ponsaelius Posted March 20, 2015 Share Posted March 20, 2015 I'm not in the "dogshite" clan like, but I'm probably closer to that grouping than the "Brilliant" crew Brilliant ffs. Michael Carrick. Exactly Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Froggy Posted March 20, 2015 Share Posted March 20, 2015 He's playing so, so well for us now man. Almost as good as he has ever done. Just signed a new contract too. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Interpolic Posted March 20, 2015 Share Posted March 20, 2015 Froggy in rating Man Utd player far higher than anyone else does shocker. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Froggy Posted March 20, 2015 Share Posted March 20, 2015 I just know how good he is. Our results with him in the team reflect this. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ronaldo Posted March 20, 2015 Share Posted March 20, 2015 If he played for us he'd be loved, as Tiote was for years for no apparent reason. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
mozy Posted March 20, 2015 Share Posted March 20, 2015 For years I thought Carrick was shite. I was wrong and England have been equally as wrong over the years. He could play on for years, especially at the base of the diamond. And especially now Gerrard has fucked off. Henderson has developed into a cracking player, but is totally different to Carrick. More like a Sami Khedira type of player. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
ponsaelius Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 Carrick is 34 in the summer, and has never been particularly good enough to be a regular for England. No way he should be part of a squad going forward. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ronaldo Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 That I agree with. Big difference between that and dogshit, mind. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
ponsaelius Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 I only said dogshit for Froggy tbf Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
ponsaelius Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 All that being said, I'm not particularly enamoured with our CM options going forward. Particularly as Wilshere is continually crocked and Oxlade-Chamberlain can't seem to kick on/nail down a position. Reckon Gerrard/Lampard/Scholes being shoehorned in and going out in the quarters will be looked retrospectively as halycon days after the next couple of tournaments. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
ponsaelius Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 Also our CB pool is ridiculously bad these days. That's less of a problem since it seems to be a global trend I guess. Forward line is the most exciting thing about the squad, and tbf, it is pretty good. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest firetotheworks Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 I'm surprised by this like, I thought it was a given that everyone thought Carrick was a really good player. I haven't seen what he's been like recently and wouldn't have him in the squad at his age anyway, but he should have played for England a lot more, he was exactly what we needed, looked brilliant when he played and was then never seen again in favour of playing the two star players, rather than playing the best combination. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
ponsaelius Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 Carrick being widely praised seems to be a very contempary opinion as far as I can tell since everybody got fed up with Lampard/Gerrard and it was in vogue to have a 'controlling' central midfielder in international football. That ignores the fact Carrick is simply not that good. He's one of a number of stable but unspectacular players Fergie managed to lift ridiculous performances out of throughout his career as far as I'm concerned. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest firetotheworks Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 Nah, I don't think that's fair at all considering he was already a very good player at Spurs. I don't think it's right at all to lump him in with the rest of those players, he's a (I dunno why I'm going with this Sounessism here, but it feels right) a proper footballer, he doesn't hide behind anything, his football ability is very good. I liked him a lot. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
triggs Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 Carrick being widely praised seems to be a very contempary opinion as far as I can tell since everybody got fed up with Lampard/Gerrard and it was in vogue to have a 'controlling' central midfielder in international football. That ignores the fact Carrick is simply not that good. He's one of a number of stable but unspectacular players Fergie managed to lift ridiculous performances out of throughout his career as far as I'm concerned. If Fergie was able to get ridiculous performances out of him over his career then surely the only evidence we have to see if he was good was those ridiculous performances? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
ponsaelius Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 He's never been more than good tbh, apart from a couple of seasons ago (Fergie's last) where he had an excellent season. He's no better than Darren Fletcher was a few years ago, in fact when they played together Fletcher was frequently the player who would take games by the scruff of the neck and was a more dominant midfielder. Anyway, it's criminal that Fergie left Man Utd with that pool of CMs. Froggy is bigging up Carrick here but he was convinced Cleverley was gonna be one of the best midfielders in the league fairly recently, a bloke who's barely good enough for a shite Villa team. The state Fergie left that part of the pitch in is pretty much the main reason they've totally gone to shit. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
ponsaelius Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 Carrick being widely praised seems to be a very contempary opinion as far as I can tell since everybody got fed up with Lampard/Gerrard and it was in vogue to have a 'controlling' central midfielder in international football. That ignores the fact Carrick is simply not that good. He's one of a number of stable but unspectacular players Fergie managed to lift ridiculous performances out of throughout his career as far as I'm concerned. If Fergie was able to get ridiculous performances out of him over his career then surely the only evidence we have to see if he was good was those ridiculous performances? I worded that wrongly, I meant as a collective. Man Utd frequently dominated regardless of the side they played. The 8-2 vs Arsenal always comes to mind, their team that day was shite on paper. As was Arsenal's admittedly, but the performance was totally rampant. I very rarely remember them getting caught out despite frequently playing unimpressive line-ups, they just seemed to get by totally on the aura. They got to a CL final in 2011 before anybody put them to the sword. Look at the team they put out that day FFS. The veil has seriously been lifted on some of their squad since Fergie went, and even spending hugely hasn't got that swagger back yet. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
leffe186 Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 Carrick being widely praised seems to be a very contempary opinion as far as I can tell since everybody got fed up with Lampard/Gerrard and it was in vogue to have a 'controlling' central midfielder in international football. That ignores the fact Carrick is simply not that good. He's one of a number of stable but unspectacular players Fergie managed to lift ridiculous performances out of throughout his career as far as I'm concerned. Can't be having that, I'm afraid. Fergie had to pay nearly 20M to get him from us, back when that was a shit-load of cash. He'd been terrific for us and we'd built our team around him - it didn't take Fergie to "lift ridiculous performances" out of him. He always was a player who was at his best in a specific role. Echoes of Hoddle - two-footed, great vision, calm, unrushed, elegant - but not quite as much flair or goals. Sit him in front of a defence in a fast-moving, passing team and he was excellent. England just never fully made that commitment. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
ponsaelius Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 England never made that 'commitment' because there was better players ahead of him. Players who were carrying their teams to titles, not just being another player in a squad which is what Carrick has always been. Can't say I've ever once thought Carrick was elegant, tbh. This is a player that was falling on his arse/giving the ball away two years in a row to cost Man Utd a CL quarter final and an FA Cup semi final not that long ago. He was widely derided at that time, which was harsh, but he's come full circle to be massively overrated now. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
mozy Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 And how well did that turn out for England? We get Frank and Stevie wanting to make the same runs and not quite fitting into the same team. That's been England problem over the years, much more than anything else. The best players did not fit together, at all, they were just good enough on their own to win qualifying games. Lampard - Needed a 4-3-3 at his peak to give him the freedom he had for Chelsea Gerrard - Benitez had it right, his best Role was behind a single striker (Torres) in a 4-2-3-1, but he couldn't player there for England because.. Rooney - Needed to play as a 10 in a front 2 or he became isolated, and came too deep. Beckham and Owen - Both pure 4-4-2 players, Beckham needed his right back for the overlap, Owen needed his Heskey to do the physical stuff. With the wonderful value of hindsight, what we needed was a horses for courses approach and selecting the lineup/team of players that bring the best out in each other, for the benefit of the team. Players like Michael Carrick. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tiresias Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 the mistake was not building the teams around scholes Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ronaldo Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 Building the team around someone who'd retired? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tiresias Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 I meant a while ago Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ronaldo Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 He retired in 2004 when the likes of Carrick hadn't even made much of a name for himself. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
The College Dropout Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 Carrick has been a great footballer. Not in that top Scholes bracket but just below. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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