Europe's Best Midfield Foursome?

[nirvaanfc]

I was just thinking today with no club football about the chances of my team (JUVENTUS) at keeping up there good form to start season...

In this i got to thinking is there anybody in Europe who has a better midfield?
So thought, i'd poll for opinions...

Now bear in mind that in my choices, Barcelona uses a defender often as a defensive middie (Rafael Marquez/ Edmilson) meaning really a 4-5-1 but i tweak it to consider them for a 4 man midfield, Chelsea usually plays five which sometimes becomes 4-4-2 (using the 4 man midfield for this system).

To qualify really in my books i was just using the regular 4 starting middie (alternatives not considered, because then by depth i'd say Chelsa and AC are in another class). A defensive minded middies, wingers, attacking middies and box-to-box stars are all considered!

In Nirvaan's estimation these are the midfields which make the grade, i'll leave one category open for OTHER so please lets not complain, i tried!

Teams like Hamburg, Werder Bremen, A.S.Roma and Valencia may not be expected but i guarantee u, take a look at these teams and see just how big of an impact these team's midfields have (plus with players like Francesco Totti, Vicente Rodriguez, Rafael Van Der Waart there are big names who deliver in place)!

[nirvaanfc]

PSV Eindhoven 2004-2005 would have figured very highly...
Park Ji-Sung-Mark Van Bommel-Johann Vogel-Phillip Cocu

Now this batch has such been seperated where Van Bommel is pushing for a place at Barcelona, Park has essentially overtaken Ryan Giggs at Man Utd and well Vogel is another good player content to warm the bench at Man Utd while only Cocu remains at PSV!

[guado]

vogel is at milan

[balla]

Chelsea or Bayern for mine.Bayern's probably gets them over the line because of the average age of about 25.

[nicephoras]

Chelsea's midfield is younger than that on average.

[SirManchester]

Here are min in order.
1.Juve
2.Chelsea
3.Milan
4.Bayern

[astabooty]

Just wanted to say that not all these teams actually have 4 midfielders, such as Barca. In fact, you only listed two of their mids (deco and xavi).

My top ones:
1) Juve
2) Milan
3) Lyon
4) Bayern

(chelsea only play 3 mids so they arent in my list)

[balla]

Chelsea's midfield is younger than that on average.
Not those 4 players selected.Makalele is what 31?32?Lampard 27?Robben 21/22?Duff 24?

[jrod69]

milan and chelsea

[nicephoras]

Not those 4 players selected.Makalele is what 31?32?Lampard 27?Robben 21/22?Duff 24?

That gets you 25, even if you don't include Essien in there. Besides, Karimi doesn't start for Bayern more than ZeRo does. He's started 1 game thus far, I believe.

[Breakwood]

Yes this is a biased vote but i gotta represent Lyon. Malouda, Juninho, Tiago, Diarra, Pedretti and clement. Add in Wiltord, Govou and Ben Arfa who are strikers but are just as good in the middle of the pitch, and you have a very good middle of the team.

[nirvaanfc]

Just wanted to say that not all these teams actually have 4 midfielders, such as Barca. In fact, you only listed two of their mids (deco and xavi).

My top ones:
1) Juve
2) Milan
3) Lyon
4) Bayern

(chelsea only play 3 mids so they arent in my list)

Now bear in mind that in my choices, Barcelona uses a defender often as a defensive middie (Rafael Marquez/ Edmilson) meaning really a 4-5-1 but i tweak it to consider them for a 4 man midfield, Chelsea usually plays five which sometimes becomes 4-4-2 (using the 4 man midfield for this system).

To qualify really in my books i was just using the regular 4 starting middie (alternatives not considered, because then by depth i'd say Chelsa and AC are in another class). A defensive minded middies, wingers, attacking middies and box-to-box stars are all considered!


Now i obviously had to tweak a few teams like Barcelona and Chelsea (both great teams ) to get them into the poll since not everyone plays with the 4 man midfield i was using!

Essien is to me the least regular of the four Chelsea middies i used and probably will in time replace Makelele but not yet!

Karimi for Ze Roberto may well be true that's my mistake!

Barcelona recently starting to introduce Mark Van Bommel as a starter and Lionel Messi also. Ronaldinho for me plays as a forward but people keep saying midfield so i put him in there!

[marakana10]

I would have to say Chelsea, because look at what they have... They possess every type of midfielder you need. You have the attacking winger on the left with Arjen Robben, a defensive winger on the right in Damien Duff with Frank Lampard being the attacking mid conjuring attacks with Makalele as the workforce in the defensive mid position. All nicely balanced... Juventus are a close second and with Vieira given the role of roaming due to Emerson being the defensive mid he is showing us some of his greater qualities that he could not show at Arsenal. He's already scored 3 or 4 goals! AC Milan is third, although even though they're winning I think they play a smaller role than that of the defensive line and the forward line disincluding Kaka. This will be disputed but every time I see ACM it's 1 act of brilliance rather than working up an attack. They do it against smaller teams but with bigger ones I haven't really seen it this season. Last year they were the biggest threat for me in ACM but now I think the more lethal aspect of their game is Shevchenko and Gilardino to be honest with Kaka supplying the balls.

[Forza Moskva]

Loko - Izmailov, Loskov, Bilyaletdinov, Asatiani.

[NeRoN_FB]

Appiah---alex De Souza---selÇuk---aurelio
FenerbahÇe

[guignol]

OL generally goes with 3 midfielders, and last year's trio of juninho, diarra and essien was excellent.

tiago looks like an excellent replacement for essien. so far they haven't jelled on the pitch into the dominant force we had last year, but time is on their side.

[eirebhoy]

a defensive winger on the right in Damien Duff
How times have changed from being one of the most exciting wingers in the world and voted best left winger in the world 2002. Bloody Mourinho. :mad: