with that all day. But who is more naturally talented at football.... hmmm... Gary Neville would tell you HBA is more talented than him. If HBA had Neville's talent, he wouldn't have even been a professional footballer. HBA was more talented than Benzema. He didn't become a better player and had a far inferior career. But talent? Benzema again will tell you HBA was more talented. “When I was looking after them both, in the U17s, I went to see them in training. I saw Karim watching Hatem mischievously, to see what he was doing. Karim was then looking to do it again and again. Thanks to Hatem, Karim, who understood that he was second best, realised that talent wasn’t going to be enough. That gave him that desire to be the best, and he has got there. As for Hatem, he didn’t have the same realisation, he thought that talent would be enough. And when we watch him now, he’s still convinced. I’m sure that some psychiatrists would rack their brains with a character as difficult as Hatem’s” said Frederic Guerra to RMC.

Yes but it requires less talent and more application of experience, concentration, discipline, bravery, dark arts, organisational skills, communication etc. Size is also an outsized factor. The least talented footballers in a team tend to be defenders. That's why when one can really play football some dafty will talk about playing him in midfield. Then with less space and time on the ball, their relative lack of footballing ability stands out. Declan Rice would've made a fantastic CB and probably would be under Pep. You're just arguing with me to argue here. Was Dani Alves talented at defending? Was that a strength of his game? Again, he learnt that part of the game but it was never a strength. Fullbacks don't tend to win the biggest individual prizes for a reason. You listen to professional footballers and they all say the same. Even TAA, "so good, he could play CM" because CMs are generally more talented than fullbacks.

Football. The hardest thing in the game is to control and score. The most talented players do the hardest things.

Like even in casual kick arounds. Sometimes you come across a player who was like RB for a non-league club. You make them the main man in your team and he's not playing RB anymore.

Comparatively - yes. Thierry Henry is more talented than Jaap Stam, John Terry, VVD, Rio etc. Name the best PL defender and Thierry Henry is more talented.

Aye he's in our elite bracket. But also for more reasons than pure talent. His leadership, experience and standard setting for the whole squad is key. To me, Isak and Bruno are the most talented players in the squad. I have them as 1 and 2, not sure the order but leaning Isak. But we need an experienced leader in the dressing room, someone who has "been there done that" at the highest level to establish professional standards that the likes of Isak & Bruno can learn from. That's Trippier. But he's had to learn that side of the game too. Some players always have those leadership qualities from young and others learn it. Trips has learnt it.