Erikse

I hope Haaland goes to a different club. I actually think he would benefit from that. He barely gets any space, he's just there to soak attention lately.

Training?? That's dangerous. Put him in a bed or something.

What xA number you are getting also depends on chemistry with teammates, tactics, how opponents set ut against you, your teammates movements, how they are setting you up, and so on. Again several Leicester fans seemed to be under the impression that Harvey Barnes would have even more impressive numbers with us, in terms of both assists and goals. I think he was just an underrated player, and we are starting to see that. I don't think that he has transformed in a couple of months of training with a new team after a long term injury. It took Gordon way longer than that, and Gordon was younger.

Maybe we should've taken this decision earlier, but I'm happy that we finally did. This never ending cycle is not great for his carreer.

They also mentioned the manager, yes. They had more faith in Howe getting the best out of him than Rodgers to say the least. As allways, the opinions were a bit split. Some were waving him goodbye, and others were disappointed at not getting more for him. We knew they had to sell though, so it's hard to get like £50m for him then.

It was argued that his xA matched that of Almiron last summer. If you watch some of the assists that he provides here, you will notice that Almiron has barely made a single delivery like some of those Barnes made for Leicester in his entire Newcastle carreer. Does these chances give him a high xA? I'm seeing some good finishing, so maybe not. But the delivery and the vision for the assists in this video are impressive, regardless of how well they did to score. In this video I'm really not seeing a different player from his best games here so far. Now, I know that this is just a compilation video. So I went to check their forum. There were frustrations in the last season about him being too predictable and allways cutting in to shoot. They were also saying that he used to be so good at going on the outside to cross with his left, and was frustrated that he didn't do this anymore. Other than that, from earlier seasons, it was the goals and assists that they really appreciated him for. Yes, he wasn't praised for his general play outside og g/a, but I was really struggling to find criticism of his delivery or service, outside of that last season. After that season of 10 assists, some were arguing that he must be one of the best crossers and finishers there is with his weaker foot, because his crosses and finishing were so impressive with his left (grain of salt, easy to overexaggerate your own players a bit). People were also saying that his pace alone just provides them with g/a consistenly. Some were saying last year that he will get loads of goals and assists with us, because we have a better team and can create space for him to use his pace. What they criticised him for the most for was during the years was his consistency. That he would go missing in games. And something about mentality, because apparently you could tell he would have a bad day at the office pretty early on. Funnily enough if you go far enough back, the thing that they complained about the most was his finishing. Apparently he improved massively on that.

Good thing Isak is also a good finisher then. If the argument is that his assists were due to having a good striker converting his passes at Leicester. Almiron has played alongside Wilson and Isak, both really good finishers. You don't see Almiron getting 10 assists in a season.

When I saw him play for Leicester, I did not see a player who was all about goals and nothing else. Would be interesting to ask a Leicester fan about this. Whether his assists were justified or not. I don't believe xA stats tell the whole story at all.

For how many months has he actually been training with us?

People tried to tell you that his general play is better than you made it out to be (based on stats). And then, despite playing just a few games with his new team mates, he is showing just that. But I suppose that's just a coincidence. Maybe his long term injury magically transformed him?

It says "Based on this Barnes basically only scores goals." Are you still under this impression? All he does is score goals?

Looking at all the xA posts from last summer is funny now. Turns out you can't judge players based on xA number, and that actual assists may be a more accurate parameter after all? @Pata wasn't the only one btw, I just picked some. The narrative was that his assist stats was lying, and that he's really just a finisher. From what I've seen of him, the actual assist numbers seem to line up better with reality than his xA.

People keep asking themselves why Pep got rid, Pep has allways said that if a player wants to leave, then they will arrange it. I don't think Pep wanted him out. He probably just wanted to be a regular starter, and Pep couldn't give him that assurance before the season. It's understandable when they have players like de Bruyne, Silva and Foden.

If you listen to his recent interview, he seems to spend his energy feeling sorry for himself. Just doesn't have the mentality of a winner at all.

It looks like he just gives up, even at the start of the game. The moment something doesn't work for him, he just shuts off for the rest of the game.